Inside
MEETING NO TICES
See
Page 6
V olume 108
Number 6
Mar c h 16, 2007
P ortland, Oregon
(PHOTO LEFT) Business Agent Steve Pickle shares information about
Teamsters Joint Council 37 at the inaugural organizing workshop of the
Change to Win labor federation in Oregon. (ABOVE) Lee Ann Halse (center)
of SEIU Local 503 talks with Steve Witte of United Farm Workers and
Patricia Avila of Local 503 during a break at the conference held March 3 in
Southeast Portland. Nearly 125 delegates from around Oregon attended the
conference. Change to Win is a national federation comprised of seven unions.
Letter Carriers to deliver message:
Don’t contract out mail service
By DON McINTOSH
Associate Editor
A Beaverton postmaster’s decision to contract out
mail delivery is producing a major outcry among
union letter carriers. National Association of Letter
Carriers (NALC) Branch 82 has filed a complaint
against Postmaster John Lee, and as of press time was
planning to picket outside his office on March 15.
Residents aren’t too pleased either. For over a
month, homeowners at the new Arbor Parc Bethany
housing development had to drive 10 miles roundtrip
to a postal sorting station to pick up their mail.
The dispute is a local skirmish in a national war of
ideology within the United States Postal Service
(USPS). The Bush-appointed majority on the Postal
Board of Governors has been pushing USPS to assign
more deliveries to private contractors. Board Chair
James C. Miller III, a former Reagan budget director,
has called for wholesale postal privatization. NALC
has energetically opposed the shift, arguing that priva-
tization would not only threaten the jobs and incomes
of America’s 325,000 letter carriers, but would also
compromise the security, efficiency and integrity of
the mail, and put the long-term viability of the Postal
Service in jeopardy.
In Beaverton, Willie Higgins just wanted to get his
mail. Higgins was the first person to move into the Ar-
bor Parc development, in the Bethany neighborhood
north of Interstate 26. Unpacking in his just-finished
townhouse, he waited for a mailbox key to appear un-
der his mat. It never came. Phone calls to Arbor
Homes brought bad news: Delivery service — to the
community mailboxes at the end of his street —
would have to wait until mid-summer, when the de-
velopment is half-full, he was told. Until then, he’d
have to drive to Hillsboro to get his mail, a location
that closes at 4 p.m.
And yet, all around him and across the street from
him, older residences and businesses were getting reg-
ular mail service.
“I don’t understand why the guy who delivers mail
across the street couldn’t simply add the new boxes to
his route,” said L.C. Hansen, president of NALC
Branch 82. That’s the way USPS normally handles
new deliveries, Hansen said.
Instead, residents had to pick up their own mail
while USPS advertised for a contractor.
USPS area spokesperson Kerry Jeffrey had few an-
swers to Labor Press questions about the contracting
process, but sources in the Beaverton post office said
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Change to Win unions
share organizing ideas
Oregon locals of the Change to Win
labor federation shared ideas for or-
ganizing in the Pacific Northwest —
and pledged to support each other’s
campaigns — during a daylong organ-
izing workshop March 3 in Portland.
Nearly125 delegates representing
all seven unions that make up the
Change to Win federation attended.
The keynote speaker was Geralyn
Lutty, an international vice president
of the United Food and Commercial
Workers who also sits on the national
leadership board of the Change to Win
labor federation.
“There are no red or blue states in
working America” Lutty said. “There
is only a state of concern.”
Lutty said workers are ready to
make a change. “We can go hide, we
can close our eyes and stay the same,
or we can create change. This is why
Change to Win was created. The status
quo no longer is acceptable.”
Union officials, staff, organizers
and activists spent the day sharing or-
ganizing strategies and discussing how
they can benefit by partnering with
other unions, community groups,
elected officials, responsible employ-
ers, and other allies around the state.
“It was an opportunity for us to
have some personal interaction with
various activists and leaders of other
unions,” said Gene Pronovost, presi-
dent of UFCW Local 555.
UFCW said Change to Win solidar-
ity will play a huge role in its upcom-
ing contract talks with grocers in Eu-
gene and the Willamette Valley.
The Service Employees Interna-
tional Union said it can benefit from
CtW resources in its campaign to or-
ganize 3,500 support staff at St. Vin-
cent and Providence Hospitals. A can-
dlelight vigil is slated for March 21.
“I’m not a union member (yet), but
SEIU has changed my life,” said Jen
Little-Reese, a certified nursing assis-
tant who is in the middle of the bitter
organizing campaign at the Catholic-
owned Providence Health Systems.
“A whole bunch of people I know are
really scared. I’m just a CNA who had
big ideas, but took no action. I had no
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