August 7, 2009:NWLP
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8/4/09
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MEETING NOTICES
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Volume 110
Number 15
August 7, 2009
Portland, Oregon
Stimulus dollars trickle slowly
to union workforce, if at all
Fred Meyer goes ‘green’??
Bob Childers and Shell Sherman, international reps for the Operative
Plasterers and Cement Masons Union, handbill the Hawthorne Fred Meyer
store in Southeast Portland Aug. 1 during the store’s grand re-opening
celebration. Several stores in the Portland metro area are undergoing
extensive remodeling, with the Hawthorne location touted as the “first green
grocery in the chain.” Union officials say that may be true — but not how you
might think. “We contend the only green that Fred Meyer is concerned about
is economical, not environmental,” Childers said. Union officials assert that
Portland-headquartered Fred Meyer and its corporate owner Kroger Co. of
Cincinnati are cutting corners on remodeling by using out-of-state contractors
who pay workers $12 an hour with virtually no fringe benefits — far below
area standards set by the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries. Cement
Masons and Electrical Workers locals are leading the campaign against Fred
Meyer, but they have strong support from other construction unions. The
unions are also seeking boycott sanction from the Northwest Oregon Labor
Council. The unions are asking people to protest Fred Meyer’s action by
calling company president Mike Ellis at 503 232-8844..
By DON McINTOSH
Associate Editor
Nineteen months after the current re-
cession’s official start, and nine months
after employment levels fell off a cliff, it
can be very hard to see the effects of the
federal government stimulus plan an-
nounced with so much fanfare earlier
this year.
Back in February, elected leaders
were falling over each other to announce
efforts to use government spending to
resuscitate the economy. One February
press conference in Portland drew both
of Oregon’s U.S. senators, plus the
Multnomah county chair, members of
city council and the Metro regional gov-
ernment, and a school district official.
Wyden, the senior and highest ranking
elected official, likened the just-passed
stimulus package to the New Deal pro-
grams that put Americans back to work
during the Great Depression.
But it’s August, and unemployment
has continued to rise. At last count, 9.4
percent of American workers are offi-
President Obama’s “Make Work
Pay” tax cut, for example, lets workers
keep an extra $8 a week to go out and
revive the economy. Another 25 percent
consisted of what might be termed “re-
lief” — like longer-lasting, more gen-
erous unemployment benefits, in-
creased food stamp benefits, and more
money for Medicaid, the government
health insurance program for low-in-
come individuals.
Then 10 percent went to rescue state
and local budgets, to stave off cuts in
services and reduce public sector lay-
offs. That left about 20 percent, $160
billion, to be spent on infrastructure in-
vestments — the sort of “put-people-
back-to-work” projects that some peo-
ple expect when they think of
“stimulus.”
When the bill was passed, the talk
was about “shovel-ready” projects. The
Labor Press set out to look for the shov-
els, starting with unions whose mem-
(Turn to Page 8)
Washington State Labor Council to mull over
political strategy; Democrats at crux of debate
OLYMPIA — Some Democrats in
the state of Washington may find out
next year whether there are conse-
quences for backstabbing a core group
of supporters.
Gov. Chris Gregoire and the top
Democratic leaders of the state House
and Senate told leaders of the Washing-
ton State Labor Council (WSLC), AFL-
CIO, last year that they would support
the federation’s top-priority — a bill
Tackett nominated to take helm at labor council
Bob Tackett, a 35-year member of Steelworkers Local
330, was the only person nominated for the position of ex-
ecutive secretary-treasurer of the Northwest Oregon Labor
Council at the July 27 monthly meeting of delegates.
Nominations are being taken to fill the unexpired term of
current executive secretary-treasurer Judy O’Connor, who is
retiring mid-term on Aug. 28. A second call for nominations
will take place at the delegates’ meeting Monday, Aug. 24. If
no one else is nominated, Tackett will win by acclamation.
Tackett’s nomination by O’Connor, a member of Office
and Professional Employees Local 11, received a half-dozen
cially unemployed (12.1 percent in Ore-
gon and 9.2 percent in Washington.)
The statistics are worse in construction,
a sector which had nationwide unem-
ployment of 17.4 percent as of June.
That’s 1.6 million unemployed con-
struction workers, a number that has
continued to rise every month.
Have stimulus efforts failed? Were
they not enough to begin with? Is an-
other round of stimulus needed, as Ma-
chinists Union President Thomas Buf-
fenbarger called for in a June 26 letter to
the president?
The federal stimulus package — the
American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act — had a much-repeated price tag
of $787 billion. That sounds like a lot if
you compare it to the roughly $3 trillion
the federal government spends each
year, but $787 billion was the stimulus’
estimated cost over a period of up to 10
years.
Of that total, 36 percent wasn’t
spending at all, but rather tax cuts — to
businesses and to individuals.
seconds. Support came from United Food and Commercial
Workers Local 555, Machinists District Lodge 24, Columbia
Pacific Building and Construction Trades Council, Laborers
Local 320, and Steelworkers Local 330.
Tackett is the Workforce Investment Act labor liaison for
the Oregon AFL-CIO. He helps workers who have been dis-
placed by plant closures and downsizings.
In other council action, Jeff Anderson, secretary-treasurer
of UFCW Local 555, was the lone nominee for the open seat
of second vice president on the labor council’s Executive
Board. A second nomination will be held Aug. 24.
called the Worker Privacy Act. The bill
would bar employers from firing work-
ers who refuse to attend workplace anti-
union meetings. But they reneged on
that promise, and added public insult to
the injury when they announced in a
press conference that they had asked
state police to investigate an internal
WSLC e-mail. Police concluded no
laws were broken by the e-mail —
which contained notes from a meeting,
including a bullet point that seemed to
threaten “not another dime” from labor
to state Democratic campaign funds if
Democrats didn’t pass the bill.
But that wasn’t all. Democratic ma-
jorities refused to pass bills of impor-
tance to labor, and passed other bills
over labor’s objections. Bills failed that
would have created a paid family leave
benefit for workers, or allowed child
care workers, performing artists, or uni-
versity lecturers to unionize.
Meanwhile, lawmakers gave busi-
ness a break on unemployment taxes,
and passed a state budget that contained
dramatic cuts to schools and services.
For organized labor, it was a terrible
legislative session.
And that was after unions had poured
dollars and volunteer hours into re-elect-
ing Gregoire and sending more Democ-
rats to Olympia. Democrats dominate
the House 64 to 34 and the Senate 31 to
18. The sweeping betrayal led to months
of soul-searching by unionists, and
prompted the labor federation to rethink
its approach to politics.
Delegates to this week’s WSLC con-
vention are considering a number of
proposals, including formation of a new
political action committee, the “DIME
PAC.” DIME here stands for “Don’t In-
vest in More Excuses,” but it’s also a re-
minder of the phrase “not another
dime” from that leaked e-mail. DIME
PAC is conceived as a way for unions
to target campaign contributions more
strategically. No longer is labor likely to
contribute to party-wide funds. WSLC
spokesperson Kathy Cummings said
(Turn to Page 5)