Jan. 1, 2010:NWLP
Inside
12/28/09
11:37 AM
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MEETING NOTICES
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Volume 111
Number 1
January 1, 2010
Portland, Oregon
A LOOK BACK AT LABOR STORIES IN 2009
New Year’s Day at the Northwest Labor Press is a chance to
look back on — and update — some of the stories we reported
in 2009.
2009 was a difficult year, with unemployment topping 12
percent in Oregon, union pension funds cutting back extras,
and local union workers agreeing to wage freezes or conces-
sions in contract votes. Among local public sector unions,
wage freezes began with 164 Vancouver firefighters two days
before 2009 began, and continued with 230 City of Vancouver
workers in four other unions. In March, 2,700 Multnomah
County workers agreed to a wage freeze in order to minimize
layoffs. And in July, the two largest state public employee
unions in Oregon agreed to pay freezes and unpaid furlough
days in new two-year contracts covering 21,500 workers. A
new five-year contract approved in July for 700 workers at
Northwest Natural Gas also had provisions for furloughs,
though it contained annual raises of 1 to 3 percent. And in
September, a contract covering up to 6,000 members of the Pa-
cific Northwest Regional Council of Carpenters included a
$4.86 an hour wage cut on smaller privately funded construc-
tion projects, to shore up union contractors facing fierce com-
petition in a major construction downturn.
At the Freightliner truck factory in Portland, it was a roller
coaster year. Parent company Daimler announced in January
that it would close the plant in June 2010 when the Machinists
Labor helps to
bring holiday cheer
Glenn Shuck (back left), executive
director of Labor’s Community
Service Agency, partakes in the
festivities at the “Presents for
Partners” holiday party Dec. 19 at
Genesis Community Fellowship in
Northeast Portland. Labor unions,
members, and allies donated nearly
1,100 toys to make this year’s party
possible. Each of the 323 children at
the party received two new toys, a
visit with Santa Claus, a stuffed
animal, and a candy cane. “This
exceeded all expectations,” said
Shuck. “I’ve never seen families
respond the way they did. They were
overwhelmed with joy.” This is the
13th year that Labor’s Community
Service Agency and the Northwest
Oregon Labor Council have held the
event. (Photo courtesy of Pat Phil-
pott.)
union contract expires, but rescinded that plan in September.
In February, the Teamsters offered an unconditional return
to work at Oak Harbor Freight Lines, where about 600 Team-
ster drivers and warehouse workers had been on strike since
September 2008. But the company refused to return 13 work-
ers it accused of picket line misconduct. Two other Oak Harbor
union supporters were fired after the return to work. A wave of
decertification attempts at different Oak Harbor locations was
dismissed by the National Labor Relations Board in March,
but since then the dispute has continued in a kind of legal
limbo: The employer technically recognizes the union, but
workers have been without a union contract since October
2007. Union-filed unfair labor practice charges continue to
work their way through the NLRB’s bureaucratic processes.
In March, perennial union foe Bill Sizemore was banned
from any role in a tax-deductible non-profit charity by a judge’s
order. Then in October, he faced a new racketeering lawsuit
filed by two teachers unions, with Nevada millionaire Loren
Parks as co-defendant. And revelations in a still-unfinished 10-
year-old racketeering lawsuit led the State of Oregon to indict
him and his wife in November for felony tax evasion.
The dream of a memorial to workers killed on the job was
realized in April with the official unveiling of the Fallen Work-
ers Memorial on the Capitol Mall in Salem.
In April, Laurelhurst Village nursing home in Southeast Port-
land fired pro-union worker Elizabeth Lehr, days after she got
involved in a union campaign by Service Employees Interna-
tional Union Local 503. But in July the company paid an undis-
closed amount to settle her unfair labor practice charge, and by
November, parent company Farmington Centers had agreed to
recognize the union as representative of its 144 workers.
In July, Iron Workers Local 516 and Oregon Iron Works
gained national attention when they unveiled the first streetcar
made in America since 1951. With a resurgence of streetcars in
the United States, the Clackamas-based company has orders to
build more streetcars for cities throughout the country.
Fred Meyer, one of the area’s largest union employers,
came under increasing criticism both from its own employees’
union, (United Food & Commercial Workers Local 555), and
local building trades unions angered at being shut out of a ma-
jor chain-wide remodeling project. From summer onward,
building trades leaders led demonstrations outside Fred Meyer
stores, even as a Spokane UFCW local blanketed Portland with
lawn signs and bus bench ads taking aim at the company for
firing cashiers for first-offense cash handling mistakes. In Oc-
tober, a manager at a Fred Meyer store in Hillsboro called po-
lice, and three UFCW Local 555 representatives, including
union President Dan Clay, were arrested for trespass. Their
(Turn to Page 7)
Measures 66 & 67
Taxing the top tier
For the first time in a
generation, Oregon voters
will decide whether
corporations and the rich
should pay more
By DON McINTOSH
Associate Editor
On Jan. 26, Oregon voters will de-
cide a question of tax fairness: Should
large and profitable corporations and
very-high-income individuals pay a
higher share of state taxes?
The Oregon Legislature answered
yes to this question in June 2009, but
business groups spent $960,000 on a
signature-gathering effort to put the tax
increases before voters. In the depths of
a severe recession, they seek to repeal
very modest and mostly temporary in-
creases in the income taxes paid by cor-
porations and high-income individuals.
Measure 66 raises tax rates on the top
3 percent of income tax payers — and
lowers taxes on 15 percent of income
tax payers — those who collected un-
employment benefits in 2009. Measure
67 raises the corporate minimum tax,
and increases the tax rate corporations
pay on their declared profits.
The tax increases are forecasted to
raise $730 million in two years, helping
fill a recession-caused hole in the state’s
General Fund. Because the money is al-
ready budgeted, for voters to reject ei-
ther measure would force significant
cuts in education, public safety, and so-
cial services.
“This is a very clear vote,” says
Chuck Sheketoff, executive director of
Oregon Center for Public Policy, a non-
profit group that researches tax and
budget issues. “The only way to turn
that around,” Sheketoff said, “is to scare
people or mislead them.”
And that’s exactly what the business-
backed group Oregonians Against Job-
Killing Taxes is doing, says Scott
Moore, spokesperson for Vote Yes for
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