SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900
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Fast Track runs off the rails
OR Legislature
Union meetings
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VOLUME 116, NUMBER 12
Fast Track appeared to go down
to defeat in the U.S. House June
12, even though a Fast Track bill
passed the House 219-211. But
that apparent defeat might un-
ravel, because House Republi-
can leaders could schedule a re-
vote any time through the end of
July.
As with everything Congress
does these days, it’s compli-
cated.
Fast Track is a proposal by
Congress to tie its own hands in
how it deals with future
NAFTA-style trade deals: Those
foreign agreements, once nego-
tiated and signed by the presi-
dent, would get a speedy up-or-
down vote in Congress with
limited debate and no ability to
amend. The labor movement
has fought Fast Track time and
again, and Fast Track hasn’t
been renewed since the last one
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6
9
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PORTLAND, OREGON
expired in 2007.
But President Barack Obama
has made passing Fast Track his
top priority, and has pushed De-
mocrats to give it to him so he
can finish negotiations on sev-
eral secret deals, including the
Trans-Pacific Partnership with
11 other Pacific Rim nations, in-
cluding Vietnam and Japan.
In the lead-up to the June 12
House vote, Obama met pri-
vately with the entire House
Democratic caucus; it was the
first time in nearly two years
that Obama had visited the
Capitol to lobby members. It
didn’t go well.
“Basically the president tried
to both guilt people and then im-
pugn their integrity,” Rep. Peter
DeFazio (D-Ore.), told Talking
Points Memo afterward. “There
was a number of us who were
insulted.”
The Senate had passed Fast
Track 62-37 May 22, but the
Senate bill also included re-
newal of Trade Adjustment As-
sistance (TAA), the program
that provides benefits to Ameri-
can workers who lose their jobs
because of foreign trade. The
House Republican leadership
decided to consider those two
parts separately. Fast Track
passed 219-211, but TAA failed
126-302.
For a bill to get to the presi-
dent’s desk, House and Senate
versions have to match. If they
don’t, one or both of the legisla-
tive chambers have to change
and revote the legislation so the
two versions conform. The Sen-
ate, with its filibuster rule, can
be a tough place to pass any leg-
islation. Some Senate Democ-
rats were reluctant to pass Fast
Track without TAA. Thus, a de-
JUNE 19, 2015
In Congress, Money Talks
Several early June polls show that Fast Track—and the trade
deals it would grease the skids for—are unpopular with the
public. A poll by New York Times and CBS News showed that
55 percent oppose Fast Track, and an NBC News poll found
that 66 percent agree that “protecting American industries and
jobs by limiting imports from other countries” is more impor-
tant than “allowing free trade so you can buy products at low
prices no matter what country they come from.”
Given its unpopularity among voters, why is Fast Track even
being considered? The answer: It’s popular among corporate
political donors. The nonpartisan research group MapLight tal-
lied $198 million in Congressional campaign contributions over
the last two years from industry and business groups in favor
of fast track, compared to $23 million from labor, civic and
business groups opposing it.
feat of the TAA bill in the House
would set back Fast Track.
Knowing that Republicans have
tended to oppose TAA, many
House Democrats voted against
TAA as a way to slow down
Fast Track, even though TAA it-
self is supported by nearly all
Democrats.
But even as she led members
of the Democratic caucus to
vote no on TAA, Democratic
Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi
signaled possible support for
Fast Track later on.
“I was hopeful from the start
Turn to Page 10
Food Front Cooperative Grocery workers vote to unionize
By Don McIntosh
Associate Editor
Workers at Food Front Cooper-
ative Grocery voted 64 to 11 to
join United Food and Commer-
cial Workers (UFCW) Local
555. The June 2 vote adds 91
workers at the co-op’s two loca-
tions to Local 555.
Food Front Co-op is not a
worker co-op but a consumer
co-op, with more than 10,000
member-owners, and two
stores: at 2375 NW Thurman
Street, and in Hillsdale at 6344
SW Capitol Highway.
UFCW Local 555 represents
workers at Fred Meyer, Safeway,
Albertsons, and other grocers.
Food Front workers joined
Local 555 once before, in the
late 1990s, but voted to go non-
union in August 2007 by 20 to 8.
Andrea Uehara, a 27-year
Food Front employee, was one
of those who voted the union
out, and now thinks it was a
mistake.
“Over the 10 years we were
in a union, we got complacent,”
Uehara told the Labor Press
Andrea Uehara, a 27-year employee, at the checkstand at Food Front.
June 10. “At the time we hadn’t
had major problems, so we
thought, ‘What do we need the
union for? All of us now recog-
nize that the union actually was
a stabilizing factor in how com-
plaints were handled.”
Uehara says at the time Food
Front workers decertified the
union, management was respon-
sive. But conditions worsened.
The company increasingly re-
lied on on-call workers to fill
positions, and fell into internal
turmoil.
In November 2014, the neigh-
borhood newspaper Northwest
Examiner reported widespread
discontent at Food Front under
the leadership of general man-
ager Holly Jarvis. Ten current
and former employees told the
paper of autocratic management
and a toxic work environment
ruled by intimidation.
The union campaign began in
January and kept going after
Jarvis retired in April. On May
11, Local 555 petitioned for the
union election. Uehara says
Food Front management didn’t
fight the union effort.
Concern about Food Front’s
future was also a big part of
workers’ decision to unionize,
Uehara said. As the Northwest
Examiner reported, Food Front
has suffered six straight years of
operating losses and now faces
the likelihood of stiff competi-
tion: A new 28,000-square-foot
New Seasons Market is slated to
open in August at Northwest
21st and Raleigh, four blocks
away. A co-op consultant pre-
dicts a big drop in Food Front
sales after New Seasons opens.
“We want a say in any staff
cuts and benefit cuts if it gets
that severe,” Uehara said.
New Seasons has never been
union. Its Southeast Division
store was the target of a Febru-
ary 2012 workers rights protest
after a nine-year employee was
fired for eating tofu without pay-
ing for it. The worker was
known to New Seasons manage-
ment as a union supporter, but
the National Labor Relations
Board found insufficient evi-
dence that was a motive in the
firing, and declined to pursue a
charge against the company.
By unionizing, Food Front
workers hope to gain the stability
of a union contract, transparency
in pay scales, and a process for
resolving complaints.
“We’re organizing to make
the co-op better,” Uehara says.
“Today I had a co-worker come
up to me and say: ‘I really feel
excited to work here now.’”