NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | July 1, 2016 | PAGE 3
OREGON
Join Oregon Working Families
Party, says MoveOn.org
Thousands of members of the
Oregon Working Families Party,
a union-backed minor party, be-
came Democrats to vote for
Bernie Sanders in the May 17
primary. Now the party is
scrambling to get them back. To
maintain its ballot status, it must
have at least 10,825 registered
voters by Aug. 10. It got a boost
June 16: The online advocacy
group MoveOn.org emailed its
Oregon members asking them
to register as members of the
Oregon Working Families Party.
“One of the most important
building blocks of the political
revolution in Oregon is in trou-
ble—and it needs our help,”
said the email. “From taking on
student debt, to fighting for sin-
gle payer health care, to oppos-
Labor legislator Brad Witt gets
the nomination of Democrats,
GOP, and Independents
State Rep. Brad Witt (D-Clat-
skanie), a
business rep
for United
Food and
Commercial
Workers Lo-
cal 555, won
nominations
from the
Democratic,
Brad Witt
Republican,
and Inde-
pendent parties in May’s pri-
mary election.
The five-term Democrat rep-
resents residents in District 31,
Oregon Tradeswomen wins
$650,000 to recruit women
region-wide to the trades
Oregon Tradeswomen Inc. was
just awarded a $650,000 grant
from the U.S. Department of
Labor (DOL) to expand its work
region-wide.
The Portland-based group re-
cruits and supports women in-
terested in joining high-skilled,
high-wage construction and
manufacturing trades — jobs
that were traditionally male-
only. Women make up 47 per-
cent of the U.S. workforce, but
just 3 percent of the construction
workforce.
The new grant, awarded over
a two-year period, will fund the
continuation of a multi-state
Technical Assistance Resource
Center — to support region-
wide efforts to increase the
number of women entering non-
INTERNATIONAL
ing unfair trade deals, the Work-
ing Families Party is building
the movement for Bernie’s
agenda in Oregon.… We can’t
let the WFP disappear.”
End of the line for union at
local Miller-Coors distributor
Workers at General Distributors
on June 22 voted 40 to 32 to de-
certify the Teamsters union.
About 80 members of Team-
sters Local 162 went on strike
Nov. 17 in response to company
demands for concessions to
match the union’s contract with
rival Maletis. But the company
hired replacement workers, and
the strike ended after 16 days.
General Distributors distributes
Miller-Coors beers and dozens
of craft beers, wines and ciders
from Salem to Hood River.
which includes Columbia
County and portions of Wash-
ington and Multnomah counties.
Witt was first appointed to the
seat in January 2005 to replace
Rep. Betsy Johnson, who re-
signed to take a seat in the State
Senate.
“I am honored to receive such
an outpouring of support from
members of all parties through-
out the District,” said Witt.
“The results from the primary
election show what our office is
all about, representing the entire
district and being a voice for all
in Salem, regardless of party af-
filiation.”
The Secretary of State’s of-
fice certified the primary elec-
tion results on June 16.
traditional occupations and reg-
istered apprenticeships. It’s one
of three such grants that the
DOL announced on June 14.
The other grantees are Chicago
Women in Trades, and Nontra-
ditional Employment for
Women, a group based in New
York City. In the West Coast re-
gional center, Oregon Trades-
women partners with Seattle-
based Apprenticeship and
Nontraditional Employment for
Women and Oakland, Califor-
nia-based Tradeswomen Inc.
Oregon’s U.S. Senators Ron
Wyden and Jeff Merkley and
Congresswoman Suzanne
Bonamici issued a joint press
statement congratulating Ore-
gon Tradeswomen on the grant.
The grant program was on the
chopping block last year, but
Wyden and Merkley helped re-
new its funding.
South Korean labor leader
faces eight years in prison
South Korean prosecutors are
calling for an eight-year jail term
for the leader of the Korean
Confederation of Trade Union
(KCTU), an 800,000-strong in-
dependent union federation. Han
Sang-gyun is accused of traffic
and public-safety violations in
connection with unauthorized
rallies in 2015 to protest two-
tier-wage legislation and gov-
ernment austerity measures.
Prosecutors claim he attempted
to incite violence at a Nov. 14
rally in Seoul when he yelled,
“Let’s advance towards the Pres-
idential Palace.” The rally did
turn violent: Riot police cor-
doned off the streets and water-
cannoned peaceful protesters in-
cluding a 69-year-old farmer ac-
tivist who was knocked down
and remains comatose with irre-
versible brain damage. After the
rally, Han took sanctuary for 24
days at a Buddhist temple in
Seoul before turning himself in
to the police. His sentencing is
scheduled for July 4.
The country’s unions, once
one of the best organized and
militant in the global labor
movement, have suffered set-
backs since the late 1990s, when
the government made it easier
for employers to lay off workers
and hire casuals. Fewer than one
in 10 workers is now unionized,
the country’s lowest level ever,
including in the 1970-80s when
Korea was under a harsh mili-
tary dictatorship.
CORRECTION
In our June 17 issue we reported erroneously that Oregon
Shakespeare Festival would contribute to 401(k)s for workers
who’ve been there over 10 years. That was part of an earlier
proposal, not part of the final agreement for the stagehands’
first union contract. More importantly, we under-reported the
sizable raises stagehands got— $0.75 to $1.50 an hour, not
$0.25 to $0.50 as reported. Over the course of three years,
some stagehands will rise from $13.60 to about $19 an hour.
Mexican police attack
teachers union
At least eight protesters were
killed and 53 injured June 19
when police in Oaxaca, Mexico,
attacked teachers’ union mem-
bers and supporters as they
blocked a highway. The teach-
ers union in Oaxaca has been
leading protests against the fed-
eral government’s move to im-
pose a national education plan
that includes teacher evalua-
tions. Demonstrators were also
protesting arrests of union lead-
ers, mass firings of protesting
teachers and the freezing of
union bank accounts. Since the
massacre, protests continue,
spreading to Mexico City and to
the Guatemalan border, where
roadblocks were set up June 27.
Nappe Blueberry Farms
10280 S.E. Orient Dr.
Boring, OR
503-663-0885
nappefarms.com
Oregon Grown —
Fresh & Local Since 1947