SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
VOLUME 118, NUMBER 1
PORTLAND, OREGON
JANUARY 6, 2017
WORKERS RIGHTS
Big Day for Billionaires Long
day and long week? Double the pay
Trump inauguration means a
billionaire in the White House
and cabinet spots for 5 more.
Just after the election, national
AFL-CIO President
Richard Trumka pledged
to work with Donald
Trump to enact at least
some of his agenda, like
renegotiating NAFTA
and reviving American
manufacturing. Trump’s
campaign proposals had
come with so few details that
you could imagine that was
possible. But the weeks since
then have dampened those
hopes, as Trump announced
plans to nominate one ultra-
wealthy individual after an-
other to his cabinet and advi-
sory councils. We take a look
Unions making
spirits
bright
Labor unions helped bring
smiles to the faces of 300 chil-
dren at the 21st annual Presents
from Partners holiday party. The
event for kids of union families
in need, plus families from
Snowcap charities, Bethel
Lutheran Youth Drop In Center,
Right 2 Dream Too, Immigrant &
Refugee Community Organiza-
tion, and Portland Tenants
United, was held Dec. 17 at
Sheet Metal Workers Local 16 in
Northeast Portland. It is
sponsored by Labor’s
Community Service
Agency — with lots of
help from the North-
west Oregon Labor
Council and its affiliated
unions, United Way of
Columbia Willamette,
and union allies who
stepped up more than
ever this year. At the
party each child re-
ceived a Christmas
stocking hand-sewn by
a group of union volun-
teers. Kids filled their
stockings with items
Turn to Page 12
at those nominees, and labor’s
reaction to them, on Page 2.
Now national and local la-
bor and community groups are
planning massive protests on
inauguration week-
end. The Oregon
AFL-CIO is encour-
aging affiliates to
join with other labor
unions for protest ac-
tions, including the
Portland event be-
low.
LABOR-LED INAUGURAL
PROTEST IN PORTLAND
Saturday, Jan. 21, 10-11:30 a.m.
Shemanski Park, 1010 SW Park Ave.
Rally followed by a march to Salmon
Street Springs at Tom McCall Waterfront
Park; there marchers will join with a
much larger women’s march.
Oregon factory workers may be
owed time-and-a-half twice
Oregon’s Bureau of Labor and
Industries (BOLI) has changed
how it interprets overtime laws
— in a way that could fatten the
paychecks of Oregon factory
workers. The change follows a
lawsuit filed by the non-profit
Northwest Workers Justice Proj-
ect (NWJP) on behalf of a group
of workers at Portland Specialty
Baking, which quashed a union
campaign in early 2016. The
suit says the bakery violated an
Oregon law that requires over-
time pay when workers “em-
ployed in a mill, factory or man-
ufacturing establishment” work
more than 10 hours in a day.
BOLI enforces that law as well
as a separate law that requires
overtime pay for all hourly
workers if they work more than
40 hours a week. Before the
lawsuit, BOLI’s advice to em-
ployers was that they had to pay
the greater of the two overtime
pay amounts, but not both. But
NWJP attorney Corinna
Spencer-Scheurich says that ad-
vice was wrong.
Suppose an Oregon factory
worker put in three 12-hour
shifts and one six-hour shift in a
week, totaling 42 hours. That’s
six hours of daily overtime and
two hours of weekly overtime.
Under BOLI’s old interpreta-
tion, the worker would have
been paid at the overtime rate
for six hours — the greater of
the two. Under the new interpre-
tation, the laws operate inde-
pendently, so the worker must
be paid eight hours at the time-
and-a-half overtime rate.
BOLI spokesperson Charlie
Burr said NWJP’s lawsuit led
BOLI to take another look at the
way the laws operate, and the
agency ended up agreeing with
plaintiffs.
“The two statutes enact dis-
tinct overtime requirements and
serve different purposes with re-
spect to restrictions on hours
worked by employees,” says an
updated manual for BOLI com-
pliance agents.
The change applies to an es-
timated 187,477 manufacturing
workers in Oregon.
No trial date has been set yet
in the bakery lawsuit. The two
sides are still submitting prelim-
inary legal arguments.
PORTLAND
To counter big money, City Council
votes for public campaign finance
Starting in 2020, Portland’s new
system will match small donors
so candidates can focus on
regular voters, not big donors
Portlanders are about to find out
what a City Council looks like
when candidates don’t need to
rely on big campaign contribu-
tors. In a 3-2 vote Dec. 14, Port-
land City Council approved a
public campaign finance pro-
gram. Starting in 2020, the City
will provide a six-to-one match
for small contributions of up to
$50 — for candidates for mayor
and City Council who agree to
certain limits on campaign con-
tributions. City Council candi-
dates in the program could get
up to $144,000 in public funds
for the primary and $216,000
for the general election — if
they agree to accept no more
than $250 from any individual,
and to limit total contributions
to $250,000 in the primary and
$300,000 in the general elec-
tion. The figures are about dou-
ble that for mayoral candidates.
The ordinance limits the pro-
gram to 0.2 percent of the City’s
General Fund — about $1.2
million a year.
The program was modeled on
similar programs in New York
City and Los Angeles, and states
such as Connecticut, Arizona,
and Maine. Portland was the
fourth jurisdiction to pass some
kind of public campaign financ-
ing in 2016.
The ordinance was sponsored
by Commissioner Amanda
Fritz, but she said the proposal
was driven by a coalition of
unions and non-profit groups.
United Food and Commercial
Workers Local 555, Communi-
cations Workers of America
Local 7901, Service Employees
Oregon State Council, and Ore-
gon Working Families Party
were among the 31 groups in
the coalition.
Fritz was joined by outgoing
Mayor Charlie Hales and outgo-
ing Commissioner Steve Novick
in voting for the ordinance.
Commissioners Dan Saltzman
and Nick Fish voted against it,
arguing that it should go before
voters for approval.