SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
VOLUME 119, NUMBER 20
IN THIS ISSUE
MULTNOMAH COUNTY OPPOSES UNION CAMPAIGN
On-call and temp workers want to join AFSCME. | Page 3
UNIONIZING AT CASCADIA BEHAVIORAL HEALTH
270 workers will now be in AFSCME. | Page 3
Meeting Notices p.6
County Courthouse Tops Out p.8
PORTLAND, OREGON
NOVEMBER 16, 2018
ELECTION 2018: A night of wins for working people
Around the nation and in Oregon
and Washington, union political
efforts bore fruit election night.
By Don McIntosh
THE RETURN OF A DEMOCRATIC HOUSE
While most Americans didn’t vote on Nov.
6, the estimated 114 million who did deliv-
ered control of the U.S. House of Represen-
tatives to Democrats for the first time in
eight years. Whether or not it was a refer-
endum on the Trump administration, it was
a clear rejection of his party after Republi-
cans passed the biggest corporate tax cut
ever and tried but failed to repeal the Af-
fordable Care Act. Come January, Democ-
rats’ new 228-207 majority in the House will
mean deadlock or compromise in Congress
for the next two years. That means any fur-
ther plans by Republicans to repeal the Af-
fordable Care Act or monkey with “entitle-
ments” like Social Security are moot. It’s
unclear whether Democrats will cooperate
to pass Trump’s slightly improved NAFTA re-
placement agreement with Canada and
Mexico. With Republicans still in control of
the Senate and White House, Democrats
won’t be able to pass their own legislation,
but they willbe able to model what a future
Democratic Congress could deliver. Let’s
hope that includes labor’s agenda of a
higher minimum wage, infrastructure in-
Rauner, a private equity fund billionaire
who attacked public employee union
members and their pensions immediately
after taking office as Illinois governor in
2015. It was his federal lawsuit against
public employee unions that became the
notorious Janus v AFSCME case — in
which the U.S. Supreme Court made
America a “right-to-work” nation for
public employees. Rauner was defeated
by billionaire Democrat J.B. Pritzker in a
campaign in which both candidates spent
a considerable part of their fortune:
Pritzker spent $175 million, and Rauner
$50 million.
A UNION ORGANIZER GOES TO CON-
GRESS Michigan voters elected a former
union organizer to Congress. Andy Levin
helped unionize health care workers into
SEIU in the mid ‘80s, and later served on
President Bill Clinton’s labor law reform
commission. At the national AFL-CIO, he set
up the Union Summer and Voice@Work
As Portland-area Democrats gathered at union-represented Hilton Hotel, it was Oregon AFL-CIO chief of staff Graham programs, and lobbied Congress to pass the
Trainor who announced the night’s big news: the re-election of Governor Kate Brown.
Employee Free Choice Act. Now he’ll serve
in the U.S. House of Representatives, in the
vestment, and an easier path to a union.
Rauner. Walker famously stripped
Republican nomination for president.
Southeast Michigan seat formerly held by
Wisconsin voters finally had enough of
SAYONARA, SCOTT WALKER, AND BYE- Wisconsin public employees of their
his father, Sander Levin.
collective bargaining rights in 2010, and
his one-two combo of slashing corporate
BYE TO BRUCE RAUNER The 2018
‘IRONSTACHE’ COMES UP SHORT Union
taxes and public school budgets, and
election had many sweet results for union later signed an anti-union right-to-work
ironworker Randy “Ironstache” Bryce failed
law and a repeal of the prevailing wage.
voted by a narrow margin to elect state
members, but perhaps none sweeter
to win the seat vacated by Republican
He then touted that anti-union record in
school superintendent Tony Evers, a
than the defeat of Wisconsin governor
his failed 2016 campaign for the
former school teacher. Then there was
Scott Walker and Illinois governor Bruce
Turn to Page 2
UA Local 290 retiree gives $500,000 to Shriners Hospital
By Michael Gutwig
SPRINGFIELD, Ore.—More
than 30 years after retiring, a
working man who found success
as a union welder is giving back
in a very big way. Duke Mitchell
— a member of United Associa-
tion of Plumbers and Fitters Lo-
cal 290 — gave $500,000 to the
Shriners Hospitals for Children.
The donation was made Nov. 5 at
Local 290’s Springfield training
center, with several retired union
brothers in attendance.
“This is not a common occur-
rence,” said Kathy Park, director
of development for Shriners Hos-
pital-Portland. Shriners Hospitals
for Children is an international
nonprofit network of medical
centers that specializes in care for
children with orthopedic condi-
tions, burns, spinal cord injuries,
and cleft lip and palate, regardless
of the families’ ability to pay.
Care is provided for newborns up
to age 18. The Portland medical
center boasts the largest team of
pediatric orthopedic surgeons
(12) in the Pacific Northwest.
Mitchell, 96, isn’t a Shriner,
and he wasn’t familiar with the
organization until a few months
ago, when he saw a story about
all the good things they do for
children.
Mitchell said he and his wife
of 72 years, Lucy Marie, often
talked about donating some of
their money to a good cause, but
they hadn’t decided on anything
when she died in 2014.
After learning about the
Shriners, Mitchell knew immedi-
ately where the money should go.
“My God, that’s the greatest
UA Local 290 retiree Duke Mitchell worked, saved, and invested, and now, at
96, has set an extraordinary example of giving.
thing in the world you could do,
— helping those little kids,” he
said. “What could you do that
would be any greater than that?
Nothing! Nothing!”
Duke Mitchell grew up in
poverty, living out of a car in
Texas during the Great Depres-
sion with 11 sisters and his
mother and father.
He learned to weld as a young
man in Kansas. He joined the
Chemical Workers Union in 1957
in New Mexico, and traveled the
country building chemical plants
and industrial mills.
He landed in Springfield in
1960, where he joined what then
was Fitters Local 481 (plumbers
and fitters locals merged to form
United Association Local 290 in
July 1985). Mitchell served on
the union’s Executive Board and
on numerous volunteer commit-
tees, including bargaining com-
mittees.
“Joining the union was the
greatest thing that ever happened
to me,” Mitchell said.
Working under a union con-
tract meant good benefits, a pen-
sion, job security, and good
wages, Mitchell said — enough
to take care of his wife and three
children, with enough left over to
invest in the stock market.
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