Northwest labor press., January 18, 2019, Image 1

SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
VOLUME 120, NUMBER 2
IN THIS ISSUE
TO RESTORE PENSION, PLASTERERS CUT BENEFITS
Local 82’s pension is the latest victim of 2008. | Page 3
AT BOLI, A LABOR CHAMPION TAKES THE REINS
Val Hoyle is Oregon’s new labor commissioner. | Page 7
Meeting Notices p.4
SAG awards watch party p.6
PORTLAND, OREGON
GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN
By Don McIntosh
Transportation Security Admin-
istration (TSA) agents at the
Portland airport say they’ve
been getting more thank-yous
from the traveling public since
they began working without pay
Dec. 22. But sympathy won’t
pay the bills. On Jan. 11, with
the partial government shut-
down in its third week, they and
the rest of the estimated 800,000
federal employees missed their
first paycheck. About 380,000
of the affected federal workers
have been furloughed, while
420,000 are working without
pay — those whose jobs involve
human safety, the protection of
property, or other work desig-
nated as essential by their agen-
cies.
If the shutdown is hitting
TSA screeners the hardest, it’s
because they’re some of the fed-
Turn to Page 5
“I can pay the minimum on my credit cards, and I can skip utility bills,” says
Trang Kim, a 16-year TSA employee. “I’m just worried about my mortgage.”
Kim, a lead worker and behavioral detection specialist at the Portland airport,
is also regional vice president of AFGE Local 1127. She came to work on her
day off Jan. 10 to take part in a union-sponsored airport protest against the
government shutdown.
LA teachers strike for smaller classes
After 20 months of unsuccessful
contract negotiations, 32,000
teachers in United Teachers Los
Angeles (UTLA) said “enough
is enough!” and went on strike
Jan. 14. Every school site in the
Los Angeles Unified School
District—more than 900—par-
ticipated in the strike. On Day 1
of the strike, a 50,000 teachers
and supporters marched to the
District’s headquarters.
It’s the city’s first teachers’
strike in 30 years, but it’s also
part of a wave of teacher strikes
that got under way last year in
West Virginia and spread to
Oklahoma, Arizona, North Car-
olina, Colorado, Kentucky, and
Washington.
In LA, teachers are striking
for smaller class sizes, 6.5 per-
cent raises, more counselors and
nurses, and in opposition to the
expansion of charter schools:
LA’s charter school industry has
grown by 287 percent since
2008, draining nearly $600 mil-
Striking LA teachers have been getting messages of support from across the
nation, including officers and staff in Oregon Federation of Nurses and
Health Professionals, above.
lion a year from public schools.
When this issue went to press,
administrators were trying to
keep schools open for the dis-
trict’s 600,000 students, using
400 substitute teachers and over
2,000 reassigned administrators,
but it’s not clear any learning is
going on, and many parents are
keeping students home.
JANUARY 18, 2019
Washington AFL-CIO will push the
Democrats on pro-worker agenda
Washington State Labor Coun-
cil (WSLC) will be going to
the State Capitol
in Olympia with
a packed agenda
this year. Last
N o v e m b e r ’s
election resulted
in stronger ma-
jorities of pro-labor Democrats
in the 2019 legislative session
that began Jan. 14. WSLC,
which coordinates the legisla-
tive efforts of 600 AFL-CIO-
affiliated unions, will push
lawmakers to pass a “Shared
Prosperity Agenda.” Some
highlights:
■ Secure schedules Require retail and
food employers to provide work
schedules two weeks in advance and
compensate workers if their schedules
are changed.
■ Workers’ rights Make farm workers
eligible for overtime pay. Bar employers
from imposing “non-compete”
agreements on workers (with just a few
reasonable exceptions). Guarantee that
hospital nurses and medical technicians
get uninterrupted meal
and rest breaks.
■ Tax fairness Levy
a capital gains tax on
profits of over $25,000
on the sale of stocks and
bonds.
■ Jobs and job training Inventory
public buildings and put them on a
schedule to be retrofitted to improve
energy use and environmental health.
Restore funding for community and
technical colleges that was cut during
the recession.
■ Safety End single-member crews for
trains carrying hazardous materials.
■ A second look at privatization
Require contractors that perform
services that used to be done by public
employees to meet performance
metrics and accountability measures.
SEE WSLC’s FULL AGENDA
https://bit.ly/2H9K0KJ
Reversing course, OHSU agrees to
recognize grad student union
Back in September, Oregon
Health and Science University
(OHSU) argued that its 250
full-time graduate student re-
searchers shouldn’t be allowed
to unionize — because they’re
not really public employees
under the law. In December,
university executives changed
their mind, and OHSU
dropped its legal objection
rather than go to a January
hearing before the Oregon
Employment Relations Board
(ERB).
“It is clear that our Ph.D.
students desire a union to for-
malize a dialogue about their
needs,” said OHSU Provost
Elena Andresen in a Dec. 28
joint statement.
“We are pleased that OHSU
decided to withdraw their ob-
jections,” responded Oregon
AFSCME Executive Director
Stacy Chamberlain. “OHSU
graduate students are part of a
growing movement of profes-
sional workers forming unions,
and they are the last group of
graduate students in Oregon to
organize.”
Union supporter Rich Posert,
a graduate researcher in cryo-
electron microscopy, called it a
big win.
“We’re all really excited to
move forward and have good-
faith bargaining,” Posert said.
Posert thinks community
support made a difference. The
reversal came just days before
a planned “social media day of
action” by the union. It also
didn’t hurt that the legal deci-
sion OHSU was trying to inter-
pret as anti-union was written
by former ERB member Jason
Weyand, who now works as
Oregon AFSCME’s attorney.
Students will now select
members of a bargaining com-
mittee and vote on what their
priorities will be. The two
sides agreed to begin bargain-
ing by March 15.
—DM