Northwest labor press., July 17, 2020, Page 8, Image 8

PAGE 8 |
July 17, 2020 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
...NLRB strikes down union at
Providence over smudged ballot
From Page 1
and refused to negotiate until
its appeal was decided.
One of the ballots that had
been counted as “yes” wasn’t
perfect. Beneath the instruc-
tion “Mark an ‘x’ in the
square of your choice,” the
ballot contained an “X” in the
“Yes” square and a diagonal
line in the “No” square that
had been smudged as if by an
eraser.
For decades, NLRB rules
said to declare “dual-marked”
ballots void and not count
them — UNLESS the voter’s
intent can “be ascertained
from other markings on the
ballot (such as an attempt to
erase or obliterate one mark).”
When a federal administrative
law judge and the NLRB’s re-
gional director looked at this
ballot, both saw the smudged
line and felt it was pretty clear
what the voter intended.
But in its May 13, 2020, rul-
ing, the three Trump NLRB ap-
pointees in Washington, D.C.,
decided it was time to change
the rules. Going forward, they
ruled, all dual-marked ballots
will be declared void — be-
cause determining voter intent
from smudges is too specula-
tive and subjective: “It is not an
efficient use of agency re-
sources to engage in a poten-
tially labor-intensive inquiry
into whether, for example, a
smudge or blur on a ballot was
an attempt at erasure or an in-
advertent marking caused by a
sweaty hand or the manner in
which a voter folded a ballot.”
“They went out of their
way to find a reason to over-
turn the vote,” says Felisa Ha-
gins, political director for
SEIU Local 49. “All the rules
at the NLRB are changing to
be more and more detrimental
for workers.”
Hagins also faulted Provi-
dence Health — which she
called a billion dollar corpo-
ration masquerading as a non-
profit — for using the anti-
union moment at the NLRB
to undermine its own work-
ers.
“These workers did a lot of
work under very difficult cir-
cumstances to build their
union,” Hagins said.
For hundreds of CNAs,
housekeepers, cooks, phle-
botomists and other support
workers at the Providence
hospital at Northeast 48th and
Glisan, the ruling means no
union recognition for now.
They must wait until at least
May 2021 before they can
vote again on whether to
unionize.
Northwest Oregon
Labor Council
Union-community coalition asks City Council to break
impasse over labor standards for Broadway Corridor
Centered on the 12-block former
U.S. Postal Service mail pro-
cessing plant in Northwest Port-
land, what’s known as the
Broadway Corridor Project is
Portland’s biggest central city re-
development opportunity in
three decades. But negotiations
over how minority and working
Portlanders will benefit from the
redevelopment have broken
down. On June 24, a coalition of
environmental justice, commu-
nity and labor organizations that
has been bargaining with the
city’s development agency Pros-
per Portland asked Portland City
Council to intervene.
“We will not support the
Broadway Corridor project until
we are sure we are getting a just
and ironclad agreement for our
communities,” wrote Vivian Sat-
terfield on behalf of the Healthy
Communities Coalition.
The goal of the talks is a
legally-binding Community
Benefits Agreement (CBA) for
the Broadway Corridor, and the
Healthy Communities Coalition
has been negotiating with Pros-
per Portland and the master de-
veloper it chose for the project—
Continuum Partners of Denver
— for 10 months.
“While I had hoped to pro-
vide a more optimistic update af-
ter such a dedicated and intense
period of negotiations, I am writ-
ing to convey HCC’s concern
that we may be unable to reach
a final agreement. We are angry
and frustrated.”
At this juncture, the sticking
points have to do with how to
oversee and enforce the agree-
ment, and about standards for
construction workers. Contin-
uum Partners does not agree that
the construction workers on the
project should have full family
healthcare benefits, which is a
standard benefit for union con-
struction workers.
City Council responded, and
an online meeting to see if the
impasse can be broken is set for
July 20. At the table will be
Mayor Ted Wheeler, Commis-
sioner Jo Ann Hardesty, Prosper
Portland executive director Kim-
berly Branam, and representa-
tives from Continuum Partners,
along with Satterfield and Kelly
Haines of the Metropolitan Al-
liance for Workforce Equity.
University of Oregon and
Oregon AFL-CIO host free
talks for union members
national AFL-CIO education director; and
Donna Hammond, IBEW Local 48
business agent.
■ August 5: The state of Oregon's
unions Presented by Oregon AFL-CIO
President Graham Trainor.
■ August 12: Education in the time of
COVID Presenters are Diane Ravitch,
former U.S. Assistant Secretary of
Education; and Oregon Education
Association President John Larson..
■ August 26: The state of Oregon’s
budget and Oregon workers
Presented by Oregon AFL-CIO political
director Jess Giannettino Villatoro; and
an Oregon legislative leader.
All talks are free and open to
all Oregon union members.
Talks will start at 5 p.m. and go
for one hour, with time for ques-
tions and comments from audi-
ence members. Register at
https://bit.ly/38Srn8m for one or
more of the talks, and you’ll be
sent a link to the Zoom call
shortly before the event.
This summer, the Oregon AFL-
CIO is teaming up with the La-
bor Education and Research
Center of the University of Ore-
gon to bring national experts
and labor leaders to Oregon
union members via Zoom calls.
Here are the upcoming talks:
■ July 29: The labor movement’s role
in the fight for racial justice
Presenters are Bill Fletcher, former
Congratulations to our 2020 Endorsed Candidates
for the August 4 Primary
endorses
Carolyn Long
Matt Little
for Congress,
3rd Congressional Dist.
for Clark County
Council, District 4
Monica Stonier
Sharon Wylie
for State Rep., 49th
Legislative District
for State Rep., 49th
Legislative District
Donna Sinclair
Daniel Smith
Tanisha Harris
for State Senate, 17th
Legislative District
for State Rep., 17th
Legislative District
for State Rep.,
18th Legislative
District