NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS |
August 21, 2020 | PAGE 13
Spreading the union’s inspiration by air and by internet
By Don McIntosh
When Vancouver SAG-AFTRA
officer Harold Phillips set out to
create a web site showcasing la-
bor radio shows and podcasts, he
had no idea how many he’d find.
Working with Chris Garlock, co-
ordinator of the Union Cities
Program at the Metro Washing-
ton (DC) Labor Council, Phillips
set up LaborRadioNetwork.org
as a resource for people like
him—who believe in the union
movement and enjoy listening to
podcasts. When Phillips first
tried to find labor movement
podcasts, podcast platform
searches for “labor” turned up
programs about pregnancy, and
“union” sent him to shows for
British soccer fans.
Since LaborRadioNetwork.
org launched in March 2020, 59
shows have been added to the di-
rectory, either because Phillips
and Garlock discovered them or
were contacted by them. Of
those, about 18 are produced by
national or local unions or union
federations. A few others are put
together by publications, non-
profit organizations, or academic
institutions. The rest are all-vol-
unteer efforts, including 16 that
are produced first and foremost
as local radio shows, mostly on
listener-supported community
radio stations.
None of the labor-focused
shows have the reach of nation-
ally syndicated radio programs
like Fresh Air or podcasts like
One of the more interesting labor podcasts in the LaborRadioNetwork directory is UComm Live, which bills itself as
the “loudest, strongest and most controversial labor show on, in, and around the internet.” Modeled after the Howard
Stern show, it shoots for fast and funny, with sound effects and cursing. The program is a project of Ucomm Media
Group, a union-focused communications firm based in Long Island, New York. Host Chris Lagrange is a former officer
of the Long Island Federation of Labor and the New York Working Families Party. He’s joined by “know-it-all” researcher
and sidekick Brian Young and other guests, and they share news, commentary, and wise cracks. Content is aimed at a
national audience, and the show has more listeners in the Chicago area than in its New York home base. UCommLive
started as a paid radio spot in 2015, but two years ago the hosts decided to go online-only at a fraction of the cost.
Today it comes out four times a month as a podcast, and is streamed live on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.
The Joe Rogan Experience, but
together, they reach tens of thou-
sands of listeners, maybe hun-
dreds of thousands, nationwide.
With a smartphone in every
pocket or purse, podcasts have
come to rival radio shows for au-
dience. Unlike terrestrial radio,
podcasts can be listened to
whenever. Listeners typically
download or stream them with
an app like Google Play,
Stitcher, Spotify, or Soundcloud,
or the Apple Podcast app for
iPhone users. [The term “pod-
cast” originated with the Apple
iPod.]
“Anybody can set up a pod-
cast,” says Phillips, who serves
as board vice president of the
Portland SAG-AFTRA chapter.
“It’s a real democratizing for-
mat.”
But podcasting and radio can
sometimes be lonely work, and
finding an audience can be a
challenge. That results in a lot of
stop and start efforts: The Na-
tional AFL-CIO’s “State of the
Unions “ podcast has had no
new episode since March 18.
To combat isolation and share
ideas, Phillips and Garlock have
set up a weekly Zoom call.
Every Wednesday, hosts from
around the country drop in to co-
ordinate and connect.
Because Phillips wants to
boost all the shows, he won’t say
which podcast is the best (except
his own national union’s pod-
cast, “The SAG-AFTRA Pod-
cast”—which to be fair is a
strong show with good produc-
tion values.)
But Oregon, it turns out, is a
hotbed of union radio shows and
podcasts. The oldest is Labor
Radio, which airs with a rotating
cast of hosts every Monday from
6 to 6:30 p.m. on KBOO-Port-
land and as a podcast.
In Salem, retired union organ-
izer Bob Rossi hosts the Labor
Radio Report with support from
the Marion Polk Yamhill Central
Labor Chapter and the Oregon
Building Trades Council. It airs
the fourth Friday of each month
at 8:10 a.m. on Willamette Wake
Up, a daily news show on
Salem’s listener-supported
KMUZ, and is available as a
podcast.
And in Ashland, retired SEIU
Local 503 member Wes Brain
hosts the Brain Labor Report on
Wednesdays at 9 a.m. on KSKQ.
Two labor podcasts also orig-
inate in Oregon. The Oregon
AFL-CIO puts on The Voice of
Oregon’s Workers. And Ore-
gon’s SEIU Local 503 produces
a podcast called Stronger To-
gether that features news and
stories from the state’s largest
public sector union.
FIND A LABOR PODCAST
LaborRadioNetwork.org