UE

  • Bissell Tries Sucking the Life Out of Union Organizing Drive

    Forty warehouse workers and their supporters picketed Wednesday in front of the Bissell distribution center in Joliet, Illinois, one of dozens of mammoth buildings that have sprung up off of I-55 south of Chicago. One week earlier Bissell—through their temp agency—dropped the axe on all 70 workers in the warehouse. Their offense? Trying to form a union.

  • Republic Factory Occupiers Meet French ‘Bossnappers’

    Chicago saw an unusual meeting of the minds last week between two groups of workers who have taken extraordinary steps when faced with a plant closing.

  • Now For Something Completely Different: Dispatches from the UE Convention

    Looking for a break from the palace politics and spit-shine glitz of the AFL-CIO convention in Pittsburgh (where, behind our reporters just hours ago, they turned back on the booming sound system to give tomorrow's speeches a dry run)? Let us transport you to downtown New Haven, where a gathering of a totally different stripe is underway.

  • How Republic Workers Occupied Their Plant

    Author(s):
    Leah Fried

    Excerpt:
    December 5 was to be the last day of work at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago. But managers soon realized that workers would not go quietly: they had voted to occupy the factory. . . .

    Body:
    December 5 was to be the last day of work at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago. But managers soon realized that workers would not go quietly: they had voted to occupy the factory.

    Members of United Electrical Workers (UE) Local 1110, they’d made plans to scatter throughout the plant, chain themselves to machines, and risk arrest. This is the story of how they did it.

    The occupation that won workers their back pay and the admiration of union members around the world didn’t happen out of the blue. It was the culmination of years of struggle to build a democratic, fighting union able to take on the boss.

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • 'Why Privatize? We Can Run It Better!'

    Author(s):
    Dave Cohen

    Excerpt:
    That’s the question United Electrical Workers Local 274 and the Office and Professional Employees (OPEIU) asked when their wastewater treatment plant was threatened with privatization....

    Body:
    “Why privatize? We can run it better!” That’s the question United Electrical Workers Local 274 and the Office and Professional Employees (OPEIU) asked when their wastewater treatment plant was threatened with privatization.
    The city council—called a Selectboard—in Montague, Massachusetts, a town of 8,500 in the western part of the state, was concerned about the treatment plant because it had lost a large industrial customer. But the Selectboard never thought to ask the people who worked there what to do.
    Instead, it solicited bids to privatize the plant in hopes of saving the town money. Soon four companies had handed in proposals, most of which promised big savings. Because of intense pressure from union members, none of the proposals called for layoffs or wage cuts (except, perhaps, cuts in management).

    Available Online:
    Yes

  • Support New Jersey ‘Supervisors’ Union

    Body:
    Workers at the Hishi Plastics factory in Lincoln Park, New Jersey, have waged a five-year organizing and bargaining battle with the company. Ninety percent of the plant’s 50 workers voted to join the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers (UE) in 2003, but their campaign was tied up by legal challenges from the employer, who claimed that some of the employees were supervisors.

    The vote was suspended for four years while the NLRB decided the Kentucky River case, which established an expanded definition of supervisory work and denied many workers bargaining rights. Nevertheless, the National Labor Relations Board counted the ballots last January and granted collective bargaining with the UE to Hishi workers.

    Expiration Date:
    Wed, 04/30/2008 - 9:59pm