Troublemakers Blog
September 14, 2009 / Jane Slaughter
Asked whether the AFL-CIO would stick to earlier statements that the federation will not support a health care reform bill without a government-insurance “public option,” incoming federation President Rich Trumka ducked this morning.
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September 13, 2009 / Mischa Gaus
Labor Notes started the AFL-CIO convention week with a little something to celebrate: we took home first place for general excellence among national labor publications, in the International Labor Communications Association Labor Media awards. ILCA is the organization of editors and reporters who put together local and national union newspapers, magazines, and »
August 17, 2009 / Steve Early
When California health care workers gave up on the project of democratizing the Service Employees (SEIU) and launched a rival organization instead last winter, the road to union recognition didn’t seem so long and hard. Soon after the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) was formed in January, in response to SEIU’s trusteeship of the United Healthcare »
June 08, 2008 / Mark Brenner
Today was Anna Burger's day in the spotlight. Her stump speech was about the 2008 elections, and why politics was so important to SEIU's future. Burger, who heads up Change to Win, is apparently the czar of SEIU's political operations, and it was nice to hear her say, "There is no question that organizing and politics go hand and hand," acknowledging the link »
June 07, 2008 / Mark Brenner
Tonight the Puerto Rican teachers held a "charla" or chat with SEIU members interested in learning more about their struggle, and the conflict between SEIU and their union the FMPR. I couldn't be there but Labor Notes Policy Committee member Steve Early was on the scene. From Steve's reports, the FMPR event sounded about as far from the highly scripted, stage- »
June 06, 2008 / Mark Brenner
After the division reports, International Executive Vice President Tom Woodruff closed the show, emphasizing a couple of the key pieces of the “Justice for All” program. These include:
Ensuring all locals follow through on constitutional commitment to spend 20 percent of their budgets on organizing.
Recommendations from the International Executive Board (IEB »
June 05, 2008 / Mark Brenner
After Andy’s speech the union turned to its bread and butter, the question of organizing the unorganized (who SEIU has determined, through focus groups I guess, we should call not-yet-union workers). Executive Vice President Tom Woodruff ran the show, and spoke about some of the strategies and key campaigns the union has on its agenda.
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June 04, 2008 / Mark Brenner
The afternoon started off with Andy Stern’s big speech. You can watch the whole thing on the web and I encourage you check it out and draw your own conclusions about Stern’s vision for the union.
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June 04, 2008 / Mark Brenner
Once I got my food I had a really interesting conversation at the lunch table with several rank-and-file SEIU members. I was sitting next to a woman from 1199 New York who remarked that this convention, her fourth one, lacked energy. The man sitting next to her commented on all the security.
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June 04, 2008 / Mark Brenner
Lunch on Day 1 of the SEIU convention was another déjà vu moment. As fates would have it, I got in line behind Gabe Kramer, a senior staffer at 1199 West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky. Gabe was part of the crew that tried to barrel their way into the banquet at the Labor Notes conference in April. You can see him »