National/Politics AFSCME grows by 90,000 since January by: John Wojcik, People’s World, July 15 2014 AFSCME President Lee Saunders today announced that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees nearly doubled the goal set in January 2014 when the union launched its 50,000 Stronger organizing campaign. Today, we are 92,155 members stronger, with new members from EMTs to home care workers, and we will continue our fight for the middle class and the future of this country, Saunders declared. Delegates to the unions 41st International Convention who heard his opening day remarks yesterday jumped to their feet and roared their approval, applauding, stomping their feet and clapping for several minutes. Our opponents want to deplete the labor movement of resources, steal our power and silence our voices, he said. The better-than-planned results of the 50,000 Stronger campaign, which was launched at an internal leadership summit in January, were particularly sweet for the union and its members, coming as they do on the heels of Harris v. Quinn, a Supreme Court decision that undermines AFSCMEs ability to represent home and child care workers. ... Chicago treasury has lots riding on outcome of Uber-taxi war Greg Hinz, Crain’s Chicago Business, On Politics blog, July 15, 2014 As the Uber-taxi war continues to rage — Gov. Pat Quinns office reportedly has received thousands of emails and other messages on the subject — one aspect thats received little attention is the potential cost to City Hall if conventional cab companies are routed. Im not saying that City Hall finances ought necessarily to rule here. Thats especially true since a version of new rules pushed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel is far more favorable to companies such as Uber and Lyft than an alternate measure pushed by Checker, Yellow et al., which is sitting on Mr. Quinns desk. But finances are a factor…..The fight continues to spark some unusual political dealings. In one new development, AFSCME, the big public-sector union, announced that its international president, Lee Saunders, will march and rally with cabbies tomorrow to push for justice and respect for drivers, a more transparent city regulatory process and a level playing field with ridesharing companies. AFSCME serves up bold, brave, determined menu in Chicago -- hold the maggots! By John Michael Spinelli, Allvoices, 7/15/2014 ...Today at McCormick Place in downtown Chicago, where AFSCMEs 41st convention convened, Saunders, chosen in an election held in June of 2012, was part of another big announcement, one the Big Dog would be proud of no doubt because it had the attributes of being bold, brave and determined, which coincidentally are the pillar themes for the convention this week. To the shouts of those present, the news broadcast by Saunders that his group expanded membership by more than 42,000 more, or 92,155 in total, was very good news indeed, especially for a long-standing trade union of approximately 1.6 million members who expect union leadership to organize for social and economic rights more than ever as more state legislatures embrace right to work laws….Christopher Mabe, president of Ohio Civil Service Employees Association (OCSEA)/AFSCME Local 11) called for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction to sever its ties with Aramark. “These are not isolated incidents,” Mabe said in a statement. “Aramark has a pattern of not only poor food quality, but food shortages, low staffing levels and security breaches. Its well past time to pull the plug on the Aramark contract…. Labor group withdraws UNCF support over Koch gift By Freddie Allen, New Pittsburgh Courier, Jul 15, 2014 Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, has discontinued supplying scholarships to the United Negro College Fund because it accepted a $25 million donation from ultra-conservative billionaires Charles and David Koch and because of UNCF President Michael Lomax’s apparent support for the brothers’ right-wing ideology. Saunders, an African American, said in a stinging letter to Lomax that he was “deeply troubled” when the UNCF accepted the donation from Koch Industries, Inc. and the Charles Koch Foundation in June, but was even more shocked when Lomax later attended the Koch brothers’ event in California. “This was a betrayal of everything the UNCF stands for. The avowed purpose of this private event was to build support – financial and political – for the Koch brothers’ causes. Your appearance at the summit can only be interpreted as a sign of your personal support and the UNCF’s organizational support of the Koch brothers’ ideological program,” Saunders wrote…. McCormick Place hosts AFSCME convention WLS, Tuesday, July 15, 2014 Members of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees from across the country are gathered in Chicago this week, for their 41st international convention….. Secretary Treasurer Laura Reyes gave the keynote address Tuesday. Shes the first woman elected to the unions second highest office. We all deserve better and that our families should not have to sacrifice anymore. Brothers and sisters we all must reach out and open that door for others, Reyes said. AFSCME Chicago Convention: Bold, Brave And Determined As Union Fights For All Workers Doug Cunningham, laborradio, July 15, 2014 As AFSCME delegates gather in Chicago for the public worker union’s convention they are highly conscious of the need for stronger organizing and more political power to stop the attacks on working people and our rights. Patrick Moran , President of Council 3 in Maryland, says AFSCME’s issues are the same issues facing the entire working and middle class in America. [Patrick Moran]: “Attacks on the middle class by the one percent, who are consolidating power in order to take democratic rights away from working people all levels – whether you’re a union member or non union member. And it;s our obligation and it’s our task to fight the anti-democratic measures by the one percent and everything they stand for.” Despite the political attacks on public unions and the union rights of workers AFSCME organized 92,155 new members last year. Lois Carson is president of the Columbus City School Employees at AFSCME Local 4 in Ohio. She says voting rights, not just union rights, are also under attack from the same right-wing one percenter forces…. Can back-to-school sales save Staples? By Bernice Napach, Yahoo Finance, 7/15/2014 ...And Staples has the additional burden of a boycott called by the American Postal Workers Union and supported by the American Federation of Teachers and AFSCME (American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees). They are protesting Staples deal to provide postal services in Staples stores with Staples workers, instead of postal workers…. Women Victorious In U.S. Supreme Courts Harris V. Quinn Julie Gunlock and Aloysius Hogan, Huffington Post, Posted: 07/15/2014 ...In order to diversify, the SEIU and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), made a tactical decision to go after women, especially women in the service sector previously considered unorganizable. But instead of encouraging women in these industries to join, the unions instead opted to force them to submit to exclusive representation by a labor union and pay for the privilege, as the Heritage Foundations Andrew Grossman explained.... Guest Post: Harris v. Quinn’s First Amendment Exceptionalism by Charlotte Garden, OnLabor blog, Posted on July 15, 2014 In Harris, Justice Alito offers a two-fold answer to this argument, though neither answer is convincing. … Curiously, though, each of these answers is inconsistent with First Amendment principles recently announced by Justice Kennedy, who has been described as “the foremost defender of free-speech principles on the modern Court.” ...It is telling that, despite this, Justice Kennedy signed onto the opinion in Harris without issuing a separate concurrence explaining his own reasoning, as he did in Hobby Lobby. This implies that he agrees with Justice Alito’s reasoning, and that there is an implicit collective bargaining exception to his more general First Amendment principles. It would not surprise me if this were the case; I have argued elsewhere that labor law exceptionalism plagues the Supreme Court’s First Amendment cases. This exceptionalism has generally worked to unions’ detriment, and this is unlikely to change in light of the current Court’s makeup…. Guest Post: Why Progressives Shouldn’t Support Public Unions: Mehlhorn replies to Rosenfeld by Dmitri Mehlhorn, OnLabor blog, Posted on July 16, 2014 ...Our disagreement centers on public sector unions: (1) technically, how much do compulsory dues translate into political dollars; (2) have public sector unions harmed the interests of the working poor; and (3) specifically, have public sector unions hurt the labor movement? Start with the technical dispute of whether compulsory public union dues “translate into many tens of millions of dollars in political contributions to Democrats.” Professor Rosenfeld points out that fair share fees from compulsory dues cannot legally be used directly for politics, per the Supreme Court’s 1977 decision Abood v. Detroit Board of Education. In practice, this legal distinction has not worked perfectly…. Hobby Lobby: A new tool for crushing workplace unionization? By Ned Resnikoff, MSNBC, Updated 07/15/14 04:16 PM ….By declaring that “closely held” corporations may hold religious beliefs, the court may have provided businesses with a new tool for crushing workplace unionization drives. In addition to declaring themselves exempt from contraception mandates and non-discrimination laws, religious employers may soon be able to argue for an exemption from collective bargaining laws. “All you need is one employer saying, ‘My religious beliefs tell me I shouldn’t collectively bargain,’” said Alex Luchenitser, associate legal director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State…. Religious primary and secondary schools are already exempt from collective bargaining rules, thanks to the 1979 Supreme Court case NLRB v. Catholic Bishop of Chicago. In a 6-3 decision, the court ruled that the NLRB does not have jurisdiction over schools “operated by a church to teach both religious and secular subjects.”…. Old-style U.S. public pensions weather cost-cutting storm By Michael Connor Reuters, 12:55 p.m. CDT, July 15, 2014 Retirement payouts for 19.3 million U.S. state and local government workers in coming years are not likely to look much different from the iron-clad pensions that former teachers and police now get. Even as lawmakers raise retirement ages and trim cost-of-living increases, few are eyeing anything that would result in the kind of massive migration to 401(k)-style direct-contribution retirement plans that happened in the U.S. private sector….State lawmakers had filed 1,234 pension bills in the first four months of 2014, according to National Conference of State Legislatures data, but few bills passed into law have made big changes…. Governments that are tiptoeing away from defined-benefit plans stop short of changes made by private companies. Some place only new hires into defined-contribution plans. Others create add-ons to traditional plans…. States Debate Millionaires Taxes Stateline.org, July 16, 2014 ...New Jersey and Illinois aside, about a dozen states have raised taxes on their highest income tax brackets since 2009, believing that raising income taxes on their wealthiest residents would yield enough additional revenues to outweigh any negative side effects. In some cases, the increases were temporary…. A Push to Give Steadier Shifts to Part-Timers By STEVEN GREENHOUSE, New York Times, JULY 15, 2014 As more workers find their lives upended and their paychecks reduced by ever-changing, on-call schedules, government officials are trying to put limits on the harshest of those scheduling practices.... Hobbled IRS cant stem dark money flow / Mystery political spending to continue unabated through midterm elections By Julie Patel, Center for Public Integrity, July 15, 2014 ...The tea party scandal, combined with Congress systematically stripping the IRS of resources and clout over decades, has led to an exempt organizations division that has all but quit regulating politically active nonprofits in any consistent, demonstrable way, a six-month Center for Public Integrity investigation reveals…. Dems want campaign finance constitutional amendment Cameron Joseph - The Hill - Ballot Box blog - 07/15/14 05:23 PM EDT House will introduce legislation to reverse effects of court decisions deregulating spending. Progressives turn from Obama to embrace Warren Robert Costa, Washington Post, July 14 at 7:40 PM ...The rally on behalf of Senate candidate Natalie Tennant was the latest in a string of recent Warren appearances in red and blue states alike, where Democratic base voters have embraced her fiery message as an envoy to working-class voters frustrated with both Wall Street and the Obama administration....Here in West Virginia — an early stage for Democrats with national ambitions going back to John F. Kennedy in 1960 — Warren was greeted as a progressive hero, with several attendees pleading with her to run for president....Warren, 65, — who has repeatedly said she will not seek the White House in 2016 — focused her pitch on pocketbook issues such as student loans and Social Security while blasting banks and big businesses for tilting federal laws in their favor. Again and again, Warren thrust her fists in the air as union members and college-age volunteers in the crowd roared their approval.... Related: The Hill : Warren aims pitch at working class Temporary Fix For Highway Money Is Well-Traveled Road by Frank James, NPR, July 15, 2014 ….The short-term bill to replenish the highway trust fund, which would fund highway spending through May 2015, is a Washington two-fer. Not only is it a classic example of can-kicking, its a great illustration of how inventive policymakers can be in finding funds when a legislative majority cant be roused for raising taxes — an especially tough vote for many lawmakers during a mid-term election year. With the highway legislation, lawmakers resorted to an accounting trick called pension smoothing. By letting companies with traditional pensions delay required payments to those funds, companies will have higher profits, which will boost what they pay in taxes. The House plan would raise $10.9 billion, most of which is needed to pay for highway projects through the end of the year. About $6.4 billion of the total would come from pension smoothing. The downside is that near-term smoothing could lead to long-term bumpiness; the trick could leave pensions underfunded in the future, resulting in higher costs to taxpayers if the federal government has to eventually step in to take over those pension funds….. Related: Roll Call, Container blog: Vote on Transportation Funding Shows How Far Conservative Republicans Have Come Reports: ACA coverage reached more than 9 million Kaitlyn Krasselt, USA TODAY, Jul. 15, 2014 Far more people are insured because of the Affordable Care Act than the White House estimated in May, new research shows. At least three new studies on the ACAs effect show big increases in the number of newly insured Americans, with the highest estimate topping out at 9.5 million from the Commonwealth Fund. That compares with the 8 million reported by the White House in May. Its hardly all good news for the administrations efforts, however. Analysts from the Rand Corporation estimate that while 14.5 million people gained coverage in the last year, about 5 million people were insured before the ACA and lost coverage because of the law - leading to a net gain of around 9 million…. Protections for Pregnant Workers Expand Before Key Supreme Court Case Josh Eidelson, Businessweek, July 15, 2014 Refusing to accommodate new mothers’ lactation after a pregnancy, refusing bathroom breaks during a pregnancy, or punishing workers for planning a future pregnancy are now all forms of illegal discrimination under federal rules. New guidelines from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the first on pregnancy since 1983, passed by a party-line 3-to-2 vote on Monday. The Democratic majority found that conditions related to pregnancy can qualify as legally protected disabilities under federal law, that it’s usually illegal to keep women out of certain jobs because the working conditions could be bad for a pregnancy, and that health-care costs tied to a pregnancy need to be treated like other costs under company insurance plans. Taxpayer Subsidy to Former Hospital CEO Is Equal to 16,800 Months of Food Stamps Beat the Press blog, Wednesday, 16 July 2014 04:00 We all know how hard it is to get by on a $5 million a year salary in New York City. Therefore readers should not feel bad about subsidizing the $5.6 million paycheck for Herbert Pardes, the former CEO of New York-Presbyterian Hospital and now the executive vice-chairman of its board of trustees. The NYT had an interesting piece on Dr. Pardes salary as well as the pay of other top executives at large hospitals. However the piece erred in presenting the issue of these large paychecks as a question of social justice versus market outcomes. As a top executive of a tax exempt institution, Dr. Pardes is being subsidized by taxpayers. If we assume that most of the money that he is soliciting for the hospital is coming from people in the top tax bracket, then taxpayers are paying roughly 40 percent of the money that Dr. Pardes is able to collect. …. Divide deepens on border crisis fix Peter Schroeder and Cristina Marcos - The Hill - 07/15/14 08:37 PM EDT Democrats in the House and Senate said Tuesday they would oppose any changes to a 2008 human trafficking law Republicans have blamed for the wave of child immigrants crossing the border. The opposition sets up a standoff and raises serious doubts about whether Congress will be able to act before its summer recess in response to what both parties argue is a humanitarian crisis. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) said he would work to make sure any changes to the 2008 law do not make it into a final funding package….The 2008 law allows authorities to send immigrant children from Mexico or Canada back to their home countries within 48 hours of a screening, but requires that children from Central America and other countries be granted an asylum hearing that can take weeks to set up. President Obama has signaled a willingness to consider changes to the law, but did not propose new language in his request for $3.7 billion in emergency funding to deal with a crisis that has overwhelmed authorities at the border….. Related: Christian Science Monitor: Child migrants 101: What does it take to win US asylum? Politico: House moving quickly on border Michelle Rhees StudentsFirst Powers Down Five State Affiliates, Including Fla. By Andrew Ujifusa, Education Week, State Ed Watch blog, July 14, 2014 12:30 PM StudentsFirst, the advocacy group founded by former District of Columbia schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, has expanded at a steady pace into many states over the last few years, but the group has confirmed over the last week that its ending the work of paid staff in five states: Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Maine, and Minnesota…. In an interview, a spokesman for StudentsFirst, Francisco Castillo, said scaling back the group in five states will allow for the organization to focus on other states, and that the number of staff affected was small compared to the overall size of the organization. He said that the group didnt see any more state affiliates closing or scaling back in the near future, and that the group is planning to expand the number of staff working in Alabama and Georgia…. John Lewis Readies ‘March: Book Two’ for 2015 By Warren Rojas, Roll Call, Heard on the Hill — Roll Calls Gossip Blog, Posted at 1:15 p.m. on July 14 The second installment of Rep. John Lewis’ illustrated history of the civil rights era, “March: Book Two” has a newly designed cover and a tentative release date: late January of next year….
Posted on: Wed, 30 Jul 2014 17:38:34 +0000
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