NSO musicians fight off furlough
The musicians of the National Symphony Orchestra are not being furloughed after all. Their union, the D.C. Federation of Musicians, AFM Local 161-710, filed a grievance after the Kennedy Center last week announced its unilateral decision to furlough the musicians, which was not permitted by the union’s contract. While the musicians’ pay has been restored, the union agreed to “substantial economic concessions” in recognition of the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Kennedy Center. The contract is also being extended for an additional year, through the beginning of September 2024, which the union said “will provide financial stability to our musicians during this difficult time.” The union also urged the Kennedy Center to bring back the Orchestra’s staff – who are not protected by a union contract – “as a matter of fairness” and announced that the musicians “are pledging at least $50,000 of our own money over the next 10 weeks to help support our NSO staff colleagues.”
ATU demands protection for frontline transit workers
With more than 40 transit workers, including 13 Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) members, dying after contracting COVID-19, the ATU is demanding that the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) immediately provide personal protective equipment (PPE) for all transit workers on America’s transit systems. "The last month has been incredibly challenging,” said ATU Local 689 president Raymond Jackson. “Our workers have been on the front lines of a global health pandemic. It is essential that we keep our members safe and make sure that every one of them has PPE. We've been working closely with WMATA to keep our members protected and get them the equipment they need." The ATU is calling for every worker who operates or maintains a transit vehicle to -- at a minimum -- be equipped with an N95 disposable respirator, gloves, and other critical gear. Despite federal funding, some agencies are citing cost and refusing. Others are making an effort but cannot identify sellers. “It is unconscionable and immoral to send transit employees to work without PPE during this health crisis,” said ATU President John Costa. “Our members provide essential public services, making sure that people can get to the doctor, the pharmacy, and the grocery store. But they cannot be expected to keep doing it while putting their lives in danger.”
photo: crowded bus in Grand Rapids, MI last week
Free “Stewards Guide to Fighting COVID-19”
Saying that “Stewards are our first line of defense on a new front,” UE is making its “Stewards Guide to Fighting COVID-19” available for free. “Stewards have a special role to play right now to assist our members as they face a life-threatening situation. Some of our workplaces must stay open to provide life-sustaining services, and stewards will need to advocate for special workplace protections. Other workplaces must close or drastically reduce the number of workers present to prevent this disease from spreading more rapidly, and stewards will need to help workers navigate layoffs and maintain connections with members outside of work.” UE is the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America.
How to Help: CSA’s Emergency Assistance Fund
In addition to the various federal, state and local financial assistance programs available to workers affected by the COVID-19 pandemic (click here for latest details), labor or labor-friendly organizations are also setting up financial support operations. If you know of one, please let us know at [email protected]
Fund Name: CSA Emergency Assistance Fund
Organized by: Metro Washington Council’s Community Services Agency
Benefits: Area union families
About the fund: Raises and spends approximately $120,000 annually and assists about 350 families. Helps workers facing hardships due to no fault of their own to meet emergency needs -- prevention of utility cut-offs, evictions, food, needed prescriptions, and other needs. Local unions refer workers to the fund.
Union Voice/Readers Write: Right campaign, wrong strike
“The 1990 strike (Today's Labor Quote: LA Janitor) started on May 22, 1990 (not April 7),” writes SEIU’s Bill Ragen, who was the lead organizer for the Justice for Janitors campaign. “The police riot the quote refers to was on June 15 and the strike ended around June 25. “The 2000 strike started in April. The Wikipedia Justice for Janitors entry conflates the two - it talks about a 1990 strike, but says it started in April and mentions Mayor Riordan, who was mayor from 1993-2001. Both were big deals - 1990 was when we started re-organizing and came back from the dead; 2000 was when all that organizing was the basis for a strike that won major improvements and also brought in new members.”
MWC COVID-19 UPDATES
Legislative updates: click here for the latest updates.
Unemployment Insurance: click here for the latest helpful information, including Am I Eligible for UI Benefits during the COVID-19 Emergency? (updated 4/7)
CSA: latest resource updates posted here including Feeding America link to local food banks.
Today's Labor Quote: Harry S Truman
“Republicans can hear the whispers of business, but not the yells and screams of working people.”
President Truman ordered the U.S. Army to seize the nation’s steel mills to avert a strike on this date in 1952. The Supreme Court ruled the act illegal three weeks later.
Today's Labor History
This week’s Labor History Today podcast: Coronavirus essential workers’ rights
On this week’s show, organizer and union rep John Barry on “Coronavirus ‘essential workers’ have rights too;” ethnographer Candacy Taylor on "Beauty Shop Culture and the Labor of Hairdressing" and Tales from the Reuther Library podcast host Dan Goldner celebrates Frances Perkins’ birthday.
Last week’s show: Socialists, suffragettes and fear at work
128 convict miners, leased to a coal company under the state’s shameful convict lease system, are killed in an explosion at the Banner coal mine outside Birmingham, Ala. The miners were mostly African-Americans jailed for minor offenses - 1911
President Wilson establishes the War Labor Board, composed of representatives from business and labor, to arbitrate disputes between workers and employers during World War I - 1918
The Works Progress Administration (WPA) is approved by Congress. President Franklin Roosevelt proposed the WPA during the Great Depression of the 1930s when almost 25 percent of Americans were unemployed. It created low-paying federal jobs providing immediate relief, putting 8.5 million jobless to work on projects ranging from construction of bridges, highways and public buildings to arts programs like the Federal Writers' Project - 1935
- David Prosten
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