Forward to a friend:
[link removed]

DC City Council contender part of national field of union candidates

"Systemic racism" at the VA?

Union members take hit as DC region's COVID cases spike

Today's Labor Quote

Today's Labor History

[link removed] LABOR CALENDAR; click here for latest listings

Union City Radio: 7:15am daily
WPFW-FM 89.3 FM; [link removed] click here to hear today's report

Immigration, Human Rights, and Global Economic Renewal: Fri, October 16, 10am - 12pm
[link removed] RSVP here

Zoom call/Virtual phonebank: Jennifer Wexton (U.S. Congress, VA 10) and Qasim Rashid (U.S. Congress, VA 1): Sat, October 17, 10am - 1pm
[link removed] Zoom link here

Metro Washington Council Delegate Meeting: Mon, October 19, 5pm - 7pm
Agenda includes election to fill 2 vacancies on the MWC Executive Board, and nominations for another vacancy that's just opened up.
[link removed] RSVP here

Metro Washington Council and Community Services Agency staff are teleworking; reach them at the contact numbers and email addresses [link removed] here.

Missed yesterday's Your Rights At Work radio show? [link removed] Catch the podcast here; "Systemic racism" at the VA? Plus: the latest episode of the San Francisco Mime Troupe's Tales of Resistance!

DC City Council contender part of national field of union candidates
D.C. City Council Ward 4 candidate Janeese Lewis George is among the hundreds of current or former union members running for office this year across the country. George was a member of AFGE Local 1403 when she worked for the D.C. government's attorney general office. "Being an AFGE union member has clearly shaped and informed Janeese's perspective as a public servant and is an important reason why the DC Labor Council endorsed her candidacy," said Metro Washington Council president Dyana Forester. "We are looking forward to working on a pro-worker agenda with her once she is elected." Other AFGE members running include Ceretta Smith (Georgia State Senate District 23), Valbrun Almonord (Georgia's 3rd Congressional District) and Hillary Scholten (Michigan's 3rd Congressional District). [link removed] Read more here
photo: Janeese Lewis George (l) with WTU 6 president Liz Davis (center) and MWC president Dyana Forester (r)

"Systemic racism" at the VA?
The American Federation of Government Employees National VA Council - the union representing 265,000 workers at the Department of Veterans Affairs - recently obtained hiring data that show white VA employees who applied for management positions were selected at double the rate of Black applicants. AFGE National President Everett Kelley said that "These troubling statistics point to an underlying bias at the VA against Black workers and validate the complaints our members have shared regarding the systemic racism they face every day while simply trying to serve our nation's veterans and war heroes." In a major victory for VA workers across the nation,
the Government Accountability Office decided to investigate systemic racism at VA, in response to the survey. The investigation - which comes at the request of Sens. Brian Schatz and Elizabeth Warren - will look into the culture, policies and practices of the VA and will determine the extent to which systemic racism impacts VA employees, veterans' benefits, and the quality of care given at VA facilities. [link removed] Read more here

Union members take hit as DC region's COVID cases spike
As the number of new coronavirus infections across the greater Washington region jumped to a two-month high Wednesday, in Maryland, state officials said an employee at the Department of Transportation's Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA) in Prince George's County died of the coronavirus, and four other workers in the department's Largo branch office have tested positive. "My heart goes out to our members who are dealing with this crisis," Mildred Womble, the AFSCME MVA local president and Council 3 executive vice president, said in a statement. "This was all preventable if management had taken the safety of their employees seriously."
Adapted from a [link removed] report in the Washington Post

Today's Labor Quote: John Sweeney

"If anyone denies American workers their constitutional right to freedom of association, we will use old-fashioned mass demonstrations, as well as sophisticated corporate campaigns to make worker rights the civil rights issue of the 1990s. We're going to spend whatever it takes, work as hard as it takes, and stick with it as long as it takes, to help American workers win the right to speak for themselves in strong unions!"

Sweeney, president of the Service Employees International Union, was elected president of AFL-CIO on this date in 1995.

Today's Labor History
This week's Labor History Today podcast: [link removed] The Package King
Former Teamster activist Joe Allen on "A Rank-And-File History of UPS." Folklorist Bucky Halker interviews iron workers Sharon Sisson and her husband Richard for the America Works podcast. And, on this week's Labor History in 2: Born into Privilege, But...
[link removed] Last week's show: Roediger on "The Sinking Middle Class"; Feurer on Mother Jones' legacy

October 16
Queen Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI, is beheaded during the French Revolution. When alerted that the peasants were suffering due to widespread bread shortages, lore has it that she replied, "Let them eat cake." In fact she never said that, but workers were, justifiably, ready to believe anything bad about their cold-hearted royalty - 1793

Abolitionist John Brown leads 18 men, including five free Blacks, in an attack on the Harper's Ferry ammunition depot, the beginning of guerilla warfare against slavery - 1859

October 17
Labor activist Warren Billings is released from California's Folsom Prison. Along with Thomas J. Mooney, Billings had been pardoned for a 1916 conviction stemming from a bomb explosion during a San Francisco Preparedness Day parade. He had always maintained his innocence - 1939

Salt of the Earth strike begins by the mostly Mexican-American members of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers Union Local 890 in Bayard, N.M. Strikers' wives walked picket lines for seven months when their men were enjoined during the 14-month strike against the New Jersey Zinc Co. A great movie, see it! - 1950

Twelve New York City firefighters die fighting a blaze in midtown Manhattan - 1966

October 18
The "Shoemakers of Boston" - the first labor organization in what would later become the United States - was authorized by the Massachusetts Bay Colony - 1648

New York City agrees to pay women school teachers a rate equal to that of men - 1911

IWW Colorado Mine strike; first time all coal fields are out - 1927

58,000 Chrysler Corp. workers strike for wage increases - 1939

GM agrees to hire more women and minorities for five years as part of a settlement with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission - 1983

- David Prosten

Material published in UNION CITY may be freely reproduced by any recipient; please credit Union City as the source.

Published by the Metropolitan Washington Council, an AFL-CIO "Union City" Central Labor Council whose 200 affiliated union locals represent 150,000 area union members.

Story suggestions, event announcements, campaign reports, Letters to the Editor and other material are welcome, subject to editing for clarity and space; just click on the mail icon below. You can also reach us on Facebook and Twitter by clicking on those icons.

[link removed]

[link removed]

[link removed]

mailto:[email protected]

[link removed]


You are receiving this email because our records indicate that [link removed] [email protected] signed up to receive this newsletter. Click here to [link removed] edit your subscription preferences
To view our Privacy Policy: [link removed]