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BREAKING: Colonial Williamsburg workers unanimously vote to ratify new union contract with significant raises and benefits

No holiday for labor effort in Jan 4 PG Special Election

Union saves jobs for Shoppers workers

Wins for Kellogg's and Takoma Park workers

How the UMD bosses stole Christmas

Solidarity Center Reports from Tunisia and Maldives

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

Union City Radio: Your Rights at Work: Thu, December 23, 1pm - 2pm
WPFW 89.3 FM orhttp://www.wpfwfm.org/radio/ listen online.

Today's show: "A Red Carol," from the San Francisco Mime Troupe.

[link removed] 2022 PG County Council Special Election Member-to-Member Phonebanking
4pm - 8pm on 12/23, 12/27, 12/28, 12/29, 12/30.

[link removed] RSVP here to sign up to phonebank for labor-endorsed candidate Edward Burroughs. NOTE: the room is also open starting at 9a.

No holiday for labor effort in Jan 4 PG Special Election

With the Special Election for the Prince George's County Council District 8 vacancy coming up in just 13 days, the Metro Washington Council's Member-to-Member phonebanks are up and running for labor-endorsed candidate Edward Burroughs.[link removed] CLICK HERE for the schedule - which runs through the holidays - leading up to the January 4 Election Day. Burroughs, who spoke to Metro Council delegates Tuesday night while out door-knocking, reiterated his "strong, strong support for labor" and promised to "stand shoulder to shoulder with you on your issues and concerns." With over 8,000 union members in the district, "We can win this," said Metro Council president Dyana Forester.

photo by Kayla Mock/UFCW 400

BREAKING: Colonial Williamsburg workers unanimously vote to ratify new union contract with significant raises and benefits

Following months of negotiations, workers at Colonial Williamsburg voted unanimously on Wednesday to ratify their new contract. The contract is a near-complete re-write of the previous one, affecting almost every aspect of the work UNITE HERE Local 25 members preform at Colonial Williamsburg's hotels and restaurants. The contract language, which the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and union negotiators agreed to on Tuesday afternoon, "is a direct result of union members' tireless organizing and persistence over the past several months," said Local 25. Over the course of the campaign, Local 25 members had countless conversations with co-workers, organized petitions, delegations, rallies, picket lines, leafletted outside their places of work, and called for a boycott of the properties where they had a labor dispute. "Workers stood up for the rights and respect they deserve, and they won," said Local 25. Following Wednesday's ratification, the union has lifted its boycott of the properties where it had a labor dispute. "We have said throughout this campaign that teaching history should not mean re-living it at work," said John Boardman, Executive-Secretary Treasurer of UNITE HERE Local 25. "Now, our members can take pride in the fact that they have won 21st Century working conditions at Colonial Williamsburg."


Union saves jobs for Shoppers workers

Union members who were working at the Shoppers supermarket at Fair City Mall in Fairfax, Virginia, are now Safeway employees with same pay and benefits working at the same location. That's because when Shoppers' parent company, United Natural Foods, announced plans to close the store, their union, UFCW Local 400, reached out to Safeway and helped make the sale happen, with full protection for all workers. "It's a win-win-win result," said Local 400 president Mark Federici. "Good for Safeway, good for the store's customers, and good for our members." [link removed] Read more here.


Wins for Kellogg's and Takoma Park workers

The Kellogg's strike is over. Members of the Baker's union struck for more than two months to win a new contract that includes NO permanent two-tier wage system, a significant increase in pensions and cost of living raises. The Kellogg's strikers rejected an earlier offer to win a better contract.

Closer to home, after more than nine months of negotiations, members of AFSCME Local 3399 have approved a new agreement with the City of Takoma Park. The local represents about 80 city workers, who also turned down an earlier contract offer to win better wage increases and bonuses. [link removed] Read more here.

How the UMD bosses stole Christmas

When the University of Maryland abruptly canceled winter commencement activities last week "due to a sharp increase in covid cases on campus," AFSCME Maryland - which represents campus workers across the state - had this pointed response: "This is what happens when you refuse to bargain with the workers demand (for) more protections for themselves, the students and community. Awful." And, in a follow-up to a story we reported last week, Politics and Prose has apparently hired union-busting law firm Jones Day to fight their own employees, who want to organize a union at the local progressive bookstore.


Solidarity Center Reports from Tunisia and Maldives

A diverse group of workers with disabilities in Tunisia, from street cleaners to city employees, share their experience with discrimination and the barriers they face at work and in accessing government services and jobs in a new documentary, "We Are All Different." The UGTT (Tunisian General Labor Union) and Solidarity Center produced the video. In Maldives, more than 600 fishers waged an offshore protest to demand the government address job safety and health concerns and stop environmentally damaging practices that impact fisheries. [link removed] Find out more at Solidarity Center.


Today's labor quote: AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler, who said, of the Kellogg's strike:

"Working people stood their ground, and working people won."

TODAY'S LABOR HISTORY

This week's Labor History Today podcast: This week's show: [link removed] Striketober & The Great Resignation: Take this job and shove it! [link removed] Last week's show: [link removed] The first pay equity strike; Massachusetts' longest strike.


December 23
AFL officers are found in contempt of court for urging a labor boycott of Buck's Stove and Range Co. in St Louis, MO where the Metal Polishers were striking for a 9-hour day - 1908

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the nation's largest employer, with 1.4 million "associates," agrees to settle 63 wage and hour suits across the U.S., for a grand total of between $352 million and $640 million. It was accused of failure to pay overtime, requiring off-the-clock work, and failure to provide required meal and rest breaks - 2008

December 24

Lillian Roberts released after being jailed for organizing illegal strike by New York state employees; sentenced to 30 days but released after 11, on Christmas Eve. AFSCME ultimately won the strike -1968

72 copper miners' children die in panic caused by a company stooge at Calumet, Mich., who shouted "fire" up the stairs into a crowded hall where the children had gathered. They were crushed against closed doors when they tried to flee - 1913

December 25


A dynamite bomb destroyed a portion of the Llewellyn Ironworks in Los Angeles, where a bitter strike was in progress - 1910

December 26

Knights of Labor founded. Constitution bars from membership "parasites," including stockbrokers and lawyers - 1869
Workingmen's Party is reorganized as the Socialist Labor Party - 1877

- David Prosten.

 

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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.

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