LaborPains.org

Teachers union activist/blogger Dr. Homeslice has turned up a clip that expresses some of the emotions felt when classrooms empty for a strike. Watch at your own risk — it’s a little crazy.

I’ve come across at least two blogs putting up photographs of teachers choosing not to comply with the strike against the Hayward school district in California’s Bay Area. I’m not going to link to the blogs themselves, but I will link to this Daily Review editorial condeming such unprofessional, unkind behavior:

Teachers union President Kathy Crummey said she thinks the blog is “very clever.” And union rep and teacher Paulette Albert praised it on her own blog, “Hayward Educators Together!,” in an entry that was subsequently deleted.It’s not clever. It’s not even adult. The photos do nothing but cast Hayward teachers in a negative, unprofessional light.

The union has been adamant that teachers aren’t resorting to physical aggression on the picket line, but posting anonymous photos of “scabs” (and, by the way, Hayward teachers probably should know that’s a derogatory term) is just as bad as getting physical.

It’s obviously meant to intimidate subs and nonstriking teachers into fearing for their safety, and their reputations. Otherwise, why do it?

• Back to the Future: UNITE HERE officials successfully negotiate with an employer to ditch a 401(k) plan in favor of a defined benefit plan. Next on the agenda: more crippling work rules!
• Fuzzy Union Math: A new report from the Center for American Progress claims passing the anti-democratic “Employee Free Choice Act” will help cut poverty by half. To be fair, it will definitely stave off poverty among union officials.
• The Wall Street Journal‘s David Berman: “The best way to understand the sale of Chrysler Group is as blood sport between parent DaimlerChrysler and its North American unions.” See more here.
• Anatomy of a Strike: “Woerner and some Snokist managers say they began receiving death threats. Woerner says protesters waved posters with the image of her face with a bull’s-eye printed on her forehead.” Predictable outcome from bad labor leadership: “the union accepted an offer that included no wage boost and only scant benefits guarantees.”
• Hawaiian state rep.’s op-ed: “unionized workplaces are less efficient and competitive than non-union shops, and consumers have been voting with their feet.”

The National Right To Work Foundation has helped some Oregonians avoid the snare of SEIU officials’ dirty organizing tactics. As they attempt to build membership by skirting real secret ballot elections, SEIU is gaining a reputation for misleading would-be members. Now SEIU Local 49 officials have been forced to reach a settlement with the National Labor Relations Board to stop “card check” organizing for six months. NRTW has the details:

In October 2006, SEIU Local 49 union officials allegedly tricked Canney and his coworkers into signing “information flyers” that were later counted as votes favoring unionization. Soon after, SBM recognized the SEIU union as the monopoly bargaining agent despite the fact that an overwhelming majority of SBM employees signed two separate petitions to the NLRB – one prior to the SEIU union’s recognition and one after – stating their wish to remain nonunion. Canney also charged that Siltronics overlooked out of date cards, promised benefits, and otherwise deceived and coerced employees into supporting unionization.

The Oregonian has more on the story, including a federal authority’s observation that SEIU’s conduct is part of a pattern:

… Catherine Roth, acting regional director of the federal labor board in Seattle, pointed to a similar case last year involving the same SEIU local. “How we handled this case is how we’ve handled cases forever,” she said. “We need to make sure people understand the law and follow the law.”

Labor cheerleader Jonathan Tasini is a smart guy, and one heck of a blogger. But he’s off his rocker with his latest statement at The Huffington Post, where he’s using his virtual soapbox to try to whitewash the card check issue. He has the gall to say: “There is only one reason tens of millions of workers are not in unions: employer intimidation and illegal behavior.” Riiiiiiiiiiiight.

Tasini thinks there’s only one reason that those Americans aren’t in unions?! Is that one reason corruption? Is that one reason the fact that members’ money funds lofty salaries? Is that one reason that members’ dues fund stays at lavish hotels or pay for golf greens fees? Is that one reason the number of unfair labor practices filed against union bosses — primarily by their own members? Is that one reason the discrimination by union leadership? Or is that one reason the union boss’s tendency to get the local plant shut down?

I doubt Mr. Tasini even acknowledges those reasons. Instead, he claims that tens of millions of Americans are bullied by their bosses. A sweeping claim like that is, of course, nonsense. Perhaps he should look at the real numbers involved, instead of relying on AFL-CIO sponsored polls (which have never released to the public, meaning there’s no telling how loaded the poll questions were).

What is Mr. Tasini’s one reason for demanding an end to secret ballot elections for working Americans — the more than $56,000 he was personally paid in dues money for, among others, “consulting” between 2005 and 2006? Or is the one reason the $57,000 in union member money directed toward his Labor Research Association in those years? Mr. Tasini’s motivation may or may not be the money, but as he toes the union line he does seem pretty well-heeled.

• John Sweeney’s wearing Brooks Brothers ties. It’s OK because the company is organized (by UNITE HERE, from the Change To Win unions that left Sweeney wearing nothing but an uncomfortable smirk). Guess that lavish salary affords a nice wardrobe.
• A former Colorado AFL-CIO official, ousted by Sweeney, complains that Sweeney acts too much like an employer: “To terminate employees at will, without due process and a fair hearing, is what we, true unionists fight (against) every day of our lives … To relieve the two elected officers in this manner is gutless and shameful.”
• UFCW was forced to withdraw its unfair labor practice complaint against Albertsons because they lacked proof of any wrongdoing. Labor leaders often file bogus ULPs to apply public pressure to employers.
• Ryan Ellis: “Conduct a quick survey of the websites of the big labor unions and you will find that organized labor is currently undertaking at least two dozen major ‘corporate campaigns.’”

The realities of the business world are complex, and leaders have to keep things competitive in an ever-changing market. Nowhere is that more apparent than when the union is the employer.

In yesterday’s Los Angeles Times, reporter Jerry Hirsch noted that the potential for another major grocery strike is rooted in the one just three years ago. UFCW members in Southern California aren’t happy with the deal their union officials cut last time because it created a two-tiered system. (Others aren’t happy with the potential for another strike.) But as we’ve noted, a major UFCW official has enacted the exact same tiered policy for his own unionized staff. Then there is the issue of labor bosses trying to kill off secret ballot voting when workers — except for their own — are deciding their union membership status.

The latest example comes from SEIU, where president Andy Stern has been forcing mergers of local unions in hopes of increasing the union’s power. But all is not well (see here). The head of the BART railway employees chapter of SEIU, Sue Angeli, told the Contra Costa Times that the process has left employees open to — shock — a world in which one must remain flexible and relevant. Those ostensible indignities include reapplying for their jobs and possibly facing pay cuts. What’s bad for union members, it seems, is fine for union employees. The paper reports:

What’s not widely known, Angeli said, is that the union’s new management team has taken a page right out of the books of the employers the union typically battles.

“It’s hypocritical,” said Angeli, also a member of the Pleasant Hill City Council. “How can this organization preach fair treatment of employees and promote the representation of workers and then turn around and screw its own people? I’m ashamed to say that I am a member of SEIU.” …

If BART or any other employer attempted to do to its represented staff what SEIU is doing, Angeli said, “We’d be on strike in a heartbeat.”

The Pajaro Valley Federation of Teachers has caved, the Santa Cruz Sentinel reports this morning. As was blogged previously, union leadership attempted to deal with members voting out 14-year President Carolyn Savino by putting her in a full-time union post while cutting her victorious opponent’s job to part-time.

It appears, however, that the will of the voters will be upheld, more or less. The new president, Francisco Rodriguez, will have a full-time position, while ex-President Savino will stay on full-time until June in order to “assist in the transition of power.”

I’m sure they’ll get along just fine.