Gaining Power Through Organizing

From state to state, workers are organizing with AFSCME for a voice on the job. Here are some recent victories:

CALIFORNIA

After their jobs had been subcontracted to privateers, 20 custodians from the University of California/San Francisco celebrated a return to full pay and benefits as members of Local 3299. Campus administrators, pressured into submission by workers and community supporters conducting weekly pickets, brought the jobs back "in house." In addition, the workers got a boost from Democratic Presidential candidate Howard Dean, who wrote a letter to the university on their behalf. The private companies — known as Excel and GMG — had cut the custodians' hourly pay from $15.65 to $11.71, eliminated their pensions, and reduced health care and other benefits.

In Tulare County, 2,500 home care workers wrapped up an organizing campaign in the state's Central Valley, in the process becoming members of United Domestic Workers of America-NUHHCE, an AFSCME affiliate. The county agreed to union recognition via card check. Tulare is the final milestone in UDWA's Central Valley effort, with a total of 13,700 home care workers now organized in the region's six counties.

FLORIDA

An organizing effort to bring AFSCME back to the state's university employees forges ahead. More than 800 workers at Florida International University made their school the latest of four to restore collective bargaining under Council 79 after Gov. Jeb Bush terminated the long-standing right on all campuses. Workers in the clerical and blue-collar units voted overwhelmingly — 475 to 93 — to return to union representation.

MISSOURI

With a single "no" vote, 94 workers from St. Louis' Lambert International Airport left no doubt about their determination to form a union with Local 410 (Council 72). "This is about winning a secure future and better jobs," says Willie Tannen, noting the Bush economy's threat to middle-class jobs. "With AFSCME, we'll have a strong voice for rights and respect."

NEW YORK

In the town of Alfred, 65 custodians from New York State College of Ceramics voted 29 to 23 join the Civil Service Employees Association/ AFSCME Local 1000.