‘Proud To Be AFSCME’

The International Union's external organizing drive — AFSCME in Motion — is picking up momentum. And it works. So say supervisors at the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority who followed the AIM game plan.

Los Angeles

First-line and senior supervisors at Los Angeles County’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority had tried again and again for more than a decade to form a union, but to no avail.

Frustration finally turned to elation in April. Armed with a fresh, new approach — the AIM organizing model — the 475 supervisors in the unit finally became part of the AFSCME family.

“We’re proud to be AFSCME,” declares one of them, James Adams, a self-proclaimed agitator who has worked at MTA for nearly 25 years and currently is a bus transit operations supervisor. “Now we have a real chance to level the playing field, rather than sit on the sidelines, accepting layoffs and budget cuts,” he says.

Adams says the time was ripe for intensifying the organizing effort last October, when many of the workers were ready to organize with AFSCME.

AIMing to succeed. Adams, along with Barbara Service, Kevin McGraff and other workers, approached AFSCME Council 36 Organizing Coordinator Karleen George for assistance. George introduced them to the International’s new external organizing model — AFSCME in Motion. The workers’ application of the AIM principles was a textbook example of how to conduct a successful campaign. (See below).

The AIM model looks at not only winning a representation election, but settling a bargaining unit’s first contract.

Initially, as outlined in the organizing model, the workers took care not to tip off their employer about the drive. To determine the level of interest, they developed a list of employee names and addresses, mapping out the workplace to target potential leaders and front-line activists interested in joining the union.

Armed with solid support and information, the workers held their first organizing committee meeting. It drew 75 workers — 15 percent of the unit — who volunteered to be part of the organizing effort. AIM recommends obtaining 10 to 15 percent of the workforce on the committee, which has the task of signing up at least 65 percent of the unit as union supporters to help ensure a successful outcome in the election.

Several weeks later, after one-on-ones and visits to nearly 20 MTA worksites, the committee signed up 72 percent of the workforce and filed a petition for a representation election in February.

Thumbs up and down. Service, a 28-year MTA worker who works as rail transit operations supervisor, believes one-on-ones — personal contact between employees supporting the union and their peers in the workplace — made the difference in getting workers to sign up.

Service says some long-time managers were reluctant to join because they thought the effort was futile, while others, frustrated because they had not received a raise since 1992, doubted the value of paying union dues. “So we had to keep the pressure on with the concrete facts: that AFSCME has a fine tradition of winning better wages, working conditions and benefits for its members,” she says.

Organizing activist and transit operations supervisor Fernando Hernandez says he, too, ran into opposition along the way, with workers citing retaliation and/or demotion as reasons why they were hesitant to join the union. “It was a collective effort, scrambling to get as many people to sign up as possible,” he says. He told workers they needed union protection, citing a 1993 incident in which upper management officials assured employees in Hernandez’ unit they would not be affected by layoffs, only to hand out termination papers to seven workers the next day.

Equipment maintenance supervisor Robert Torres, by contrast, didn’t face a lot of opposition in his organizing efforts. He set up a table outside the Gateway Building, passed out leaflets, answered questions and signed up members whenever he had time off from work. “I signed folks up left and right. ... I have a reputation of getting the job done, no matter what it is,” he says, proudly bragging that as a former bus maintenance worker for over 20 years, none of the buses he serviced ever failed an inspection. MTA has a fleet of 2,200 buses and a variety of other rail services, including rapid and trolley transportation.

Senior Supervisor Michael Turf says that what really convinced him to sign up was the fact that as a member, he would have ownership in the union.

AIM really works. The workers indeed made the campaign happen, noted George, by following many of the organizing model’s guidelines. They ran into periodic glitches, specifically ploys by MTA management to derail or stall their efforts.

The committee first had to convince MTA to waive the public utility code that does not allow supervisors in California to organize. (The state law governing collective bargaining by units of local government, on the other hand, allows supervisors to unionize, as do public employee laws in 20 other states.)

Then MTA did not want the supervisors under one bargaining unit, so the organizing committee compromised by agreeing to two separate units.

In the representation election, a whopping 84 percent of those eligible voted: First-line supervisors cast 324-37 ballots for the union and second-line managers voted 29-2.

Over a thousand more workers at the MTA are ready to organize. Administrative support and professional and technical employees are targeted for the next phase of the organizing drive.

The AIM model makes it clear that securing a first contract, not simply winning a representation election, is the ultimate goal of an organizing campaign.

George noted that the organizing committee that provided the base for the election victory stepped right in to prepare for bargaining their first contract. Committee members are now divided into five separate groups to work on contract language: seniority, grievance procedure, retirement, salary, and wages and benefits.

Hernandez, who serves on the seniority committee, says having AFSCME on our side “feels like a ton of bricks has been lifted off our shoulders. We now have a future with AFSCME.”

By Venida RaMar Marshall

Main Ingredients in AIM, AFSCME’s Organizing Model

The AIM Model works because it draws from the efforts of successful employee organizing campaigns all around the country. The document was the collective effort of 60 organizers from councils and locals around the country, as well as the International.

The model sets the stage for a winning campaign by pointing out what others have learned by trial-and-error: That certain elements are key in a successful effort “from first contact to first contract.” Those elements include:

• Thorough preparation
• One-on-one organizing
• Strong committees, giving workers ownership of the campaign
• Strong majority support for the union
• Fast-paced campaigns
• Involvement by current members in organizing new members
• Message discipline, projecting the reasons for unionizing even in the face of employer resistance
• Sound decisions at each stage

The publication — AFSCME in Motion: Organizing Together, Growing Stronger — is available to AFSCME councils and locals upon request from the International Department of Organizing and Field Services, 1625 L Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036-5687 or telephone (202) 429-1260 or e-mail organize@afscme.org.