Power to Win: Fueling AFSCME's Future
Opening AFSCME’s 2008 Presidential candidate forum — the nation’s first — this February, where he told attendees, “We want a candidate who can articulate a bold vision and a real plan. Someone who will reform health care, safeguard our retirement security and maintain a vibrant public sector!”
Photo: Jean Dixon
Messsage from the President
By Gerald W. McEntee
AFSCME is changing big time — and there’s no stopping us now! We’re powered by the new Power to Win plan of the 21st Century Initiative passed at the International Convention in August of 2006. One of the cutting-edge initiatives of Power to Win is the AFSCME Leadership Academy, which will give leaders and activists the tools they need to build a stronger union. We are moving full steam ahead on the main priorities of the Power to Win plan: growing our union, increasing political action and getting more members involved. We are not just looking at the future, we are the future.
The Winning Ticket
We moved from the Convention right into the 2006 midterm election bigger, bolder and better because we had Power to Win — a plan to take back our country from the right-wing, anti-worker politicians. Labor mobilization efforts reached 13.4 million voters in 32 states. We pulled out all the stops when it came to PEOPLE fundraising, so we could go beyond union members to workers with the same concerns. The results were stunning: We picked up 10 legislative chambers, six governorships, 30 seats in the U.S. House and six seats in the U.S. Senate — which gave us control of both houses of Congress for the first time in 12 years.
The House of Labor and the voice of working people are generating new energy across the nation. Already, our hard work is paying off on our issues. During the first 100 hours of the 110th Congress, the House of Representatives voted 315–116 to raise the minimum wage — the first time in a decade.
Aligned with our Power to Win vision, affiliates from Connecticut to California fight every day to win health care for all and to implement strategies to limit rising costs. In states, and in Congress, we’re positioning health care as the issue for the 2008 elections.
To prepare right now for the 2008 elections and score federal, state and legislative victories, affiliates are working to increase our political power — a vital Power to Win mandate. Our goal is to recruit 40,000 member activists and register 90 percent of our members to vote by Election Day in 2008. And we took a running start toward sending a pro-worker, pro-family candidate to the White House when we convened the nation’s first Presidential candidate forum in Carson City, Nevada, in February. For details see the story in this issue.
The Growing Season
We’re also organizing. We did great in 2006. In fact, it was a banner year as over 50,000 new workers joined our union — despite a 326,000 decline of union membership nationwide.
A stellar example of how we built our success was aggressive targeting of new and non-traditional workers. In Michigan, where the average child care provider takes home $9,000 a year with no benefits, 40,000 providers won the largest card check in modern labor history. In Iowa, 3,000 home care workers — who serve the state’s elderly and disabled — won their first AFSCME contract. And in Oklahoma, workers rallied to uphold a 2004 state law allowing 10,000 non-uniformed municipal workers across the state to organize.
With our Power to Win commitment to organize at the rate of 3 percent per year for affiliates and 2 percent per year for the International Union, plus recruit and train organizers like never before, we are determined to outdo ourselves in 2007 and beyond.
End Game
So at the end of the day, when we take a long hard look at our union and ask, “What exactly is changing?” the answer will be, “Just about everything!” And when we ask how we’re fueling these changes, the answer will be, “We have the Power to Win.”
