Thumbs Up for West Coast PEOPLE

LOS ANGELES

What does James Adams tell members about voluntary PEOPLE contributions? "This is a necessity, not an option."

Adams, president of Local 3634 (Council 36), speculates: "If AFSCME has 1.4 million members, just think if everyone gave $1 a month: We could add all of that to our war chest."

Member contributions are a part of AFSCME's PEOPLE (Public Employees Organized to Promote Legislative Equality) program. A legislative and political-action operation, PEOPLE works with affiliates to mobilize members in state and local elections. In addition, volunteers are trained to participate in grassroots movements.

Says Cheryl Parisi, Council 36 executive director, "In California, we're in an enormous budget crisis. Virtually every public employee is going to be affected by the outcome of the decisions that get made. Our members appreciate the importance of political action and want to be as powerful as they can be."

Last January, the council's executive board established a one-year goal to add 1,000 members to the rolls of PEOPLE contributors. The panel developed a variety of plans based on the numbers in each of its 42 locals.

For example, Local 3090 — the largest, with 5,000 clerical workers — mounted an aggressive worksite campaign. Such ambitious activists as Annette Williams, Norma Torres and Carmen Hayes-Walker held on-site meetings, talking to their colleagues, one on one, to gain their support. The result: 300 new participants — which is 30 percent of the council's target number — in less than six months.

QUICK RESULT. Then there's Local 3624, checking in with less than 50 members. Union officials gave jackets and T-shirts to new folks signing up. In a single night, Parisi says, 30 members (representing more than 70 percent of the membership) joined PEOPLE.

Local 3634 has built on the momentum of its successful organizing campaign in late 1999. When activists organized their counterparts in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority, they were also able to convince 10 percent of the workers to join PEOPLE.

Today, the 500-member unit has reached 30 percent by getting associates to sign up at membership meetings. Sonny Abrego, 3634's PEOPLE chair, says activists make the connection between politics and work. When California lawmakers tried to introduce a privatization bill, Abrego says pro-union legislators, supported by AFSCME, killed it. That kind of can-do example is shared at meetings.

 In addition, Local 3634 members just agreed to a long-term deal through 2008. Says Adams: "We make sure people know that, without our political involvement, we would not have received the contract."

He also declares: "As public employees, we are the only ones who have the right to elect our bosses. We keep drilling into people and telling them that this is why we need their PEOPLE contributions. When you can elect your own bosses, you can hold them accountable."

— Jimmie Turner