Pres. Lee Saunders, Sec.-Treas. Laura Reyes and Martin Luther King III joined former strikers and union members from across the country at the renaming ceremony.

More than 1,500 union members and allies marched from the Local 1733 union hall to the National Civil Rights Museum. Local and nationally renowned leaders spoke in front of the historic Lorraine Motel, where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his life fighting for racial and economic justice 45 years ago today.

President Saunders rallied the crowd saying, “This is the beginning of a new movement in Memphis and across the country.” Major gains have been won since 1968 but the fight continues. Once again, AFSCME members are fighting for their livelihoods and to keep strong services for Tennessee community members. Threats of privatization loom large in the city, and elsewhere, and they’re facing the largest school district merger in United States history – a merger that threatens to put children's needs last.

Saunders was joined by Rev. Dwight Montgomery of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Wade Henderson of the Leadership Conference for Civil and Human Rights and Van Jones of Rebuild the Dream.

Members of the International Association of Fire Fighters held signs reading, “I Am a Fire Man.” Harold Schaitberger, president of the IAFF, said, “The struggles from 1968 are the same struggles today…I don’t care if they have a ‘D’ behind their name or an ‘R,’ we need leaders who will stand up, not step back.”

“Today, we sent a message that the fight isn’t over,” said Keith Johnson, chapter chair for the sanitation workers of Memphis. “We’re going to fight on and fight harder. All we’ve ever asked for is respect for the honest work we do.” 

Sec.-Treas. Laura Reyes, Martin Luther King III, Pres. Lee Saunders and IAFF Pres. Harold Schaitberger lead more than 1,500 union members and allies in a march from the Local 1733 union hall to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. (Photos by John Focht)

GEO Group was on track to give Florida Atlantic University $6 million to place its name on the school’s football stadium for 12 years. Following student outcry, a letter signed by more than 60 anti-private prison groups including AFSCME, and media attention from the New York Times to The Colbert Report, the so-called “Owlcatraz” deal was called off by GEO.

These private prison corporations often cut a deal with state governments promising to bring down corrections costs – while still making a profit – although the alleged savings prove illusory. GEO, one of the largest prison privateers in the county, has been under attack for years for its cost-cutting methods that put all stakeholders at risk, from corrections officers to the general public and even the prisoners themselves.

Private prison companies, including GEO, use cost-cutting methods that include: refusing costly (i.e. violent, ill or otherwise high-needs) prisoners and forcing them into the public prison system; setting mandatory capacity quotas on the state government; for-profit overcrowding; cutting corrections officers’ salariesby tens of thousands of dollars; dangerous understaffing and allowing facilities to fall into cruel and unusual disrepair.

The public backlash against private imprisonment – including an official condemnation by the New Hampshire House of Representatives – is unsurprising in light of the facts of for-profit corrections facilities. AFSCME will continue to fight against for-profit prisons and state privatization which serve to line the pockets of corporate fat cats at the expense of public services and the working families who provide them.

Forty-five years ago, Dr. King stood at the pulpit of the Mason Temple in what would be his final act of solidarity. His words were more like prophecies.

“And then I got into Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out…Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead,” he said. “But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.”

Forty-five years ago today, King was assassinated.

Attendees of Wednesday night's forum and celebration.

Yesterday, hundreds gathered at the Mason Temple for an event organized by AFSCME to commemorate King’s life and his work on behalf of 1,300 striking sanitation workers of AFSCME Local 1733 in 1968. The evening started with a song and a prayer and AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker set the tone for the evening, challenging the crowd to maintain unity.

AFSCME Pres. Lee Saunders honored the 1968 strikers. “They made a demand, and their demand sounded throughout Memphis. When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., stood with them, together, they changed the course of history.”

He challenged attendees to move King’s work forward. “We must be agents of change, just as the sanitation workers were 45 years ago. We must pick up the torch that Dr. King and the sanitation workers carried, letting its flame light the path and guide us through the darkness.”

Indeed, like those famous strikers who came before them, many current workers of Local 1733 still suffer from unfair wages and unsafe working conditions.

MSNBC host Karen Finney led a panel discussion of leaders including Van Jones of Rebuild the Dream, Johanna Puno Hester of APALA and an AFSCME International Vice president, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN), Terry O’Neill of the National Organization for Women and Benjamin Todd Jealous of the NAACP. The panel covered everything from budgets and equal pay to voting rights and immigrant justice, focusing on the need for unity and stamina.

King’s eldest son, Martin Luther King III, stood in the exact spot his father did 45 years ago. He recalled lessons he learned from his father and mother, lessons of love and solidarity. And he ended, “We can never ever forget about organizing. Organize. Organize. Organize.”

Walker hails from California, and is grateful for having the opportunity to represent her fellow UDW home care providers.

“Today I got caught in the rain and had to buy a hat,” she said. “It’s rainy and cold in this city – I decided to stay in to save up my energy for tomorrow. I’m going to need it.”

Like other AFSCME members, Walker will be getting up bright and early Thursday to participate in a Volunteer Member Organizer blitz program to help her AFSCME brothers and sisters who work in the Memphis city schools. They are fighting back against widespread layoffs due to a recent decision by the school board to privatize custodial services.

“I’ll be visiting both AFSCME members to turn them out to this week’s MLK events and non-members to move them to join the union,” she said.

Walker also said she is looking forward to the events in the evening.

“We’re having a panel discussion on economic justice at the historic Mason Temple,” she said. “We will be joined by civil rights and community leaders, including Martin Luther King III.”

She added, “I’m excited to make a difference in this civil rights movement and I thank God for allowing me to see this day…. I’m overwhelmed with gratitude for this opportunity to honor Dr. King and AFSCME Local 1733 sanitation workers.”

The program is open to graduating high school seniors who are also a child of (or financially dependent grandchild of) an active or retired, full dues-paying AFSCME member. In addition, the person must be an applicant to an accredited college or university and subsequently accepted as a full-time student in a four year degree program.

Each $2,000 scholarship, which may be used for any field of study, can be renewed each year for a maximum of four years provided the student remains enrolled in a full-time course of study.

The 2013 winners are:

1. Cody Brown, Oklahoma Local 2875
2. Alisha Donnell, California Council 36
3. Alyssa Friedman, Rhode Island Council 94
4. Samantha Glass, New York District Council 37
5. Maceo Gutierrez-Higgins, Oregon Council 75
6. Selena Hamer, Georgia Local 1644
7. Hannah Kangas, Minnesota Council 5
8. Brianna Messner, Wisconsin Council 40
9. Kevin Simpson, Pennsylvania Council 13
10. Leamon Wilson, Michigan Council 25

Click here for applications and further details about the AFSCME Family Scholarship, or call AFSCME’s Department of Education and Leadership Training at (202) 429-1256.

On April 3, 1968, a heavy storm rumbled in Memphis and threatened to keep union members, civil rights leaders and community activists at home. But the activists braved the storm and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. headed down to the Mason Temple. When he got there, Dr. King commanded the pulpit. He preached on the story of the Good Samaritan and said, “The question is not, ‘If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me? If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?’ That’s the question.”

On the following day, Dr. King was assassinated. Twelve days later, the sanitation strike ended. The city agreed to recognize the workers’ union and raise wages for the workers.

This year marks the 45th anniversary of Dr. King’s final act of solidarity. In commemoration of his life and his solidarity, union members, civil rights leaders and community activists are again gathering in Memphis for a series of historic events.

On April 3, the community will gather from 7-10 p.m. in the historic Mason Temple at 930 Mason St., Memphis, Tenn. Highlights a panel discussion on economic and racial justice including Karen Finney of MSNBC, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN), Benjamin Todd Jealous of the NAACP, Van Jones of Rebuild the Dream and Terry O'Neill of the National Organization for Women. Civil rights leaders the Rev. Al Sharpton, AFL-CIO Exec. Vice Pres. Arlene Holt Baker, AFSCME Pres. Lee Saunders and Martin Luther King III will also give special remarks.

On April 4 at 8:30 a.m., we will rename a local street 1968 Strikers Lane, then march from AFSCME Local 1733 (485 Beale St.) to the National Civil Rights Museum (450 Mulberry St.) and end with a rally.

The invitation from Martin Luther King III, AFSCME Pres. Lee Saunders and Rev. Al Sharpton reads, “We look back this year and remember, because we know that the foundation laid in the most triumphant and tragic days of the civil rights movement – of our economic justice – must inspire and guide us in the struggles we now face.”

For more information and to RSVP, please visit www.memphis2013.org.

During this year’s Women’s History Month, there has been a lot of talk about the need for women to “lean in” – or step up – in order to move up in the workplace. In Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead, author and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg tells women they need to “lean in” to claim their place at the table. Some have criticized Sandberg for not understanding the real plight of working women. Others have praised her work as a step forward.

Amidst this chatter about “leaning in,” Brigid O’Farrell, author of She Was One of Us:  Eleanor Roosevelt and the American Worker, said that the best way for women to improve their working lives is by joining a union. O’Farrell wrote:

In 1936, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote in her My Day column that there were only two ways to bring about protection for workers – “legislation and unionization”…Sisters can cheer on the struggle for equality among the CEOs, but also use that struggle to remind people of what is needed in the “other women’s movement.” We can seize this moment of discussion and organize.  As Eleanor Roosevelt told delegates to a CIO convention, “We can’t just talk. We have got to act.”

This Wednesday, March 27 at 8 p.m. EDT, O’Farrell will lead the AFSCME Online Leadership Academy’s newest webinar, “Eleanor’s Voice in Leadership and Labor History.”  This leadership course for women will examine Roosevelt’s leadership and her relationship with the labor movement. Like many union women, her labor story is not widely known. A proud union member for more than 25 years, Roosevelt was a champion for all working people, especially women.

This course will be initially offered as a live webinar and later launched as an OnDemand course with interactive learning activities. Click here to attend the live webinar on March 27 at 8 p.m. EDT. If you are unable to connect to the online portion of the course, you can listen in by dialing 1-877-534-5630 and entering access code 2265380409.

Contact AFSCME’s Education Department at 202-429-1256 or education@afscme.org if you have any questions. 

They pushed back loudly against the council’s previous approach of balancing the city’s budget at the expense of working men and women, and in response the city came back to the table with a new proposal removing furloughs for the second year.

Although not originally on the council’s agenda, the workers – a sea of AFSCME green T-shirts – made themselves heard and became part of the agenda. In the last four years, when the city faced hard economic times, the workers understood and made tough sacrifices to help the city. Now, when the city is on firmer financial footing, officials have been unwilling to negotiate fair contracts with the workers that are more reflective of the economic health of the city.

“Do you enjoy your warm offices in the winter and your air-conditioned offices in the summer?” member Garrett Brown asked the council, pointing out that his unit kept them running, along with keeping the lights on and the trucks running for the city. “We produce 11 percent of the revenue for the city and that is something you all need to remember at the table.”

Joining with their Local 101 brothers and sisters in solidarity were United EMS Workers-AFSCME Local 4911.

“I’m here to stand in unity with my union brothers and sisters of AFSCME,” said Jason Brollini, a paramedic at Rural/Metro 911.  “I’m also here because I take great pride in how beautiful our city looks, and that’s all thanks to these folks.”

Next Wednesday, city workers will head back to the table to continue negotiations for a fair contract.

Watch the latest episode of AFSCME.TV to see how our efforts make a real difference in the push for reform, and why it’s the right thing to do.

Since February 2011, these home care workers put every effort into bargaining their first contract. They held weekly testimonies at Board of Supervisor meetings. They rallied. They executed strategic media campaigns. They garnered support from elected officials, community partners and faith leaders. They attempted mediation again and again.

Last week, these workers finally saw victory when, behind closed doors, the county’s Board of Supervisors, acting as the Governing Board of the IHSS Public Authority, approved an agreement that included a historic wage increase for county home care workers.

Margaret Lewis, a home care worker from Garberville, Calif., and member of CUHW, said, “I’m glad we’re finally able to move forward. The real winners today are the people we care for. Better pay for county caregivers means better care for our seniors and disabled.”

CUHW statewide Pres. Gail Ennis called the agreement a “great victory for home care workers who have lived in poverty for over a decade.”

AFSCME Sec.-Treas. Laura Reyes – who volunteered for weeks on the local’s recognition campaign – added, “When I knocked on the doors of Humboldt home care workers back in 2011, I saw how many were struggling to make ends meet while caring deeply for the people they serve. I’m so proud that these workers will now be able to continue providing quality care while earning a fair wage.”

The agreement must be ratified by county home care workers and receive final approval from the state and county before the wage increase takes effect. 

I work in the Bureau of Justice Assistance at the Department of Justice. I work for the American people and I am worried about the dangerous effects sequestration will have on the projects that I help make happen.

The Justice Department awards grants to local governments. Those grants are used to keep our communities safe.  I’m talking about bully prevention programs in our schools, support for victims of violent crimes and training for local police forces. When sequestration cuts hit us, the projects we work with will not receive the support they need, funds will dry up and our communities will suffer.

So many politicians in Washington claim the sequester cuts are invisible cuts. Well, some of the most important things we do at the Department of Justice are designed to be invisible.

Take for example one project we fund that targets Internet predators. We have law enforcement officials scour the Internet to catch predators trolling in online chat rooms and other websites to prey on children. You may never meet these law enforcement officials; in fact if you do, it means you were doing something wrong.

But when your kid logs on to Facebook or starts tweeting, you want to know that someone is there keeping the bad guys at bay. These invisible crime fighters are in front of their computers protecting our kids from the very real threat of online predators. The Internet is a big place and slowing their work or asking them to do more with less will leave us all more vulnerable.      

Sometimes it’s the things we can’t see that we really need the most. 

Elaine Snyder, a member of AFSCME Council 26, works for the Bureau of Justice Assistance with the Department of Justice. She lives in Frederick, Md. 

The workers are employed in the state Office of the Comptroller, Department of Education, Retirement and Pension System and Transportation Authority. Nearly 7 out of 10 workers cast ballots for AFSCME.

The Maryland General Assembly passed a bill last April that authorized collective bargaining rights to workers in these four previously excluded agencies – rights previously granted to other state public service workers. AFSCME members lobbied hard for this bill.

 “State workers deserve the same right to vote for collective bargaining if we choose to that most other workers already have,” said state employee Jody Curry, a new, proud AFSCME member. “Nearly 70 percent of my co-workers and I voted yes, for AFSCME 3 and collective bargaining.”

Council 3 Pres. Patrick Moran said the decisive victory came at a significant time in the new council’s history.

“We were founded in December, so to come out of the gate with this significant organizing victory shows that unions are very much here for workers and workers are responding to that,” Moran said.

Workers nationwide are winning a voice on the job through AFSCME. See some of our latest victories here.

“Workers are under attack and deserve a true advocate,” said President Saunders. “Corporate-backed politicians are attacking fundamental American rights on the job, from collective bargaining to workplace safety to retirement security.”

Perez’s “experience, and his deep respect for working men and women, makes him an excellent choice for Secretary of Labor,” President Saunders added. In addition to his background as assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, Perez also was a Justice Department attorney for 12 years, prosecuting civil rights cases. The Harvard-educated lawyer also was a deputy assistant attorney general in the Clinton administration and a former secretary of the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.

As a first-generation Dominican American, Perez also would become the only Latino in President Obama’s Cabinet at this time. That is no small matter in a nation where the Latino community is increasingly important to the nation’s economic growth.

With so much at stake, President Saunders said, “we urge his swift confirmation.”

“The time is now to fix our broken immigration system,” Pres. Lee Saunders told the cheering crowd gathered outside a local church for an afternoon of activism and testimonials from immigrant workers and students. Joining him were Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Illinois and Rep. Juan Vargas of California. Saunders urged the hundreds in attendance Saturday to demand action from Congress. “We’ve got to be on the frontlines of this fight to bring 11 million aspiring citizens out of the shadows.”

Rally participant Gilbert Leos, a home care provider in San Diego with United Domestic Workers/AFSCME Local 3930, is also a former border patrol agent. In both his current and former profession, he saw the desire of immigrants to come to this country to improve their own lives and to make a contribution.

“I saw what the needs are for immigration reform,” said Leos. “People just want to have a better life and make a decent living.”

Members of the United Domestic Workers, University of California Local 3299, Local 127 (Council 36) and United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals stood in solidarity with their sisters and brothers from the AFL-CIO San Diego and Imperial Counties Central Labor Council and Unite Here at the event.

The afternoon’s events were part of an ongoing cross-country tour mobilizing activists. Future stops include northern California, New York, New Jersey and Chicago. AFSCME Sec.-Treas. Laura Reyes, who sits on the National AFL-CIO Immigration Reform Task Force, recently appeared at a rally in Anaheim, Calif.

On Saturday, waving signs that read, “The time is now,” attendees echoed the message that immigrant workers want to join in the fight for a voice on the job, good wages and better working conditions. But they can’t speak out and join the fight if they’re denied the basic right to citizenship in the country where they labor in service.

“We have to pull together as a community to make this reform happen,” UDW Executive Director and AFSCME International Vice President Doug Moore said. His fellow International Vice President Johanna Hester pointed out that this effort will come from just such a collaboration. “We are seeing labor joining with our progressive allies, faith-based groups and community members with a new sense of urgency and commitment.”

Also participating were Maria Elena Durazo, chairwoman of the AFL-CIO Immigration Reform Task Force and Lorena Gonzales, Secretary-Treasurer of the Central Labor Council. At a prayer service preceding the rally, immigrants shared their stories of struggle and fear under the current system.

Gov. Dannel Malloy signed the bill into law establishing the Sandy Hook Workers Assistance Fund after it was unanimously approved by both chambers of the state General Assembly.

The fund will complement the state’s workers’ compensation benefits, which do not include coverage for post-traumatic stress disorder or other emotional or mental trauma. And it is intended for all workers affected by the tragedy – from first responders to teachers and custodians.

“We commend General Assembly leaders for uniting in a bipartisan fashion to help workers who suffered great emotional trauma from responding to the massacre,” said Salvatore Luciano, an AFSCME International vice president and executive director of AFSCME Council 4, which represents 35,000 employees, many of them in Connecticut state and local government. "We must continue working together to honor the brave children and workers who died that horrible day, and to help the Newtown community heal.”

First responders who walked into the horrific scene inside the school on Dec. 14 – after a gunman shot and killed 20 children and six adults – were traumatized by the experience. And many of them received health services from the Connecticut Council of Police Unions (AFSCME Council 15), which also encouraged them to attend peer-support team meetings.

But because workers’ compensation does not cover injuries resulting from mental trauma, many who needed help the most were left to fend for themselves. Unable to return to work, they depleted sick and vacation time before being forced to choose between fully recovering and earning a paycheck.

“This fund will now take care of their immediate needs,” said Jeffrey Matchett, executive director of AFSCME Council 15, which includes members of the Newtown Police Department. “It’s going to make up for some lost wages and copays for insurance, and it’s going to fill the short-term void left by workers’ compensation.”

The new law will allow those eligible to receive financial assistance for uncompensated leave from their job, and pay for related medical expenses not covered by their own health insurance. The program, which will limit each claim to one year of benefits, will be privately funded and administered by the state’s Office of Victims Services.

AFSCME applauds this effort, as well as a separate bill yet to be signed into law that would require Connecticut’s workers’ compensation system to cover mental or emotional illness resulting from workplace trauma.

Montgomery says she’s never had a bad experience with the people she serves. However, the drivers are currently losing their independence and their voice on the job, and “We have to stop it,” she said.

Cab drivers in New Orleans are currently considered independent contractors. They have no right to collective bargaining. The City of New Orleans controls every aspect of their work. Yet, the workers themselves have no voice to challenge their working conditions.

To engage the community they serve in their struggle, drivers are partnering with AFSCME Council 17 and meeting with progressive organizations across the city to drive home their message: All workers in New Orleans deserve a voice.

When taxi drivers have a voice, the community will prosper.

“We provide a quality and necessary service to the people of New Orleans and to the whole tourism industry,” Montgomery said.

New Orleans' tourism industry brings in $5.5 billion per year, accounting for 40 percent of New Orleans’ tax revenues.  From the pick-up area at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport to the shuttling of tourists between the French Quarter and Bourbon Street, the tourism industry relies heavily on quality cab services.

Right now, with the help of AFSCME Council 17, drivers are working to remind Mayor Mitch Landrieu and the City Council of how a safe, stable tax system in New Orleans benefits everyone.

“In the taxi cab industry, you meet so many people from around the country and around the world,” Montgomery said. “You get to talk to these people and get to know where they come from. I’ve had everybody in my cab from the hustlers to the CEOs. I treat everyone the same.”

Now, it’s time for Montgomery and her fellow New Orleans cab drivers to get fair treatment on the job. 

The daughter of Donald and Virginia O’Brien, Catherine is in her 50s but functions at the level of a seven-month-old. She suffered severe brain damage at birth, cannot talk or verbally communicate her needs, is subject to seizures, requires a special diet, and must be transported in a wheelchair.

Yet despite all this, Catherine is “contented and happy” at the publicly run facility, according to her parents, who write: “She receives the best of care there. The professional doctors, nurses, social workers, therapists, personal care assistants and many other employees on staff provide a high quality of life for Cathy and all the residents.”

This is why it is so upsetting to the parents and guardians of the more than 700 residents at the Woodbridge and North Jersey developmental centers that state officials are trying to shut them down ever since a government-appointed task force last year decided so. It issued a legally binding recommendation for shutting down the facilities.

According to a survey in 2012, 96 percent of parents or guardians of the severely intellectually disabled individuals who live there oppose the closing and the transfer of their loved ones to privately run community homes.

But because of Gov. Chris Christie’s political agenda – with an emphasis on privatization, despite evidence that publicly run centers provide better care – the parents of Catherine and others may soon have to travel more than 100 miles to see them. This sudden change in the lives of individuals who lack the tools to understand the decisions made for them may prove to be extremely disruptive.

Catherine “is classified as not being a candidate for living in a community home by the professional staff inter-disciplinary team,” her parents write. “She becomes very upset by change and needs frequent contact with us to keep her stable and happy.”

Not only do the Woodbridge and North Jersey centers fulfill the needs of their residents, they are the only facilities of their kind in the northern part of the state. Privately run facilities often have little oversight and have been known to reap millions of dollars from Medicaid. And there are proven dangers to individuals who are transferred from developmental centers to community homes.

Today, the hopes of those affected by this short-sighted decision are pinned on legislation introduced recently by Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle that would keep at least one developmental center in each region of the state. Also, state Sen. Joseph Vitale plans to introduce legislation that would keep both centers open.

AFSCME is leading a coalition of families, friends and caregivers to keep all the state’s seven care centers open, “as a life-saving choice for our most severely intellectually disabled individuals and their families.” The group has a Facebook page.

Please help keep open the Woodbridge and North Jersey centers by signing this online petition.

On Feb. 22, the progressive magazine published on its website an article that took AFSCME and other unions to task for “furthering America’s addiction to mass incarceration.”

Mother Jones is an important voice, normally outside of the mainstream media’s anti-union chorus.

But boy did they get this one wrong.

In reality, the issue of “mass incarceration” never entered the Tamms prison debate – which itself was part of a much wider debate about Illinois prison closures over the past year. The pro-closure side of that debate argued five prisons should be shuttered because the state couldn’t afford them.

AFSCME Council 31 – which represents Illinois corrections officers – argued that it was wrong and dangerous to close any prison at a time when the state’s all-time high population of more than 49,000 adult inmates is crowded into prisons built for just 32,000. Our case was for the safety of workers, the dignity of inmates and the security of the general public.

Mother Jones neglected to mention Council 31’s efforts to prevent the closure of the Dwight Correctional Center for women and three secure halfway houses known as Adult Transition Centers. These facilities offer programs that have been uniquely successful in reducing recidivism, and in speaking out to keep them open, the union has been joined by the state’s leading inmate advocacy group, the John Howard Association. The union and inmate advocates agree that the closures would worsen overcrowding, violence and inmate living conditions throughout the rest of the state prison system.

The authors of the piece also failed to note the union’s support for legislation passed last year to reinstate the awarding of good-time credits for inmates. AFSCME supported this legislation because it could be a positive first step toward relieving dangerous and degrading overcrowding. Moreover, when responsibly administered, good-time incentives are a crucial tool to encourage the completion of rehabilitative programs that reduce recidivism and reward safe comportment and good behavior.

Efforts to limit overcrowding, preserve rehabilitative programs and reinstate good-time credits may be a lot of things, but “furthering America’s addiction to mass incarceration” they’re not.

In reality, incarceration rates are driven by criminal statutes and sentencing laws, not by our union’s insistence on maintaining safe conditions in the prisons where our members work or our advocacy for the rehabilitative programs they administer.

Make no mistake, there are significant problems plaguing America’s corrections system. Chief among them, the danger posed to our communities, inmates and our nation’s corrections workers by turning public prisons into private, profit-making institutions. Corrections Corporation of America last year sent a letter to our nation’s governors offering to buy their prisons in exchange for a 20-year guarantee that the prisons would remain 90% occupied. As shocking as this is, so-called “bed guarantees” are not uncommon. If you want to figure out what’s driving our nation’s addiction to mass incarceration, follow the money.

Mother Jones would better serve its readers by shining a light on prison privateers’ toxic agenda, not by inaccurately attacking those of us who work every day to help our communities.

Since then, AFSCME has indeed been on the frontlines. First, AFSCME members lobbied more than 50 members of Congress on the issue during its Legislative Conference. Now, AFSCME is co-sponsoring a series of events across the country calling for fair and comprehensive immigration reform.

The message is clear:  We need our members of Congress to pass common-sense immigration legislation that creates a roadmap to citizenship for aspiring Americans. Currently, there is an underground economy where employers pay immigrants workers next-to-nothing and have them work in dangerous conditions. Plus, these employers avoid paying taxes. This lowers standards for all workers and deprives our communities of much-needed revenue. A clear path to citizenship would raise wages for all workers – no matter where they were born.

This past weekend, hundreds of workers and community allies came out to affirm that message at AFSCME-sponsored rallies in Orlando, Fla., Haines City, Fla. and Union, N.J.  

In Orlando, Representative Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), a key champion on Capitol Hill for immigrant rights, spoke. He said, “The moment for immigration reform is now. The Latino community…with your massive voter turnout…along with union allies like AFSCME, SEIU and UNITE HERE will make it happen. Sí, se puede!”

More events are scheduled for the tour on Thursday in Chicago, Ill., on Saturday in Houston, Texas, March 16 in Chula Vista, Calif., and March 17 in northern California. Check back here for event details.

Seven items from your local dollar store, not including sales tax.

An Angry Whopper with a side order of French fries.

Two packages of F.M. Brown’s Extreme Select Seeds for your hamster.

Not bad, perhaps, if you like bargains, fast food and small, furry pets. But if $7.25 – the federal minimum wage – is your hourly pay, what you can’t buy is a decent living.

Sen. Tom Harkin (IA) and Rep. George Miller (CA) want to raise the federal minimum wage. They plan to introduce a bill that would raise it to $10.10 an hour and provide for automatic future increases based on the cost of living.

“It is more apparent than ever that working families struggling to make ends meet on today’s minimum wage…need and deserve a raise,” they said in a jointly issued statement. “By acting now to raise the minimum wage we will lift families out of poverty while simultaneously giving a significant boost to our economy. An increase in the minimum wage is long overdue.”

President Obama in his State of the Union address called for raising the federal minimum wage for the first time since a legislated increase five years ago, from $7.25 to $9 an hour. Ultra-conservatives immediately criticized his proposal and argued that it would lead to higher unemployment. But many economists dismissed their concerns, believing that raising the wage would stimulate the economy because the lowest-paid workers would have more money to spend on products and services.

Aside from stimulating the economy, a higher minimum wage would help address growing inequality, particularly for women because they constitute a majority of the workers who would benefit, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

The federal minimum wage was last raised five years ago. Since then, several states have adopted higher minimum wages. (The highest minimum wage in the nation is Washington State’s, which is set at $9.19 an hour.) But in nearly half the states, the minimum wage is the same as the federal wage.  

“If we want the fruits of economic growth to benefit the vast majority, we will have to adopt a different set of guideposts for setting economic policy, as the ones in place over the last several decades have served those with the most income, wealth and political power,” wrote Lawrence Mishel, president of the EPI. “Establishing a higher minimum wage is an important piece of what is needed.”

On March 4, 1913, Pres. William Howard Taft signed a bill creating the U.S. Department of Labor. It was the first time that workers gained a voice with a seat in the President’s Cabinet. Since then, it has been a defender of workers’ rights in a battle that continues today.

A proclamation by Pres. Barack Obama states:

“Over the course of a century, the Department of Labor has fought to secure strong safeguards for workers and their families. It helped lay the cornerstones of middle class security, from the 40-hour work week and the minimum wage to family leave and pensions.”

The DOL’s mission may be 100 years old, but the need to defend workers’ rights is one that must be recommitted to daily. Today, the right of collective bargaining – for better wages and working conditions – is under attack like never before. So-called “right-to-work” (for less) bills advocated by corporate-backed groups such as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) are spreading nationwide, threatening to undermine the very rights won during those 100 years.

Recently, in places like Indiana, Kansas and Ohio, the fight goes on. The DOL’s stated goal of “strengthening free collective bargaining” is a work in progress – one that AFSCME will continue to support with boots on the ground.

Learn more about the DOL. Check out the department’s centennial video, an interactive timeline, a collection of historical posters and newsletter vignettes, including an article on the DOL’s mission to protect the rights of union members with the creation of the Office of Labor-Management Standards.

Duncan immediately contacted Richmond Police Capt. Jim Branum to tell him what he knew. Police followed up, finding a man scraping a decal off a red pick-up truck. It was the same decal a passerby spotted on a truck a day earlier. That passerby connected the truck to a local store robbery that same day and notified the police.

Once the details of the robbery and suspect truck became public, Duncan realized that he, too, had seen the suspect vehicle and knew where it was. As a result of his quick thinking, police secured a warrant to search the suspect’s home. He was later charged with one count of armed robbery.

Richmond Police Department Capt. Bill Shake told a reporter for pal-item.com, “We would not have been able to solve this as fast if it had not been for citizen input.”

Duncan and Richmond resident Russell Mabry – who gave police the initial description of the suspect’s vehicle – were honored on Feb. 4 with a commendation from the Richmond Police Department. Duncan’s proclamation stated:   

“Your dedication to the quality of life in Richmond and your community spirit and sense of teamwork as an employee of the City of Richmond; and with your assistance in locating the vehicle involved in the series of Village Pantry robberies is to be commended. You have raised the bar for many to achieve.”

A group called Fix the Debt, which advocates slashing the deficit by cutting such social safety net programs as Social Security and Medicare, includes “lobbyists, board members or executives for corporations that have worked aggressively to shape the contours of federal spending and taxes, including many of the tax breaks that would be at the heart of any broad overhaul,” according to The New York Times.

Fix the Debt, armed with a reported $43 million corporate-donor war chest, recently began a national advertising campaign urging President Obama and members of Congress to revise the tax code and also reduce long-term spending on social programs, The Times reported.

This comes after the group failed to win any of their three major objectives in the compromise “fiscal cliff” bill that Congress passed on New Year’s Day: cutting Social Security and Medicare spending, cutting corporate tax rates and shifting to a system that would grant a permanent corporate tax holiday on offshore income.

The real motive of this group is laid bare by The Times article. For instance, it highlights that a key member of Fix the Debt, former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia, “received more than $300,000 in compensation in 2011 as a board member of General Electric. The company is among the most aggressive in the country at minimizing its tax obligations.”

Another Fix the Debt leader, former Louisiana congressman Jim McCrery, is also a lobbyist whose “clients have included the Alliance for Savings and Investment, a group of large companies pushing to maintain low tax rates on dividend income, and the Win America Campaign, a coalition of multinational corporations that lobbied for a one-time “repatriation holiday” allowing them to move offshore profits back home without paying taxes.

Ironically, some Fix the Debt leaders represent companies that paid no net federal income tax from 2008 through 2010, including Boeing, Corning, General Electric, Honeywell and Verizon Communications. Helping to reduce the national debt by paying their fair share is obviously not on their agenda.

Fix the Debt’s “official” mission was to urge “Washington to agree to comprehensive debt reform that avoids the fiscal cliff and puts the long-term U.S. debt load on a gradual path of reduction.” Now we know its real motive is not to fix the debt unless it also protects the tax loopholes that benefit its members, even if it comes out of the hides of those who can least afford it. Learn more about the hypocrisy of Fix the Debt here.

Their message to the governor: No more budget cuts that hurt education and support for local governments. The demonstration, outside the Veterans Memorial Civic and Convention Center, was sponsored by the progressive labor group We Are Ohio.

“The last couple of years have been tough, but we’re working our way back,” said Bart Anderson, an electronic technician who works on the city of Lima’s water plants. Anderson, also president of Local 1002 (AFSCME Council 8), said it’s still a struggle to fund education, and the last school levy failed to pass. “As a community, we’re just getting by,” he said. “And from what I know about the budget, it’s just more empty promises.”

Mark Factor, a water treatment plant employee and Chief Steward of Local 1002, talked about the long-term pressure on the city of Lima’s budget. “When I first started working for the city in the 1990’s, we had 180 members. Now we are down to 120.  It’s taken a while but it seems like they just keep chipping away.”

The protestors specifically objected to the governor’s inadequate support for the Local Government Fund, which provides funding for counties and municipalities. They also decried the governor’s lack of support for education funding.

Governor Kasich’s first budget cut $1 billion from state revenues going to local governments, and $1.8 billion from education. That’s $2.8 billion in all. Ohio’s cities and counties now have $600 million less to work with compared to what they received before Governor Kasich was elected. For the city of Lima and Allen County, the loss to local governments was $8 million, while education funding was reduced by $13 million – a total $21 million hit.

Kasich’s budget proposals aren’t the only thing that have riled up Ohioans lately. AFSCME members recently joined other activists at a “No Rights At Work” rally to fight back against tea-party efforts to put “right-to-work-for-less” legislation on the ballot. Read more about that here.

Carlson told TV station KARE-11 that he spotted the elderly man walking on the side of a road with a walker after 11 p.m. one night last month. The man, later identified as Clare Karsten, 88, a retired minister from New Brighton, had wandered off from an assisted living facility wearing only socks with no shoes, a light sweater and light slacks.

“It was 12 below zero out” at the time, recalled Carlson, a radio communications operator. He quickly turned his car around and headed back to the man. “He was like ‘Well, I was with a bunch of guys and they just left me here,’” Carlson told the TV interviewer. “I said, ‘Well, pretty cold outside. Maybe you should get in my vehicle and we will figure out where you live.’”

After contacting an on-duty dispatcher, Carlson waited for emergency personnel to arrive and transport Karsten to a nearby hospital, where he was treated.

Karsten’s son, Paul, praised Carlson’s willingness to take a chance and help a stranger. “I cannot tell you enough how good it felt to know that somebody made that effort, particularly in the middle of the night when you do not know who you are coming up on or you do not know what the circumstances are,” he told KARE-11. “I sometimes think we live in a pretty selfish society these days, but I find that people like him remind me that there are good people out there.”

AFSCME applauds the good work of Nicholas Carlson and all of our members who do their jobs faithfully, without expectations of public praise.

“Public service isn’t just a job; it’s a calling to make a real difference in our community,” says Council 5 Exec. Dir. Eliot Seide, also an AFSCME International vice president. “It’s a chance to truly help our neighbors, their families and strangers we’ve never met. Nick Carlson is an everyday hero; he’s part of what keeps our communities strong.”