Thursday, January 19, 2017

LOCAL

► In today’s Seattle Times — Labor leader Teresa Mosqueda announces run for Seattle City Council — Teresa Mosqueda, a labor-movement leader who helped write last year’s initiative to raise the state minimum wage, is running for Seattle City Council. Mosqueda is political-campaign director at the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO and has served on the state’s Exchange Board, which oversees Obamacare. Announcing her run Wednesday, Mosqueda said she wants to address Seattle’s affordable-housing shortage, economic inequality and uneven health outcomes.

► From Slog — State Labor Council’s Teresa Mosqueda to run for Seattle City Council — Mosqueda, a 36-year-old Latina renter, said she would bring a “collaborative style” to policymaking on the council. “Cities are going to be the last line of defense” against a Trump administration, she said. “We as a city need to think proactively about what we need to do to protect our folks.” Mosqueda’s campaign already has notable endorsements.

► In today’s (Longview) Daily News — New contract means changes for Longview classified employees — Last week, the Longview School Board ratified the latest SEIU 925 contract, bringing pay raises to paraeducators, bus drivers, food and maintenance workers, and other classified employees throughout the district.

WOMEN’S MARCHES

► From AFL-CIO Now — AFL-CIO Proud to Partner with the Women’s March on Washington, D.C. — AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka: “Thousands of our 12.5 million members — women and men alike — will come together this weekend to stand up for gender justice, equality and opportunity for all.”

ALSO at The Stand — Inauguration Day rallies, women’s marches planned statewide — Here’s what’s happening on Saturday, Jan. 21:

OLYMPIA — An estimated 2,500 women are expected to gather at the Capitol’s Tivoli Fountain at 10 a.m. on Saturday, jan. 21 and march down Capitol Way toward the Olympia Farmers Market. There, they’ll turn around and march back to the Capitol for a rally. Get details.

SEATTLE — The Seattle Womxn’s March, being held in solidarity with the national Women’s March on Washington D.C to stand up for human rights and social justice, will be Saturday, Jan. 21 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in downtown Seattle. JOIN THE LABOR CONTINGENT of the march! Meet at 10:30 a.m. at the Washington State Labor Council, 321 16th Ave. S. (on the march route) to join the march from there to the Seattle Center. Get details about the march.

SPOKANE –The Women’s March on Spokane begins at 11 a.m. at the Spokane Convention Center, 334 W Spokane Falls Blvd. Get details.

VANCOUVER/PORTLAND — A rally and march demonstrating a United Front Against the Trump Agenda will be held Saturday, Jan. 21 from 10 to 11:30 a.m. in Vancouver. Participants will gather at Shemanski Park (SW Park/Salmon), march to Waterfront (Salmon St. Springs), where they will join the Portland Women’s March at noon. The Oregon AFL-CIO has endorsed this event and is encouraging affiliated unions to participate. Get details.

WENATCHEE — The Women’s March on Wenatchee begins at 11 a.m. at the Wenatchee Community Center, 504 S. Chelan St. Get details.

YAKIMA — A march in support of Central Washington women will take place in Yakima on the same day as the national Women’s March on Washington and nearly 400 similar marches throughout the world. The Women’s March on Yakima will begin at 10 a.m. Saturday at the corner of M.L. King Jr. Boulevard and North Second Street. Get details.

MORE WOMEN’S MARCHES are planned in Kingston, Langley, Union, Port Townsend, and Mount Vernon. Click here for details.

► In today’s Seattle Times — ‘Stirred out of our complacency’: Women ready for march after Trump inauguration, and newfound political activism — After a contentious presidential campaign that brought issues of sexual assault and women’s equality to the forefront, many women in Western Washington are getting politically involved, some for the first time in their lives.

► In today’s Seattle Times — 50,000 expected to attend Seattle women’s march day after Trump inauguration

► In today’s Spokesman-Review — About 2,000 expected to march Saturday for women’s rights in Spokane in wake of Trump inauguration

THIS WASHINGTON

► From AP — Washington tries to fix paid leave law dormant since 2007 — A decade ago, Washington state created a paid family leave program that required many employers to offer five weeks of paid time off for new parents. But the law that once offered hope to working parents quickly turned into an empty promise because state lawmakers never came up with a way to pay for the benefit, resulting in an indefinite delay of its implementation.

Now lawmakers from the state where companies like Microsoft and Amazon already offer the benefit to their workers are gearing up to consider a host of bills in a bid to replace the dormant law with one that gives more time off for new parents and people who need to care for sick relatives — plus a higher weekly benefit than originally envisioned and a steady funding stream. Legislative hearings on the various proposals start Thursday.

ALSO at The Stand — Renewed push begins in Olympia for paid family leave

► In today’s Olympian — Senate’s two-thirds rule for taxes isn’t helpful (editorial) — The foremost challenge in the 105-day session is to fully fund K-12 public schools, which could end the unconstitutional practice of using local voter-approved levies to subsidize teacher pay and benefits. By putting the two-thirds-vote roadblock in place, the 25 members of the Senate Majority Coalition Caucus could well gum up legislative action and thwart the majority’s will later in the year — that is, if their action on the two-thirds rule is even legal.

► In today’s Seattle Times — Yes, Sen. Schoesler, legislative process is the media’s business (editorial) — It’s only the second week of the legislative session and state Senate Majority Leader Mark Schoesler already is biting the heads off journalists who asked him when the Republican plan for fixing the way the state pays for education will be ready. “That’s none of your business,” Schoesler snapped. None of our business? Whoa, senator. If it’s not the people’s business, then whose business is it?

► In today’s Seattle Times — Give teens a leg up — expand the training wage (by Erin Shannon) — A legal starter wage that is lower than the costly minimum helps counteract the job-killing impact on youth employment.

ALSO at The Stand — Sub-minimum ‘training wage’ is a bad idea (by Jeff Johnson) — Youth unemployment is a national phenomenon that bears no correlation to higher minimum wages. The state youth unemployment rate is 11.7 percent, slightly above the national average — just as our overall unemployment rate is slightly higher — which ranks Washington 24th highest. Which states have the highest youth unemployment? West Virginia (state minimum wage: $8.75), South Carolina ($7.25) and Georgia ($5.15!).

EDITOR’S NOTE — Erin Shannon, formerly of the Tom McCabe-era BIAW, works for the Washington Policy Center, a business-funded “think tank” that advocates against government regulation and for “free-market solutions.”

HEALTH CARE

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — Constituents urge Larsen to help preserve health care system — Rep. Rick Larsen (D-2nd) is taking the stories of hundreds of people back to Washington, D.C., to make a case for why he thinks the Affordable Care Act should stay. Larsen visited seven cities including Everett and Mountlake Terrace this past week. Many people want to keep the current health care system, while hoping to make tweaks. At this point, a replacement plan has not been drafted. “Don’t turn our lives upside down now without being able to judge what’s next,” Larsen said.

► In today’s Spokesman-Review — Former hospital association CEO: ‘You can’t lay all of the problems on Obamacare’ — As a Republican-controlled Congress and the Trump administration start discussing plans to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, the former chief executive of the American Hospital Association has some advice to offer. “It isn’t the ACA,” said Rich Umbdenstock. “It’s health care that’s complicated. You can’t lay all of the problems on Obamacare.”

► In today’s Washington Post — Republicans look to avoid YouTube moments in fight over Obamacare repeal — Lawmakers are turning to Facebook and telephone town halls in apparent bid to avoid repeating the testy town halls of 2009.

EDITOR’S NOTE — You know, like this one starring Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers…

THAT WASHINGTON

► From The Hill — Trump team prepares dramatic cuts — The changes proposed by staffers for the Trump transition team are dramatic. The departments of Commerce and Energy would see major reductions in funding, with programs under their jurisdiction either being eliminated or transferred to other agencies. The departments of Transportation, Justice and State would see significant cuts and program eliminations. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting would be privatized, while the National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities would be eliminated entirely. The proposed cuts hew closely to a blueprint published last year by the conservative Heritage Foundation, a think tank that has helped staff the Trump transition.

► In today’s Washington Post — Cabinet nominees confront growing ethical questions — President-elect Donald Trump’s choices to lead commerce, health and human services and the Office of Management and Budget face the kinds of problems that have torpedoed Cabinet-level nominees in the past. But it’s far from likely that Trump’s picks will buckle under political pressure.

ALSO at The Stand — Urge senators to oppose nominees Puzder, DeVos, Price

► From TPM — Before his HHS nomination, Price had employer health insurance in his sights — Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) has long championed a major overhaul to the much bigger employer-based insurance system in order to push consumers to buy their own plans.

► From the Guardian — ‘Ugly women don’t sell burgers’ — the trickle-down effect of Team Trump — female employees at fast food restaurants operated by Andrew Puzder, Donald Trump’s nomination for labor secretary, face far higher levels of workplace sexual harassment than the industry average.

► From The Hill — Senate seeks deal on Trump nominees — Senate leaders are negotiating a deal that could allow votes on a number of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks on the day of his inauguration.

► In today’s Washington Post — Trump’s nominees are putting us all at risk by ignoring ethics laws (by Sen. Elizabeth Warren) — If the Republican-led Congress ignores these basic ethics requirements today, the American people and the nominees themselves likely will pay the price tomorrow.

► From Bloomberg — Tables may turn in collective bargaining — A new Republican-controlled NLRB may reconsider some of the most important rulings of Obama appointees, and there could be major changes in the board’s analysis of union-management relations, expert say. Here’s a list of rulings in jeopardy.

NATIONAL

► From AP — Missouri, New Hampshire could become ‘right-to-work’ states — Newly bolstered Republican majorities are moving quickly in several states to diminish the power of organized labor with new laws prohibiting mandatory union fees in workplaces. In a right-to-work state, employees can’t be required to pay union dues or fees. But unions that are the exclusive bargaining representative still must represent all employees, even those who don’t pay.

TODAY’S MUST-READ

► From The Nation — Post-election survey: Democrats can still reach Trump voters — The Working America team went back into the field after the election, surveying over 2,300 voters in Ohio and Pennsylvania to make sense of what had happened. Their conclusion: Many Trump voters “are as up for grabs [to Democrats] now as they were before the election,” Karen Nussbaum said. … There was the woman who got insurance through the Affordable Care Act, and voted for Trump anyway, because, she said, “he’s just talking, he won’t get rid of it.” An 80-something lifelong Democrat switched to Trump because “he didn’t feel safe anymore.” A lot of the Trump voters “just couldn’t stomach Hillary.” But most disturbing were the people who didn’t vote, who tended to be younger and/or voters of color. “They really regretted not voting,” he said. “They didn’t realize Trump could win.”

The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.