NEWS ROUNDUP

Global strike summer | SAG-AFTRA strikes over AI | Boeing deals

Friday, July 26, 2024

STRIKES

► From the Yakima Herald (July 19) – Windmill Farms workers conduct work stoppage at Sunnyside mushroom plant – Lorena Avalos, an agricultural worker who helped organize the stoppage, said Windmill Farms has been retaliating against workers ever since a June 13 court hearing. The supervisors enacted new rules wherein workers must meet quotas, higher than previously set, each week. If they fail to pick a designated number of mushrooms, Avalos said they are fired. Windmill fired six people on Thursday, igniting the protest.

Editor’s note: this week, wildfire smoke has made air quality in the Yakima Valley – the air thousands of farm workers are toiling in – unhealthy to breathe. Washington has regulations for working in smoke, but as United Farmworkers points out, enforcing those regulations remains a struggle. 

► From Deadline (July 25) – SAG-AFTRA Calls Strike Against Major Video Game Companies After Nearly 2 Years Of Contract Talks – “We’re not going to consent to a contract that allows companies to abuse A.I. to the detriment of our members. Enough is enough. When these companies get serious about offering an agreement our members can live — and work — with, we will be here, ready to negotiate,” SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher said in a statement.

► From the San Bernadino Sun (July 22) – Amazon workers strike over alleged unfair labor practices at San Bernardino air hub – The one-day strike stems from retaliation workers said they have faced for union organizing, according to a news release sent by a public relations firm on behalf of the striking workers. “We’re on strike to send a message to Amazon: Treat your workers with the respect and dignity we deserve,” Anna Ortega, a worker at the facility, said in a news release.

LOCAL

► From Eater Seattle (July 24) – Seattle Sandwich Chain Homegrown Says It Will Close Most of Its Shops –  When drivers for its wholesale division announced plans to unionize in 2022, Homegrown installed cameras that monitored them while they worked. The chain’s restaurant employees voted to form a union later that year and in 2023 some went on strike to protest the firing of a union leader. In March, that strike ended and the contract was ratified; notably, it included a provision that gave them time-and-a-half pay on especially hot days, a rare “heat protection” benefit.

Editor’s note: Homegrown is claiming economic instability, but as a tweet reshared by the Homegrown Union points out…

► From the Washington State Standard (July 23) – Thousands of low-income WA families qualify for a tax credit they aren’t claiming – The state estimated that about 360,000 Washington residents would qualify for the tax credit, which provides an annual refund of $50 to $1,255 depending on income level and the number of qualifying children in a taxpayer’s household. As of Dec. 31, 2023, the department issued 163,348 refunds, amounting to $116,776,567.

Editor’s note: check if you’re eligible. 

► From Tri-City Herald (July 25) – What could be nation’s largest solar project planned by feds at Eastern WA nuclear site – Expanding clean energy generation creates good-paying jobs, protects the environment and supports healthier communities across the country, said Brenda Mallory, chairperson of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Hanford jobs plus jobs at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, both Department of Energy facilities, account for just over 11% of jobs in Benton and Franklin counties but they pay as much as 23% of all wages in the two counties, according to previous Tri-City Development Council data.

Photo: Genna Martin/Crosscut

► From Crosscut (July 23) – Federal court orders higher pay for foreign guest workers in WA orchards – Edgar Franks, FUJ’s political director, said the union currently negotiates wages for the workers it represents by doing a test pick. After the test, growers and workers come to an agreement on wages after measuring how much workers picked. Most workers — especially H-2A workers — aren’t in any position to negotiate rates or unionize, so they wanted to address problems with the prevailing wage process to ensure proper pay. Franks said they do whatever they can to make sure all workers are paid well.

 

AEROSPACE

Photo: Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty

► From CNN (July 25) – US Department of Justice finalizes plea deal with Boeing –  One additional condition detailed in a new filing on Wednesday is that Boeing’s board of directors will have to hold a meeting with victim families and their legal representatives within four months of the sentencing date. Boeing will also have to invest at least $455 million into its compliance, quality and safety programs, the agreement states.

► From Newsweek (July 25) – Boeing Can Veto Safety Monitor Pick Under New Sweetheart Deal – A key provision is an “independent compliance monitor” during Boeing’s three year probation period, who will work to “reduce the risk of misconduct” by the company. According to the deal, the DOJ will “use their best efforts” to appoint a suitable candidate within 90 days of Wednesday’s filing. However Boeing will have a chance to object to the DoJ’s selection if it “believes in good faith that any of the six candidates do not meet the requirements.”

 

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From Willamette Week (July 25) – Postdoc Researchers at OHSU Vote to Authorize Strike, if Necessary – Postdoc researchers, many of them from outside the U.S., provide a low-cost, high-talent labor pool to institutions like OHSU. AFSCME leaders say their post-doc members helped OHSU win a record amount of research grants last year. “We are standing together for better pay, better benefits, and better working conditions. Our work helped OHSU get a record $600 million in research grants last year, but they refuse to offer us a penny above a nationally set minimum wage that doesn’t recognize the cost of living in Portland,” says Paige Arneson-Wissink, a pancreatic cancer researcher.

► From Reuters (July 24) – Hotel workers in four US cities to hold strike authorization votes – Workers at 125 hotels in the four cities have sought significant pay raises in new contracts to replace ones that have expired or will expire soon. “We are getting ready,” said Elena Duran, a server at Marriott’s Palace Hotel in San Francisco. “Seeing the proposals from the hotels, people are not happy.”

► From the Los Angeles Daily News (July 19) – IATSE film and TV crew workers ratify new contract with Hollywood studios – Daily News – According to the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees union, which represents roughly 50,000 Hollywood crew workers, 85.9% of its members voted in favor of the Hollywood Basic Agreement, and 87.2% approved the accompanying Area Standards Agreement.

► From NBC News (July 24) – Disneyland workers reach tentative deal with company, averting strike – “We have shown Disney that we are the true magic makers of the park and today proves that when workers stand together for what they deserve, we win,” the Disney Workers Rising Bargaining Committee said in a statement. “We look forward to making our voices heard during the voting process to ratify this contract.”

READY FOR A VOICE AT WORK? Get more information about how you can join together with co-workers and negotiate for better wages and working conditions. Or go ahead and contact a union organizer today!

 

NATIONAL

Michelle Litvin for The New York Times

► The New York Times (July 26) – Child Care Costs Challenge Women’s Gains in Work Force – There are signs that the labor force participation gains among women with children under 5 has plateaued since September, according to an analysis from the Hamilton Project, an economic policy research group at the Brookings Institution…the $24 billion in aid that the government allocated to the child care industry expired in September. Some employers are tightening expectations about working on site, making it more difficult to balance job demands with needs at home. For mothers of young children hoping to get back into the work force, the result may be that longstanding barriers to child care are rearing up again.

► From USA Today (July 26) – 34 years after passage of Americans with Disabilities Act, data sheds light on the disabled – “Other than rare instances of overt animus, most of the discrimination we see towards people with disabilities in this country tends to be from what we call ‘malign neglect,’” Stein told USA TODAY. “It’s not that we’re trying to exclude them from opportunity, it’s that we didn’t even bother to consider them eligible or worthy of opportunities.”

Editor’s note: interested in learning more about disability and organizing for disability rights? Two good places to start: Disability Visibility edited by Alice Wong and Black Disability Politics by Sami Schalk (open source). 

► From Huffington Post (July 24) – Blue States Line Up To Ban Anti-Union ‘Captive Audience’ Meetings – Illinois is poised to become the eighth state to enact such a ban after the legislature passed a bill outlawing employers from holding mandatory meetings of a political or religious nature…“There’s a problem with workers having to not only listen to anti-union rhetoric at work, but religious rhetoric or political rhetoric from the employer,” Drea said. “People just want to go to work to work. They don’t want to be indoctrinated.”

► From The New York Times (July 25) – WNBA’s Popularity Booms but Money for Players Hasn’t Kept Pace – As its popularity booms, the W.N.B.A. has made some concessions to players beyond the collective bargaining agreement, but it isn’t quite ready to fully loosen its purse strings. Some owners would also like to make serious investments in players, but league rules protecting competitive balance often don’t allow for that.

 

POLITICS & POLICY

Photo: Tony Gutierrez/AP

► From AP (July 25) – Harris tells teachers union she’s ready to fight for country’s future — ‘bring it on‘ – The 1.8 million-member AFT has backed Harris and her pro-union agenda on the premise that a second Trump term could result in restrictions on organized labor and a potential loss of funding for education. The AFL-CIO, which represents 60 labor unions including the AFT, has backed Harris.

► From KQED (July 24) – What Does a Likely Harris-Trump Matchup Mean for Labor? –  “Everything we know about the vice president and her involvement in the Biden administration indicates that she would give workers a chance to move forward,” [former NLRB chairman Bill] Gould said. “And everything we know about the Trump administration tells us the exact opposite, that they would restrain worker [organizing] and enhance inequality between those who have and those who have not.”

► From NW Labor Press (July 19) – AFL-CIO says J.D. Vance, Trump’s VP pick, is no friend of labor – “Senator JD Vance likes to play union supporter on the picket line,” Shuler said in the statement, “but his record proves that to be a sham. He has introduced legislation to allow bosses to bypass their workers’ unions with phony corporate-run unions, disparaged striking UAW members while collecting hefty donations from one of the major auto companies, watered down safety protections for rail workers at the request of industry lobbyists, and opposed the landmark Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act…”

► From Crosscut (July 25) – WA Public Disclosure Commission investigating initiative sponsor – The complainants allege that Let’s Go Washington’s campaign finance filings are opaque and difficult to decipher. They allege it is difficult to discern how much money has been raised for each individual initiative. Signatures for all but the natural gas initiative were collected in the same 2023 campaign. They claim that reported in-kind donations are Impossible to sort. And they expressed concerns about a lack of transparency about how the money was spent.

 

INTERNATIONAL

Photo: Michel Spingler/AP

► From AP (July 25) – Workers go on strike at five-star Paris hotel where IOC members are staying for Olympics – The [Union] CGT said the employees were demanding a pay increase, having not received a raise for seven years. The strike comes after a fifth round of negotiations failed Wednesday.

► From The Connexion (July 23) – Paris airport workers file strike motion for Olympics opening ceremony – The Force Ouvrière (FO) union – which represents 11.5% of workers at airports operated by the Aéroports de Paris (ADP) group, namely Orly and Roissy-Charles de Gaulle – filed the motion, which will last from 05:00 on July 26 to 07:00 on July 27.

 

JOLT OF JOY

We’re living through unprecedented times, a time period that will undoubtedly be the stuff of nightmares for teenagers cramming for their AP US History exam in 2060. But one constant remains — through it all, people are still getting their jokes off on Twitter. And thank god for that. Exhibit A:

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