NEWS ROUNDUP

WA’s grid | Funding care | Whole Foods union

Monday, November 25, 2024

 

STRIKES

► From NBC Bay Area — San Francisco Marriott Marquis Hotel workers go on strike — The San Francisco Marriott Marquis Hotel workers joined workers at the Grand Hyatt San Francisco, Hilton San Francisco Union Square, Marriott Union Square, Palace Hotel and Westin St. Francis, where workers represented by Unite Here Local 2 are already on strike. Local 2 officials said in a press release that the strike now includes 2,500 housekeepers, bellhops, cooks, dishwashers, servers, bartenders, and more.

► From UNITE HERE Local 2

► From the AP — Charlotte airport workers strike over wages ahead of busy Thanksgiving travel — The Service Employees International Union announced the strike in a statement early Monday, saying the workers would demand “an end to poverty wages and respect on the job during the holiday travel season.” The strike was expected to last 24 hours, said union spokesperson Sean Keady. Employees of ABM and Prospect Airport Services cast ballots Friday to authorize the work stoppage at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, a hub for American Airlines.

 

LOCAL

► From the Seattle Times — Bomb cyclone shows cracks in WA’s electrical grid — In the aftermath, grid experts say the cyclone’s damage — and our struggle to bounce back — proves we’re in desperate need of significant upgrades as utilities rush to wean themselves off fossil fuels, add renewable power and the transmission lines to match. Utilities don’t just need more power and bigger transmission lines, they’re even short on electricians needed to make repairs and maintain the grid we already have.

► From the Spokesman Review — Idaho potato companies have been mashing consumers with price collusion, anti-trust suit alleges — The four largest producers of frozen potatoes and french fries, including two companies based near Boise, have supersized their profits over the last few years by gouging American consumers through higher prices that they improperly set by agreement, according to a federal anti-trust lawsuit filed this week.

► From the Seattle Times — Seattle-area return-to-office mandates strain household budgets — Across the state and country, millions of workers are seeing a large-scale reversal of the remote work flexibilities that rapidly became the norm four years ago. As the ground shifts, it’s bringing back major budgetary considerations that workers haven’t had to contend with for years. Employees acclimated to working remotely are often taken aback by just how much commuting costs — expenses that, when compounded, can feel like an effective pay cut.

► From Real Change News — Stabbing attacks target CID unhoused community, leave neighbors feeling unsafe — Danh sees grievances like Ku’s as part of a wider way that capitalism drives polarization between different groups of people in the community and contributes to a wider sense of insecurity. “We are all poor and working class; our struggles are about the same struggle of unhoused folks,” Danh said. “We are just one or two safety nets away from being unhoused ourselves. It’s just the way that America has built itself up. It’s pitting the working class against the poor and unhoused rather than who is the true enemy: the rich.”

 

AEROSPACE

► From the Seattle Times — Boeing: We could be Jet City once more — Many of us remember the bitter 2013 fight securing the 777X. The entire state rallied, aware our “Jet City” identity was at stake. We offered tax incentives and permits in record time. State legislators, the governor and economic development leaders (me included) congratulated ourselves for winning the 777X. But we knew it was the Machinists who really won it by giving up their defined benefit pension plan. Boeing will eventually fix its culture problems and the day will come when it announces a new airframe. Thanks to the Machinists again, that plane will likely be built here.

 

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From the New Seasons Labor Union in Portland:

► From People’s World — Baltimore nurses picket Catholic bishops conference — Short-staffing, low pay and the resulting revolving door of registered nurses joining and then leaving Ascension Health Care’s St. Agnes Hospital in Baltimore led RNs there to take their case to the ultimate authority over the Ascension chain: The nation’s Catholic bishops. So when the prelates came to their annual conference on November 20, this year at the Marriott Hotel in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, marching nurses, members of National Nurses United, met them while wielding informational picket signs.

► From the Hollywood Reporter — PBS Strike Averted As Union and Member Stations Reach Tentative Deal — A writers’ strike at PBS was narrowly averted on Thursday night as the Writers Guild of America East and member stations reached a deal. Few details are available about the deal at present, but according to the union, the deal “breaks new ground” in its coverage of animation writers, AI protections, protections for made-for-new media programs and paid parental leave.

► From SEIU Healthcare 1199NW:

 

ORGANIZING

► From In These Times — Whole Foods Workers File for First-Ever Union, Defying Amazon — The campaign has been a year in the making, as ​“people come and go due to the churn of working retail and working for Amazon,” explains worker-organizer Ben Lovett, who has been at the Center City location since 2023 in the prepared foods department and as an online order shopper. ​“It slowly built as we mapped all the departments and recruited new organizers. We started collecting cards a couple months ago and reached a majority after about 7 or 8 weeks.”

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

► From the Washington Post — Some companies offer health benefits for employees managing menopause — The benefits are designed to meet the needs of people dealing with menopause and of their employers, who are adding such coverage to help retain employees, many who have decades of experience, are in management and senior leadership positions or are in line for those posts. Among the companies offering a variety of menopause-related benefits are Microsoft, Genentech, Adobe and insurer Healthfirst.

 

POLITICS & POLICY

► From the Washington State Standard — Care providers for developmentally disabled people ask Legislature for more pay — Advocates are asking lawmakers to increase rates for these workers by 9.5% in both 2026 and 2027, which would cost the state roughly $99 million a year. That’s based on recommendations from a 2023 Department of Social and Health Services rate study report that found providers were severely underpaid compared to living wage benchmarks. At the time, the average hourly wage for a direct support professional was $20.12.

► From the Seattle Times — Washington state’s early learning programs could face budget cuts — DCYF has proposed cutting nearly $68 million from the Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program, Washington’s free preschool for 3- to 5-year-olds. And it has proposed eliminating an Early ECEAP program for babies and children up to 3 years old, a budget cut of $9.25 million. About 14,000 kids are enrolled in ECEAP, according to DCYF.

► From the Yakima Herald-Republic — Republicans win 14th District races with results pointing to a more competitive territory — While the election results were clear, they also show the 14th Legislative District is more competitive. Officials with both parties said it will be a key territory for them in the years ahead. The 4-percentage point margin is a change from recent years: 14th District House elections in 2020 saw Republicans Chris Corry and Gina Mosbrucker each with 19-percentage point leads over their Democratic opponents.

► From CNN — Trump’s Labor secretary pick is surprisingly pro-union. It doesn’t mean his administration will be — “Lori Chavez-DeRemer has built a pro-labor record in Congress,” the AFL-CIO, the nation’s major federation of unions, said in a statement Friday. “But Donald Trump is the President-elect of the United States — not Rep. Chavez-DeRemer — and it remains to be seen what she will be permitted to do as Secretary of Labor in an administration with a dramatically anti-worker agenda.”

► From Common Dreams — Unions Note Chavez-DeRemer’s Record, ‘But Donald Trump Is the President-Elect’ — Some skeptics and critics highlighted that Chavez-DeRemer—who only entered the U.S. House of Representatives last year—has just a 10% lifetime score from the AFL-CIO. Among them was longtime labor reporter Mike Elk, who warned, “This is divide and conquer politics at its worst as Trump prepares for an attack on federal workers unions!”

► From the Washington Post — Labor unions prepare for battle against Trump’s federal workforce plans — Federal unions will be a favorite target, as they were previously. In 2018, Trump issued three executive orders that nearly blew away the ability of federal employees — notably, not just union members — to be fully represented by labor organizations, particularly in grievance procedures. President Joe Biden revoked those orders shortly after taking office. Beyond what Trump did before, what he might do next has union leaders ready for a fight.

 

INTERNATIONAL

► From Yahoo — Strike at French cognac maker Hennessy over measures in China spat — Hundreds of employees of French cognac maker Hennessy, part of the LVMH group luxury empire, went on strike on Tuesday to protest measures the brand plans to employ to circumvent Chinese tariffs imposed in a spat with the EU.

► From Global News — Canada Post says no ‘major breakthrough’ in talks as strike enters 2nd week — CUPW national president Jan Simpson told Global News that although “morale is up” among picketing postal workers, some layoffs and benefit cancellations have begun as the company tries to save its bottom line. “You can’t expect to negotiate a contract and save your company on the backs of workers,” she said in an interview.

The Stand posts links to local, national and international labor news every weekday morning. Subscribe to get daily news in your inbox. 

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