NWDC wage theft | Costco contract | Cannabis organizing

Friday, January 17, 2025

STRIKES

► From Oregon Live — Doctors unions, like the one on strike at Providence, are growing more common — Fox said her once-fulfilling job, defined by patient care and autonomy, shifted into a struggle against exhausting schedules and chronic understaffing. “It’s crazy. There are days when we can’t eat, can’t sit and can’t even pee because we’re so busy,” Fox said. Doctors unions are growing more common across the country. While physicians historically sat atop the health care hierarchy, an increasingly consolidated health care sector has left them finding more affinity with nurses and other more commonly unionized colleagues.

Editor’s note: you can support the striking workers through their Fundraiser by Oregon Nurses Association : Support the Providence Strike Fund

LOCAL

► From the Seattle Times — Tacoma prison must pay $23M for violating minimum wage, court says — A private immigration prison in Tacoma must pay $23 million in back wages and penalties for violating Washington’s minimum wage law, after it paid detainees as little as $1 a day, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday. GEO Group relied on those barely paid laborers to operate the facility, the appeals court wrote. In the kitchen, it employed 13 full-time employees but needed nearly 100 detainees a day to prepare and serve meals and clean up. One full-time employee was responsible for all the facility’s laundry, supervising 15 detainees a day. Without the detainee work program, GEO Group estimated it would have had to hire 85 additional full-time employees to run the facility.

► From Cascade PBS — WA advocates sue ICE over release of detention center records — Korthuis said the goal with this case is to empower those unable to legally advocate for themselves due to lack of immigration status, and “shed light on what people need to do if they’re trying to hold the agency accountable and learn what works, what their rights are, and what they can expect in that process.”

AEROSPACE

► From Business Insider — Boeing should treat workers better to recover from its ‘mess,’ Emirates boss tells BI — Tim Clark, the president of Emirates airline, told Business Insider in an interview: “You look after the people, they look after you. I think they’ve been offsided by the previous management for too long. Have you got yourself into a mess like this because you prided yourself on treating them badly and not giving them a deal when you were making fat profits and taking bonuses at board level? Really? That’s not the way to run a business.”

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From the Teamsters:

Hundreds of Costco Teamsters from throughout Southern California held a practice picket as the January 31 deadline of the Costco National Master Agreement approaches. Nationwide, more than 18,000 Teamsters at Costco are demanding an historic, industry-leading contract and are… pic.twitter.com/0JJmwU5Opt

— Teamsters (@Teamsters) January 17, 2025

NATIONAL

► From Slate — Starbucks Workers United claims coffeehouse is requiring LA-area baristas to work amid wildfires — An accompanying video clip showed the raging wildfires engulfing nearby buildings. An unnamed voice in the background can be heard saying, “He said, ‘No, we’re staying open. Sorry, you can just serve everything, like, well-done.’”

POLITICS & POLICY

► From MyNorthwest.com — From outlawed to mainstream: Washington cannabis workers push for union rights — In a move that underscores this dramatic shift, state lawmakers took testimony on Wednesday during a hearing on House Bill 1141, aiming to grant collective bargaining rights to agricultural cannabis workers. An important characteristic of the bill is organizing rights. Employers, defined as licensed cannabis producers or processors on farms, would be prohibited from interfering with employees’ rights to organize and select representatives for collective bargaining.

► From WTNH — Senate Democrats push for striking worker protections — “Workers should not be required to suffer or be under economic pressure that might make them cave to a settlement,” State Sen. Martin Looney, the president of the State Senate, said of the effort to expand unemployment benefits to striking workers. “That’s not fair.” “If [Gov.] Ned Lamont wants to connect with working families, he should listen to working families,” [Connecticut AFL-CIO] Ed Hawthorne said. “And that’s exactly what this bill supports.”

Editor’s note: oh hey Connecticut, twins! 

► From the union-busting Columbian — Lawmakers again trying to lower legal alcohol limit for drivers in Washington — Traffic deaths have risen rapidly in recent years, from 538 in 2019 to 809 in 2023, according to the Washington Traffic Safety Commission. The 2023 figure was the most deaths on Washington roads since 1990.

► From HR Dive — Trump names former EEOC Commissioner Keith Sonderling deputy labor secretary — Prior to serving on the EEOC, Sonderling served as the acting and deputy administrator of the DOL’s wage and hour division. He also taught employment discrimination at The George Washington University Law School. Authors of the Littler post characterized Sonderling as a “complementary pick” to Trump’s “labor-friendly” DOL secretary nominee, and said he was “expected to bring more balance at top levels of DOL leadership.”

► From Labor Notes — How Labor Can Fight Back Against Trump’s Mass Deportation Agenda — The need is great: The United Farm Workers reported on January 8 that some of its members were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) traveling home from work in Kern County, California. “Random actions like this are not meant to keep anyone safe,” the union wrote on X, “they are intended to terrorize hardworking people.” Workers and unions face a dual challenge: They must defend their undocumented co-workers and ensure that no crackdown will deter their ongoing battles to improve workers’ lives.

► From the NW Labor Press — Joe Biden: The best president labor ever had — As Joe Biden gets ready to leave the White House Jan. 20, one verdict is clear: He kept his often-repeated pledge to be the most pro-union president in U.S. history. For four years, at every level of his administration, he and his appointees went out of their way to support unions and union labor.

JOLT OF JOY

This week marks the 110th anniversary of “Solidarity Forever,” a certified banger, with many classic renditions. It’s fitting that the anniversary falls the same week as the birthday of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who so profoundly embodied solidarity. Nothing fills the corners of my heart quite like hearing the century-old song at 21st c. protests. Here’s the baristas of Starbucks Workers United in 2023:

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