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NEWS ROUNDUP

Why IBEW | Boeing lays off 2k | WA Supreme Court

Monday, November 18, 2024

 

STRIKES

► From KEZI 9 — Local economist breaks down uptick in Western Oregon labor strikes — There have been at least four different strikes across Douglas, Lane, Linn and Benton Counties over the past 2 months, and there may be an economic indication as to why it’s happening, according to a local labor economist. “A strike used to be sort of scary, right? People were like, ‘Oh, no.’ They would use strikes against people actually trying to form a union,” [AFSCME’s] Baessler said. “Now folks are like, ‘No, you know what? What do I have to lose? Let’s go out there. Let’s fight for what we want. Let’s fight for what we need.'”

► From the AP — Strike by workers at a casino near the Las Vegas Strip enters 2nd day — The work stoppage launched Friday at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas is the first open-ended strike in 22 years for the Culinary Workers Union, the largest labor union in Nevada, with about 60,000 members. Union members were on the picket line again on Saturday.

► From Culinary Union (UNITE HERE 226):

► From the NW Labor Press — Strike at Franz bakery in Springfield — Roughly 180 workers at Franz Bakery in Springfield have been on strike since Oct. 31. Workers are seeking higher wages, more advance notice on their schedules, and safety and training improvements. “The company doesn’t want to hear ‘safety.’ They don’t want to hear ‘change.’ They don’t want to talk about improvements of any kind,” Franz Bakery sanitation worker and union negotiating committee member Brad Currier told the Labor Press.

 

LOCAL

► From Business Insider — ‘My life is a million times better’: A man who quit his desk job to be an electrician shares his takeaways from the switch — Snyder is a member of a labor union called the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). The union provides benefits, job security, collective bargaining, and a sense of community. “Excellent,” was Snyder’s response when asked to describe his pay and benefits as a union member. Based in Seattle, he makes just over $48 an hour, accrues another $3 an hour for his 401(k), and also has a pension. His health insurance is through the union, not his employer, so Snyder isn’t worried about losing coverage if he switches jobs. If he’s on the hunt for a new job, Snyder doesn’t have to apply individually and interview — the union helps facilitate matching available jobs to union members looking for work.

► From Cascade PBS — Priced Out: Fear and resistance in WA mobile home parks — Hurst & Son LLC, a Port Orchard company that owns about 60 mobile home communities in Washington, purchased Hideaway in 2015. Since then, residents allege the company has cut down trees that once shaded the park, removed a playground, allowed roads to crumble and curtailed maintenance — all while hiking lot rental rates, charging extra for previously included utilities and imposing new fines.

► (Also) From Cascade PBS — A guide to WA’s mobile home tenant protections and dispute program

► From the Cascasdia Daily News — More than $279M in federal funds have paid for Whatcom, Skagit transportation projects — More than $279 million has flowed into Whatcom and Skagit counties for transportation projects since the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed nearly three years ago. These projects include everything from fish culvert installations and bridge repairs to airport and ferry upgrades. The interactive map shows county-by-county impact of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

► From the AP — More logging is proposed to help curb wildfires in the US Pacific Northwest — U.S. officials would allow increased logging on federal lands across the Pacific Northwest in the name of fighting wildfires and boosting rural economies under proposed changes to a sweeping forest management plan that’s been in place for three decades. The U.S. Forest Service proposal, released Friday, would overhaul the Northwest Forest Plan that governs about 38,000 square miles (99,000 square kilometers) in Oregon, Washington and California.

 

AEROSPACE

► From the Seattle Times — Boeing lays off more than 2,000 Washington workers — Boeing has laid off 2,199 workers in Washington, according to a notice filed Monday with the state’s Employment Security Department. The cuts are part of a companywide effort to reduce Boeing’s workforce by 10%, or 17,000 workers. Before the layoff notices delivered to workers last week, Boeing had 66,000 workers in Washington.

► From KING 5 — Hundreds of SPEEA employees included in Boeing layoffs, union confirms — SPEEA, the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace, represents more than 17,000 engineers, technical workers, pilots and other aerospace industry professionals. The union confirmed that 438 of their Boeing employees will be laid off, including 218 members of their professional unit and 220 technical employees.

► From CNN — Spirit Airlines files for bankruptcy — Spirit Airlines filed for bankruptcy protection Monday, as mounting losses, unaffordable debt, increased competition for bargain-seeking airline passengers and the inability to merge with other airlines left it little choice. Spirit’s problems could lead to higher fares across the industry. Its low-fare model had prompted major airlines to also offer no-frills “basic economy” seats on their planes. If it is forced to scale back its schedule or cities that it serves, goes out of business or gets purchased by a larger airline, that pressure to offer lower fares will be reduced.

 

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From Game Developer — SAG-AFTRA’s newest agreement secures protections for video game dub actors — The actors union established an Independent Interactive Localization Agreement (IILA), which covers localization of games first made in a non-English language. Its terms are similar to the budget-based tier agreement for indie developers established back in February: under the IILA, localizers have AI protections and expanded voiceprint and session options for “both principal and atmospheric roles, as compared to the original Localization Agreement.”

► From Progressive Railroading — Rail carriers, SMART-MD reach labor pact. For Railroad Career Professionals — The tentative pact is the third that the NCCC has announced this week: NCCC announced similar agreements with the Transportation Communications Union (TCU) and the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen (BRC). The NCCC reached the agreements on behalf of represented railroads that had not previously reached local agreements with these unions, according to a press release issued by the National Rail Labor Conference (NRLC).

 

ORGANIZING

► From WXYZ Detroit — Corewell Health nurses in Metro Detroit vote yes to join Teamsters Union — The National Labor Relations Board says this was one of the largest union elections in more than 20 years. “I feel like we need the union for a while now and enough is enough, it’s about time we get one,” said Sarah Johnson, nurse at Corewell Health Beaumont Hospital. Sarah Johnson was one of main people who pushed for more than 9,600 nurses from Corewell Health East hospitals to unionize.

► From the NW Labor Press — Workers at Peet’s Coffee Broadway shop join IWW — Baristas at Peet’s Coffee at 1441 NE Broadway in Portland voted 11-0 to join the Portland Branch of Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in an Oct. 23-24 election held at the cafe. It’s the fifth win in the IWW’s Peet’s Labor Union effort, after four coffee shops unionized in the San Francisco Bay Area.

► From Amazon Teamsters:

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 NW Labor Press — Laborers union to offer 12 weeks maternity leave — The Laborers’ International Union of North America (LiUNA) will begin offering 12 weeks of maternity leave benefits starting Jan. 1, 2025. New mothers will be eligible for up to $800 per week for 12 weeks. Laborers Local 737 Business Manager Zack Culver said he hopes the new benefits will encourage more women to apply to join the Laborers union and that they’ll help retain female members who may otherwise leave the workforce when they have children.

► From the AP — About 20% of Americans regularly get their news from influencers on social media, report says — About one in five Americans – and a virtually identical share of Republicans and Democrats – regularly get their news from digital influencers who are more likely to be found on the social media platform X [Twitter], according to a report released Monday by the Pew Research Center. The findings, drawn from a survey of more than 10,000 U.S. adults and an analysis of social media posts posted this summer by influencers, provide an indication of how Americans consumed the news during the height of the U.S. presidential campaign that President-elect Donald Trump ultimately won.

 

POLITICS & POLICY

► From the Washington State Standard — Race for WA Supreme Court seat still close as final votes are tallied — As of Friday morning, Sal Mungia, a trial lawyer, was leading Dave Larson, a Federal Way judge, by about 22,000 votes, or roughly 0.7%. The gap between the two candidates has grown significantly. The day after Election Day, Larson led Mungia by about 1,000 votes. As of Friday morning, about 67,912 ballots statewide were left to be counted. Although the gap between the two candidates is close, it’s still currently above recount range.

► From the Spokesman Review — Signature problems spark high ballot challenges in largely Latino-populated and student-populated counties in Eastern Washington — Hunt also said that although Adams County has a large percentage of challenged ballots, it is ultimately a statewide issue. In 2020, the State Auditor’s Office released a report on ballot rejections statewide from the general election. The report showed that white voters had the lowest ballot rejection rate among racial and ethnic groups at less than 1%, while Black voters had the highest rejection rate at about 2.5%. Franklin, Okanogan, Adams and Kittitas counties had the highest percentage of rejections.

► From Common Dreams — Trump Taps Project 2025 Co-Author Who Cozied Up to Musk to Lead FCC  — A portion of Project 2025—the far-right policy document that Trump repeatedly said he had nothing to do with—was authored by Carr, who has been an FCC commissioner since 2017. Carr wrote in Project 2025 about “reining in Big Tech” and called for Section 230 of the Communication Act to be limited in order to stop what conservatives have called discrimination against right-wing views by Facebook, Google, and other Silicon Valley giants. Carr was the only current government official to co-author Project 2025.

► From the Guardian — Harris campaign failed to connect with working class, US union federation says — Liz Shuler, president of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), said the Democrat’s bid for the White House did not resonate with working-class people who remain “very much economically insecure”. Harris had an almost 17-point lead among union members, according to the AFL-CIO. But outside of labor unions, low-income voters disproportionately voted for Trump. “We’re meeting and discussing within our own ranks about how we can actually translate the messaging that we were able to galvanize our members around,” said Shuler, “which did resonate since we turned out at higher numbers than the general public for Harris.”

► From NBC — After Democrats lost the working class, union leaders say it’s time to ‘reconstruct the Democratic Party’ — “I don’t think the party has fully embraced, and hasn’t for decades, really, working-class people,” said Brent Booker, the general president of the Laborers’ International Union of North America. “We have to deconstruct and reconstruct the Democratic Party if they’re going to be the party of working people.”

► From the Washington State Standard — Wildfire survivors appeal to Congress to end federal income tax on settlements, lawyer fees — Western wildfire survivors are calling on Congress to stop playing political football with a bill that would relieve them of federal income taxes on recovery settlements and lawyers fees. Oregon’s U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat, vowed at a Portland town hall to get a bill passed by the end of the year, and potentially by Thanksgiving.

► From the Washington State Standard — State panel not ready to scrap building codes targeted by gas initiative — “We need to address it. I don’t think there’s an emergency,” said Roger Heeringa, a council member. “If we act before Dec. 5 we’re going to get sued. If we act after Dec. 5 we’re going to get sued. We need to figure out what’s the right thing for us to do.” The council may meet at least once more before the election results are certified. Members said they want to talk with the panel’s attorneys to better understand the consequences of the measure’s passage.

► From Chron — Texas judge sets overtime rule back to 2019 Trump-era level — Millions of Americans who would have become eligible for overtime pay at the start of 2025 are now unable to receive that benefit, after a judge in Texas has blocked a federal exemption rule. Jordan, a University of Texas graduate who was appointed to the bench by President Trump in 2019, has set the minimum threshold for exemption back to the 2019 level of $35,568. The DOL did not immediately offer a statement.

 

INTERNATIONAL

► From CBC News — Sides in Canada Post strike remain far apart on several issues, union says — Canada Post workers went on strike early Friday after failing to reach an agreement with their employer, shutting down the corporation’s mail service across the country. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) says about 55,000 workers in its urban, rural and suburban mail carrier bargaining units are off the job, adding that little progress has been made during bargaining.

 

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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