Last Week in Southern Labor: 10/10 – 10/17

Here’s what workers in the US South and the colonies were up to from Friday, October 10, to Friday, October 17

Union Elections

• The National Labor Relations Board continues to be shut down, but workers can still be voluntarily recognized by their employers. 50 workers for Aviation Management Analytical Consultants (AVMAC) at the Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) in Beaufort, S.C were able to secure just that by organizing with the International Association of Machinists (IAM). The workers are aircraft mechanics providing maintenance and technical support on F-18 aircraft for the U.S. Marine Corps, and the union says they organized to have a stronger voice on the job and improve their working conditions

Grievances, Unfair Labor Practices, & Court Cases

• The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) has filed a lawsuit over the partisan out of office emails that the administration has inserted in automatic replies of furloughed workers, making it appear as if the workers whose name is on the email were saying the message. AFGE says this violates the free speech rights of the workers. 
• AFGE has scored an initial victory in their lawsuit against the Trump administration during the shutdown, with a federal judge ruling that the administration can’t take any action to RIF members of AFGE while the case plays out. We’ll see if that decision is overturned though. 
• AT&T workers in Miami, FL – unionized with the Communication Workers of America (CWA) Local 3122 – are demanding that the company fix its broken elevators. They have been malfunctioning for years, trapping workers who are then forced to wait to be rescued. The union is bringing in Miami-Dade’s Office of Elevator Safety to try to get them to crack down on AT&T
• The Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 1546 is calling on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to investigate its employer – the Capital Area Transit System (CATS) in Baton Rouge, LA – for what the union calls a “toxic and lawless environment,” particularly as it relates to sexual harassment. A supervisor is recorded multiple times saying a female worker has a “special effect” on him, among other complaints.

Strikes & Bargaining

• Teamsters say they won their nationwide strike against Republic Services after members of Local 728 in Cumming, GA, voted to ratify a new union contract with the company that contains a 46% raise, improved labor protections and work rules, and an improved healthcare plan.
• Aramark workers at the Newport News Shipyard in Newport News, VA – unionized with UNITE HERE Local 23 – ratified their first union contract that secured $4.75 in raises over the life of the contract, plus union health insurance, a pension, and job security
• Luis Leon has a great article profiling where VW workers in Chattanooga, TN are at in their contract negotiations for LaborNotes. 
• Workers at Hilton in Houston, TX won a new union contract after a 40 day strike that contained a $20/hr minimum wage, to increase to $22/hr minimum wage by the end of the contract. They also won new job security protections, improved workloads, and more. 
• The IAM and Boeing are resuming mediation next week, as the 3,200 person strike drags on. They will enter their 12th week on strike next week. The union has recently filed unfair labor practice charges against the company for failing to bargain in good faith. 
• The Atlanta Federation of Musicians, American Federation of Musicians (AFM) Local 148-462, and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (ASO) have reached a new three-year collective bargaining agreement (CBA). The new contract includes a 15% wage increase.

Political & Legislative

• A second round of No Kings protests are scheduled to take place on Saturday, October 18th – with 2,500 events taking place and millions expected to participate. The AFL-CIO, AFGE, and many other unions have endorsed the action. The shutdown will no doubt be a big theme at protests across the country. 
• The Federal Employees Civil Relief Act was introduced in the Senate by Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, with 17 original cosponsors. Companion legislation was introduced in the House by Reps. Brendan Boyle, D-Pa., and Emily Randall, D-Wash. The legislation would protect federal workers, federal contractor employees, and their families from foreclosures, evictions, and loan defaults during a government shutdown. AFGE has endorsed the legislation. 
• Coal miners gathered in DC to protest the Trump administration’s labor department as it refuses to defend and postpones the enforcement of a new rule aimed at decreasing the rising rates of black lung among the country’s miners. One 80 year old woman quoted in the New York Times about the event, whose husband recently died of black lung, said that she feels like coal miners are now just being “cast aside to die.” 
• United Video Game Workers – CWA is opposing Saudi Arabia’s attempt to purchase EA sports. They say that, if allowed to happen, this will further concentrate power and wealth into the hands of a few gatekeepers while doing nothing to address the concerns of players and workers. They are calling on regulators and elected officials to scrutinize this deal and ensure that any path forward protects jobs, preserves creative freedom, and keeps decision-making accountable to the workers who make EA successful.
• The AFL-CIO has released a policy paper on the principles necessary to protect workers in the face of artificial intelligence. Broadly, they call for strengthening labor rights and broaden opportunities for collective bargaining to ensure workers have a voice in how it’s implement, advancing guardrails against harmful uses of AI in the workplace, supporting and promoting copyright and intellectual property protections, developing a worker-centered workforce development and training system, institutionalizing worker voices within AI R&D, requiring transparency and accountability in AI applications, modeling best practices for AI use with government procurement, and protecting workers’ civil rights and uphold democratic integrity

Internal Union Affairs

• The Association for Union Democracy is holding a workshop on the rights of union members, specifically their rights to free speech, and how it’s protected. 
• The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) has a really cool profile up on their website of a young woman organizer out of their North Carolina local union
• The Professional Educators of North Carolina – a teachers union in that state that had been independent – signed an affiliation agreement with the American Federation of Teachers and will now be called the American Federation of Professional Educators of North Carolina
• The American Postal Workers Union (APWU) has elected a new slate of national officers, with Jonathan Smith from New York now leading the union as president. The previous president, Mark Dimondstein, did not run for re-election.

Listener Submissions

• A teacher from North Carolina called in to our program last week and talked about how his union has won meet and confer rights in Asheville and Durham, and they’ve had their first meetings, and seems like it’s going well, all things considered!