UE NEWS Updates

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Local 613 Finds Member-Run Unionism Well-Suited to Functioning During Crisis

May 26, 2020
Pittsburgh

The work performed by the teachers, speech language pathologists, and registered nurses of UE Local 613 at the Western Pennsylvania School for Blind Children requires a high level of technical and social skills. 

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the local has also needed to confront new challenges in maintaining the participatory principles of bottom-up, rank-and-file unionism. Led by the efforts of their executive committee, union representation and meetings have proceeded with minimal interruption. 

Erie Wabtec Locals Fight for Protections for UE Members, Their Families and Their Community

May 26, 2020
Erie, PA

In mid-March, as the number of COVID-19 cases began to increase across the country, UE Local 506, whose members work at Wabtec’s huge locomotive manufacturing facility in Erie, PA, began pressing the company to take action to ensure the health and safety of its members, their families and the Erie community. 

Local 170 Supports Members in Time of Need

May 26, 2020
West Virginia

UE Local 170, which represents state workers throughout West Virginia, has been working in many different ways to help their members in this time of need. “We just received our first order of 500 cloth masks, gloves, safety glasses and wipes to give out to members at the state hospital,” reports Vice President Leslie Riddle. “Due to back orders this has been a difficult process at times. But we have placed orders for several more.”

Local 1123 Wage Reopener Removes New-Hire Tier, Restores Wage Increases

May 23, 2020
Bolingbrook, IL

Local 1123’s most recent contract with National Consolidation Services was signed in late 2018, when the business was on the brink of bankruptcy. The local was forced to accept a wage freeze and a “new hire” tier $3 per hour below the regular rate, but got the company to agree to a wage reopener in April 2020. Negotiations took place on April 16, and the union negotiated a settlement which provides for 50-cent across-the-board wages each year and removes the tier.

William and Mary Workers Organize with UE

May 20, 2020
Williamsburg, VA

The William & Mary Workers’ Union, the newest chapter of UE Local 160, has been organizing workers at the College of William & Mary, a public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia, since 2019. Like their counterparts in North Carolina and West Virginia, public workers in Virginia do not have the right to collective bargaining. Since going public in November, the union has made significant progress in growing and making their demands heard on campus.

County Road Crew Wins Parity With Urban Counties

May 19, 2020
Cedar County, IA

UE Local 893, Sublocal 15, which represents the Cedar County Road Crew in Tipton, Iowa, ratified a new three-year agreement on March 3. The agreement includes a wage adjustment of one dollar plus two percent in the first year, one dollar plus three percent in the second year, and seventy-five cents plus three percent in the third year. “The membership was pleased with the contract, which brings road crew wages up with those in surrounding urban counties,” said Sublocal Secretary-Treasurer Hap Deerberg.

Press Roundup: UE Locals Take Action to Address Pandemic

April 30, 2020

UE locals from coast to coast have been taking action to make sure workers’ voices are heard as decisions are being made which impact our health, our jobs, and our ability to provide for our families. The next issue of the UE NEWS will feature extensive coverage of local activities, but in the meantime we have put together a selection of press coverage that UE locals have received over the past month. (Not a UE member? You can still subscribe to the UE NEWS for as little as $5/year.)

May Day 2020: Working People Must Unite Across Borders

April 30, 2020
Pittsburgh

This year, we celebrate International Workers Day as the novel coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic has made clear the central importance of workers to our society. It is the labor of frontline workers — healthcare workers, grocery and food workers, sanitation workers and others — that is keeping people alive right now, not the wealth accumulated by capitalists.

UE and Unifor call for urgent action for workers and the planet

April 22, 2020
Pittsburgh and Toronto

As working people and representatives of trade unions, we join environmental activists in marking the 50th anniversary of Earth Day with alarm and concern for the future of our planet. The time to fight for immediate and bold climate action is now, but the needed economic transition will not take place without strong guarantees for worker rights and good jobs for all.

UE Officers Call on Labor Movement To Organize Worker Fightback in the Face of the COVID-19 Crisis

April 10, 2020

“Life-and-death circumstances are being imposed on U.S. workplaces and workers are increasingly responding by standing up, fighting back and walking out, but frequently without the support of organized labor,” UE’s three national officers wrote in an open letter in In These Times. “Unions have a choice right now: Hunker down and try to ride out the COVID-19 storm or put our shoulders to the task of assisting workers in their fight to either improve conditions on the job or shut their workplaces down.”

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