UE NEWS Updates

On September 22, the Portsmouth City Council passed a collective bargaining ordinance allowing city workers “the right to organize, form, join, assist, and pay dues or contributions to employee organizations, to bargain collectively through an exclusive bargaining representative of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid and protection.”

UE Local 119, which represents approximately 200 one-on-one aides, teacher assistants, bus aides, and before and after school program attendants in the Winslow Township schools, concluded negotiations with their employer, the contractor ESS, at the end of September. The one-year contract will provide most workers with a 2.25 percent wage increase, with some senior workers receiving a three percent increase. Workers also gained a second day of bereavement leave.

Higher prices ahead thanks to war and corporate greed; nearly half of private-sector workers saw wages decline from 2021 to 2024; deportation policies have shut down job creation; Canadian unions demand improved unemployment insurance to deal with tariff chaos; and new NYC office of worker power inspired by UE project. All in this month’s Economics News for Workers.

During a wide-ranging discussion at their fall meeting, held on September 3 and 4, UE’s General Executive Board addressed health care, AI, threats to labor rights and democracy, and new federal regulations which impact UE’s international-worker members. The General Executive Board is made up of 16 rank-and-file members who are elected by UE’s geographical regions, plus the three national officers.