The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, July 29, 2005, Friday

Copyright 2005 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

July 29, 2005 Friday Home Edition


SECTION: Business; Pg. 1F;

HEADLINE: A tale of two union men;
Historic split in labor movement pits friends who have fought side by side

BYLINE: MATT KEMPNER

BODY:
They were close friends in a hostile environment, trying to spread unions in the South.
Bruce Raynor was the Southern regional director of a textiles union, whose battles included winning a three-year struggle to organize hundreds of workers at two curtain-making plants in east Georgia. Stewart Acuff launched the Georgia State Employees Union and became president of the Atlanta Labor Council, helping win union jobs building venues for the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.
Together, Raynor and Acuff operated side by side as two of the most prominent labor leaders in Georgia over the past two decades. They even went to jail together after a sit-in at a local Kmart.
But now the two 50-something guys hold crucial national posts on opposite sides of the biggest split the U.S. labor movement has faced in decades, one that may help determine whether unions become a historical afterthought or a reignited power in the American workplace.
Acuff is national organizing director of the AFL-CIO, the federation representing most major U.S. unions. Raynor is general president of UNITE HERE, a textile and hotel workers union with 450,000 active members and one of several big unions that appear to be on the verge of bolting from the AFL-CIO.
This week, two giant unions --- the Service Employees International Union and the Teamsters --- announced their departure from the AFL-CIO, draining labor's dominant federation of about 3 million workers. At least two other unions, UNITE and the United Food and Commercial Workers, are considering doing likewise. Leaders of the protesting unions criticize the AFL-CIO for not focusing enough resources on signing up new members after decades of union decline. Just 12.5 percent of U.S. workers --- and less than 8 percent of those in the private sector ---are union members, down from about one in every three workers in the 1955, when the AFL merged with the CIO.
The split in the AFL-CIO is testing friendships in the highest reaches of the labor movement, an arena that at least in theory is supposed to be a bastion of unity.
"It makes me angry," said Acuff of unions leaving the federation. "Unity and solidarity are the foundation of the labor movement.
"It's not a difference of opinion," he said. "Not at all. It's a destruction of unity."
Raynor describes the scenario as "honest disagreements between the leaders of many American unions and some of the staff of the AFL-CIO. It doesn't mean I don't have respect for those people. They are honest, smart people. They care about workers. We just see it differently."
Union organizers often tend to be a passionate lot. In many parts of the nation --- but especially in the South --- their chances of victory have been slim.
Union membership in the South is particularly low --- a fact historians link in part to the region's relative lag in developing heavy industry such as steel and automobile plants, where unions have historically been strong.
Efforts to organize Southern textile plants met with brutal failure early on, especially in the 1930s, a fact historians tie to particularly tough resistance by plant owners and government leaders. With unions already weak, Southern politicians passed laws that made labor organizing even harder. Just 6.4 percent of Georgia workers are members of unions now --- about half the ratio for the nation as a whole.
But union organizers keep trying.
Raynor grew up in New York City, the son of a truck driver dad and a mom who worked in retail. Acuff grew up in rural western Tennessee, the son of a Southern Baptist preacher and a schoolteacher mom. Two different upbringings, but Raynor and Acuff followed a similar path, including college and organizing on the front lines of the union movement.
Both came to Atlanta in the 1980s. They worked closely --- organizing drives, standing in picket lines, and helping on campaigns of friendly politicians. They were arrested and went to jail together, Raynor recalls, when they held a protest at an Atlanta area Kmart in the 1990s. Raynor remembers the ultimate punishment: He had to write an essay on civil disobedience. Acuff recalls a protest at another retailer that led to both men's yearlong banishment from Lenox Square mall.
And before Acuff decided to run for president of Atlanta's Labor Council, Raynor stayed with him until midnight on a Friday before Christmas as the two tried to tally how many votes Acuff might get.
Acuff said Raynor "built a good organizing tradition at UNITE in the South that had a great effect on the way I looked at the world." In particular, he said, he had great respect for the perseverance Raynor's organization showed in continuing to battle for union membership.
Raynor, for his part, liked what he saw in Acuff. "Stewart is a capable, honest, hardworking, dedicated man."
And Raynor said he still considered Acuff a friend, though he said the two hadn't seen much of each other during recent years. Acuff lives near Washington, where the AFL-CIO has headquarters. Raynor lives in the suburbs of New York City, the base for UNITE.
The two did speak briefly this week in Chicago, where the AFL-CIO was holding its convention, Raynor said, but he declined to describe the conversation.
"I've heard his point of view," Raynor said. "I just don't agree with it."
Acuff also declined comment on the subject.
But the two don't hide their differences of opinion about how to rebuild the U.S. labor movement.
Raynor said his union, which represents workers in the textile, hotel, gaming, laundry and apparel industries, had yet to decide whether it would leave the AFL-CIO. But he said he was convinced the AFL-CIO --- which gets funding from dues paid by unions --- needs to funnel far more money into increasing the number of union members in the United States. That means cutting back on other spending, including political lobbying and campaign contributions, he said.
"The AFL-CIO has tied itself too closely as a wing of the Democratic Party," he said.
Some unions should merge to reduce costs, said Raynor, and all unions should financially and organizationally support a union taking on a huge target nationally, such as unionizing Wal-Mart.
The AFL-CIO has balked at the idea of making major cuts in political spending.
"Politics and organizing should be absolutely integrated and combined," Acuff said. "It makes no sense to do one without the other."
But Acuff said much of what UNITE and other critical unions have pushed for has been endorsed by the federation.
"We have taken action on every one of the issues that they have raised, and the differences that remain are not nearly large enough to warrant disruption of unity," Acuff said.
He declined to comment on what motives the unions might have for departing.
What impact the split in the AFL-CIO might have on union efforts in the South, and Georgia in particular, is unclear, Acuff said. "It's too early to tell."
Raynor, though, said he hoped the changes would lead to more union organizing throughout the nation, including Georgia.
He compared pay for dishwashers in Atlanta with that in booming Las Vegas, where UNITE has signed up many of its newest members. Atlanta dishwashers, he said, generally get about $6.50 an hour, have little or nothing in the way of health benefits, no pensions and no free training to learn skills to get better-paying jobs. In Las Vegas, dishwashers represented by the union make $14 an hour, have pensions and full health care benefits for themselves and their family at no extra cost, and get free job training.
"That's what is at stake in this fight for workers in Atlanta," Raynor said.
What's at stake for friends within the labor movement is another matter.
Raynor said that if his union broke away from the AFL-CIO, it would still work with the federation on campaigns where they agree.
As for the relationship between Acuff and Raynor, both said they expected to remain friends.
"We can have disagreements and be friends," Raynor said. He paused, adding, "I hope that is the case."

GRAPHIC: CHARLOTTE B. TEAGLE / Staff Bruce Raynor ; AFL-CIO Stewart Acuff UNION NUMBERS Union members in the United States in 2002: 16.1 million. The AFL-CIO represented about 10 million of those workers. ; THE BRUCE RAYNOR FILE General president of UNITE HERE, a union representing 450,000 workers in the textiles, apparel, hospitality, gaming and laundry industries. > Graduated from Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., in 1972. > Started in the education department of the former Textile Workers Union of America in 1973. Worked on organizing drives in the South, including a union drive at textile maker J.P. Stevens in the 1970s. > Came to Atlanta in 1980 and served as Southern regional director for the Textile Workers Union of America. Lived in Fayetteville. > Left Georgia in 1999 as he moved up the union ranks. Elected president of UNITE in 2001. In 2004, the union merged with one representing hotel workers --- and he was elected president of the resulting union, UNITE HERE. > Lives in Nyack, N.Y., with his wife. He has five children, including two daughters who live in Georgia.

Chicago Tribune, July 28, 2005, Tuesday

Copyright 2005 Chicago Tribune Company
Chicago Tribune

July 28, 2005 Thursday
Chicago Final Edition

SECTION: NEWS ; ZONE C; Pg. 18

HEADLINE: John J. Sweeney;
Despite the exit of 2 key unions from the AFL-CIO, the federation's leader remains the same soft-spoken, unruffled conciliator

BYLINE: By Stephen Franklin, Tribune staff reporter.

BODY:
On the walls of the AFL-CIO's executive offices in Washington, there's a small painting that clashes wildly with the upbeat, modern decor. It's a dark, gloomy Depression-era portrait of three raggedy guys.
The first time John J. Sweeney saw it, he recalls doing a double take, and insisting that it stay. He liked it because it stirred memories of decades ago when he was starting out as a union worker in New York City.
"I said, `Oh, my, they reminded me of the people sitting outside of my office,'" Sweeney recalled recently. "And it reminded me of how much I was able to do for some of them."
Now the question is how much he can do for the AFL-CIO.
On Wednesday, Sweeney, 71, won another four years as president of the labor federation that now appears to be a deeply wounded institution besieged from within and without.
Four unions boycotted the convention in Chicago while two of them, in dramatic fashion, quit and will form their own group, the better, they say, to deal with the challenges facing a labor movement that appears in inexorable decline.
From stepping up the federation's fight against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to finding money to help local labor groups hurt financially by the unions' departure, Sweeney vowed Wednesday to keep his organization moving forward and described the dissidents' effort as a failed "power grab."
Ever the optimistic mediator, however, he hoped that they would return. And he predicted that the 54 unions in the loosely linked federation would embrace the reforms laid out this week.
"We are very enthusiastic about implementing the changes we've talked about," he told reporters. "I think we really have to think positively about building a stronger labor movement."
Times, indeed, may be different for organized labor since Sweeney's first union days. But he remains, say those who know him, the same soft-spoken, unruffled conciliator, someone who more resembles a cuddly grandfather with a soft Bronx Irish accent.
Even during this week's convention, when the AFL-CIO's 50th anniversary turned into a divorce proceeding, Sweeney seldom stoked the sense of betrayal that hung over the sessions at Navy Pier.
His acceptance speech barely touched on the exit of the Teamsters and Service Employees International Union, and their 3.1 million members. Several other like-minded unions, which have set up a rival organization to the federation, are expected to also quit the AFL-CIO.
"Through all the harsh words and the turmoil, I was actually thinking how very lucky I am, not only to have my supportive family at home, but also to have the support of my union family," he told the delegates.
The reluctant candidate
Such a crisis might have seemed unlikely 10 years ago when Sweeney took office.
He was a reluctant candidate in a palace coup of union leaders who said labor badly needed to change and oust AFL-CIO President Lane Kirkland.
It was the federation's first contested election ever. Until then all of its leaders had died or retired from office. This week, too, Sweeney did not face a challenger.
Sweeney, who was the head of the SEIU, was portrayed by foes as a radical who would plunge labor into nasty street battles. With unions deeply divided, he barely won.
His strength as SEIU president, said Cornell University labor expert Rick Hurd, was building bridges between old and new labor leaders and opening the way for young militants like Andy Stern, the SEIU's current president, to bring new ideas to the union.
So, too, after his AFL-CIO victory, Sweeney laid out ambitious organizing and political plans, hired staff to carry them out and opened federation meetings to workers, something never done before. A deeply religious man, he urged unions to work closer with clergy on workers' issues.
Ironically, Sweeney was a reluctant candidate again, agreeing to stay in order to keep the federation together, according to those close to him.
As unions bucked or sidestepped some of Sweeney's efforts in the late '90s, he pulled back, say critics like Anna Burger, a longtime SEIU official, who ran Sweeney's 1995 campaign. Today, she heads the seven-union dissident coalition.
Another critic is Stern, who sparked the dissident unions' rebellion and several months ago said Sweeney had to step down so reform could take place in the AFL-CIO.
"[Sweeney's] personality and style isn't suited to anything other than managing success," Stern said this week.
The two had not talked privately since Stern called for Sweeney's ouster, and Stern said he tried to call him Monday, just before announcing the SEIU's departure. But they never connected. "I felt I owed him a call," Stern explained. "There is no person who loves his family, his God, and his union as much as he does."
A union man from the start
Unions clearly have been stepping stones in Sweeney's life. The son of Irish immigrants--his mother was a maid and his father a New York City bus driver--he often tagged along with his father to union meetings as a youngster, and once stepped in for him at a union-sponsored street political rally.
He got involved in local Democratic Party politics, and that is how he met his wife, Maureen, a former New York City schoolteacher. She had volunteered to help with a campaign, and they spent their first date, according Ray Abernathy, Sweeney's longtime speechwriter, at a union dinner. The night Sweeney became AFL-CIO president, they went to a union dinner too.
Sweeney, who picked up the nickname "the Pope" at the SEIU local in New York where he built his power base, has few close friends, preferring to spend time with his family and to golf with his daughter, Trish.
"He is the most self-confident man I've ever met in my life," said Abernathy.
Asked about his mood late one day in Washington several weeks ago as the federation seemed headed for collision with his one-time protege and union, Sweeney calmly shook his head.
"As I used to tell my kids, there has hardly been a day for the past 48 years that I wasn't happy to go to work."
sfranklin@tribune.com
- - -
John J. Sweeney
- Born May 4, 1934, the Bronx, N.Y.
- Economics degree from Iona College, New Rochelle, N.Y.
Married, two children.
- First union job was working with the International Ladies Garment Workers union as a researcher in New York.
- President of the Service Employees International Union from 1980 to 1995.
- President of the AFL-CIO since 1995.

Investor's Business Daily, July 28, 2005, Thursday

Copyright 2005 Investor's Business Daily, Inc.
www.investors.com
Investor's Business Daily

July 28, 2005 Thursday

SECTION: SECTION LEADERS & SUCCESS; IBD'S 10 SECRETS TO SUCCESS; NATIONAL EDITION; Pg. A03

HEADLINE: BE HONEST AND DEPENDABLE Build Yourself A Coalition

BYLINE: By Cord Cooper

BODY:
9 You've come up with an idea rife with potential for your firm. The downside? Parts of it are controversial. The initiative could step on some toes.
Clearing hurdles and getting a green light involve building momentum, says Samuel Bacharach in "Get Them On Your Side." Bacharach is director of Cornell University's Institute for Workplace Studies.
Build a coalition by solidifying your base, Bacharach says.
When presenting your plan, know your audience. Know what resonates and what produces resistance, says Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner, author of "Changing Minds."
Here are other tips for moving your initiative forward:
** Highlight your strongest allies. Turn them into your first line of defense. "Cultivate (a) relationship with them and keep them strongly supportive," Bacharach said.
** List those on the fence. They might support your goals but propose different ways to reach them. How you court them could mean the difference between bringing them into your camp and turning them into adversaries.
** Highlight the resistors. Your choices? Find ways to bring them around, or devise strategies to "keep them from derailing your efforts," Bacharach said.
** Prioritize. First, shore up your allies, he advised. Make sure they fully understand the initiative and support all aspects of it.
Next? Move fence sitters to your side with help from your most convincing supporters.
Then use momentum to convert or marginalize the opposition. Be aware that time is a critical factor. "If you wait too long, potential resistors will become bona fide (critics) entrenched in their position," Bacharach said. If you approach them too early, "you'll come to them from a weak position. The trick is to deal with resistors when they know you have a groundswell of support."
** Avoid a mess -- coalesce. "Without a coalition, you're a lone wolf in the organization -- where the risk is much greater than any likely reward," said Bacharach. "With a coalition, you improve the chances of (success), of surviving unintended consequences" and raising your profile as a leader.
** Infuse power. To succeed, coalitions have to be unified, with each person reinforcing the other's ideas. Unity propels power. "Often coalitions are made up of people with no real authority in the organization," Bacharach said. Solidarity gives them clout.
"A successful coalition must find the balance between the self-interested goals of individual members and the collective goal of the group itself," he said.
** Play it smart. Work with human nature, not against it. Challenge a person, and he'll get defensive. Show interest in his views, and he'll be more apt to listen to yours, says communications coach James Van Fleet.
** Spot concerns. If you can "take the pulse of a group, spot unspoken concerns" and share a vision that excites and unifies, you can accomplish almost anything, said leadership coach Daniel Goleman, author of "Working With Emotional Intelligence."

The Washington Times, July 28, 2005, Thursday

Copyright 2005 News World Communications, Inc.
The Washington Times
July 28, 2005 Thursday

SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. C11

HEADLINE: Sweeney elected to lead AFL-CIO again

BYLINE: By William Glanz, THE WASHINGTON TIMES

BODY:
Despite conflict, feels 'new sense of clarity about our mission'
When AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney waltzed to re-election yesterday, it was the first time all week he had no opponent.
For two days, Mr. Sweeney was upstaged by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President Andrew Stern, his former protege, and Teamsters President James P. Hoffa and their plans to leave the labor federation.
Yesterday the 71-year-old patriarch of organized labor stood on a massive stage before more than 1,000 frenzied supporters basking in the spotlight, not sharing it.
"Despite the conflicts and even the divisions we've suffered, I think we all feel a new sense of clarity about our mission and new energy propelling us toward our goal," Mr. Sweeney said after his nomination.
But defections by two of the labor movement's biggest unions could complicate efforts to reach that goal.
Mr. Sweeney will preside over a smaller, poorer and more fractured labor movement than the one he led just a week ago.
"I wouldn't want to be in his shoes," said Mike Milliman, vice president of the Orange County, Calif., Central Labor Council.
Labor leaders are sorting out the ramifications of the decision by the Teamsters and SEIU to defect, but their departure will affect funding and could weaken the labor movement politically if an organizing war between AFL-CIO unions and the insurgents diverts money that could be spent funding the campaigns of sympathetic political candidates.
The decision by SEIU and Teamsters will result in a loss to the federation of $18 million annually in union dues.
"The political role of the AFL-CIO is compromised anytime a union leaves because they are coordinating the activity of fewer unions and doing it with fewer resources," said Richard Hurd, labor relations professor at Cornell University.
The federation will face another setback if Unite Here, a union representing hotel and restaurant workers, and the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) International pull out of the AFL-CIO.
An exit by the UFCW, the union most likely to sever ties with the federation, would result in the loss of an estimated $8 million in dues.
Labor leaders scrambled yesterday to eliminate the potential for a shortfall, raising dues 4 cents, from 61 cents per member to 65 cents.
It was a swift response intended to help state labor federations and central labor councils, which are responsible for much of the grass-roots political efforts by unions.
"This was not done by accident. We wanted to make it clear that we will do what we need to make sure those unions have the resources they need," International Association of Fire Fighters President Harold Schaitberger said.
Mr. Sweeney's supporters rallied around him yesterday, saying he has not been weakened by the defections.
"This is a challenge, but we've all faced challenges. They did not cut the legs out from under him," said International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers President Thomas Buffenbarger.
But the impact on Mr. Sweeney may not be immediately clear.
"Whether he is stronger or weaker because of this, we'll know as time goes by. He certainly would have come out of this strengthened had he been able to keep the other unions in the federation," Mr. Hurd said.
Mr. Sweeney will boost his standing and prevent further erosion of the federation's influence if he can prevent Unite Here and the UFCW from leaving, Mr. Hurd said.
The Laborers and United Farm Workers are the only members of the newly formed Change to Win Coalition that have pledged to remain in the AFL-CIO.
Mr. Buffenbarger said that while Mr. Sweeney was not weakened by the dissension that dominated the convention, he was affected.
"He's hurt because his union betrayed him," he said.
Mr. Sweeney headed the SEIU before Mr. Stern.
Mr. Stern made it clear this week that he thinks Mr. Sweeney's approach to running the federation - he employs a consensus-building style and shuns making podium-pounding demands - is partly responsible for the long, steady decline of labor.
Mr. Stern supports forced mergers between unions so there are fewer, bigger labor groups.
American Federation of Teachers President Ed McElroy said Mr. Sweeney's approach is among his strengths.
"John is not big on bluster, rhetoric or stealing the limelight. He's a man of substance," said Mr. McElroy, who did not support Mr. Sweeney during his first candidacy for president in 1995.

The Baltimore Sun, July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2005 The Baltimore Sun, Maryland
The Baltimore Sun, Maryland

July 27, 2005, Wednesday

HEADLINE: Leadership styles may have contributed to SEIU split from AFL-CIO

BYLINE: By Stacey Hirsh

BODY:

John J. Sweeney and Andrew L. Stern both emerged as leaders of organized labor's fastest-growing union. The first was from an older generation, known for his consensus-style leadership. The second has a reputation of being a risk-taker.
When Sweeney was president of the Service Employees International Union, he hired Stern and the two worked closely for about a decade as they tried to bolster the country's labor movement. Stern, 54, has since become president of the fast-growing SEIU. And Sweeney, 71, heads organized labor's umbrella organization, the AFL-CIO.
Earlier this week, though, Stern's union joined the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and broke from the AFL-CIO to form a competing coalition, the most divisive move to hit organized labor since the 1930s. Other unions are expected to follow.
Stern and others complain that Sweeney's organization is mired in the past and has failed to stem sliding union membership while American workers are in crisis. Their new group -- so far 3.2 million of the AFL-CIO's 13 million members -- said it plans to focus more on growing its ranks.
For two men who had long walked the same path, this public break-up shows the clear leadership differences between what experts describe as Sweeney's cautious style and Stern's impatience.
"John Sweeney, when he was at the SEIU, brought in a lot of creative, younger, more radical labor unionists and put them into positions of authority because he felt the union needed a shake-up, needed new ideas and Andy Stern was one of those people who he valued," said Richard Hurd, a professor labor studies at Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
The two didn't always see eye to eye, Hurd said, "but they had a very good relationship, there's no doubt about that, and there was a lot of mutual respect." And once he became president of SEIU, Stern began pushing the AFL-CIO to adopt more aggressive policies on organizing unions, Hurd said.
At the SEIU, Stern has been building on the ideas that Sweeney developed, said Jarol B. Manheim, a professor of media and public affairs at George Washington University who has written about labor strategies. But Sweeney's role of compromiser at the AFL-CIO, "and his low-key style hasn't been enough to stir passions within the movement, even though he's made some organizational changes and strategic changes that were in line with the organization 10 years ago when he was first elected," Manheim said.
Union membership has declined from 20 percent of the nation's workforce in 1983 to 12.5 percent as of last year. Manheim suspects that Stern and other leaders simply felt that "time has run out for business as usual."
"I don't think John Sweeney's a bad leader. I love John Sweeney, but the direction had to change," said Bob Moore, president of the SEIU Maryland/DC State Council and the union's international vice president.
Moore, who has been part of the SEIU under both Sweeney and Stern's leadership, said he doesn't see the SEIU's decision to leave the AFL-CIO as divisive. Instead, he and other union leaders are hoping it will turn the labor movement around.
Already, Stern has made some moves to reform SEIU internally, Moore said. Some local unions have merged, he said, and the union spends 50 percent of its budget on increasing membership.
The departure is an opportunity, Moore said, "for us to be able to do something different and get some of our partners in this coalition to do some things differently, to concentrate on organizing in some core industries."
If each union dominated the industry it focused on, organized labor could set wages and working conditions in those sectors, experts said. But with a changing economy and global workforce, they said, that can't always work.
"It's one thing if you're doing that with janitors, it's another if you're doing it with steelworkers who are in a globally competitive industry," said John Jordan, president of Principor Communications and a former labor strategist and organizer who has worked with both Sweeney and Stern.
In Maryland, for instance, the United Steelworkers of America represent employees at the Baltimore Zoo and the Good Humor/Breyers ice cream plant in Hagerstown.
Sweeney and his supporters have said that the two unions' decision to bolt the AFL-CIO will be damaging to organized labor, weakening its strength.
"President Sweeney is a consensus builder," said Stewart Acuff, organizing director of the AFL-CIO. "He understands how to and works hard at moving an entire institution, and that requires a strong will and a great degree of patience."
But experts said those leaving to form the coalition were running out of patience.
"Sweeney is of generation where it's really about building consensus. There really is this idea among these older labor leaders, they get in a room and they hash it out and they negotiate," Jordan said. "Whereas Stern's style is not to negotiate, it's really to set out what he wants and expect people to fall in behind him."

Chicago Tribune, July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2005 Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune

July 27, 2005, Wednesday

HEADLINE: Many union members say they get little in return for dues

BODY:

Building engineer Don Lasota knows little about his union's history-making split from the AFL-CIO, a move that could weaken or revitalize a labor movement struggling to halt a decades-long decline in membership.
But the 25-year union member thinks a shake-up can't help but be good if it makes unions leaner, stronger and more in touch with people like himself.
"There's--I don't how many--vice presidents, and what do they do?" Lasota, 58, said Tuesday while taking a cigarette break in front of the Streeterville high-rise where he works. "Some say we're the pawns, and we can get pushed around every which way. I think that if they cut out that dead weight and go and split like this, it might be better."
All around downtown Chicago, workers had little idea what their unions' leaders were doing at Navy Pier, where hundreds of delegates from around the country were setting the AFL-CIO's agenda while two big unions were making separate plans after breaking away.
They are the rank-and-file in one of the country's labor strongholds, a city with 450,000 union members.
Some are stalwarts who speak with pride about their unions, but others are disaffected members who say they see little benefit for the dues they pay.
Many of them, echoing the concerns of leaders of the warring factions, say unions no longer have the clout to protect workers' jobs and deliver hope for a better future.
"I'm not so much pro-union as I used to be because they make a lot of promises that don't pan out," said James May, 47, a shipping and receiving clerk on the loading docks at Northwestern University's downtown campus.
May said he joined a union seven years because his job was in danger of being contracted out, but he's still not convinced his job is secure. "It's protecting us now," he said, "but who is to say what's going to happen?"
He knows his local number--No. 681--but couldn't name its affiliation, offering "sand and gravel" as the name of his union.
That's common, labor experts said, because the typical member, unlike the activists who turned out for the AFL-CIO rallies last Sunday, is far removed from a union's international workings and its dealings with the 56-member federation.
"For them, the union is the local shop steward," said Richard Hurd, a Cornell University labor expert. "Many have no interest in becoming activist.
"They see the union almost as an insurance agent--if they have a problem, they call them up," he said.
Independent polls suggest that workers' sentiment about their unions has varied little over the last 30 to 40 years, Hurd said. If given a chance to vote, 85 percent would keep their unions.
Nonetheless, many workers interviewed Tuesday said they had little to show for their union dues.
"I just know they take our money and give it to the Democratic Party," Barbara Woodson-Silas, a 17-year union member, said, laughing. "To me, the union used to be strong back in the day. But today, it's not."
A member of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, she said she joined because she was given a card to fill out during orientation when she started working at the Cook County Clerk's office.
Lanette Lee, 37, who works at the Cook County Treasurer's office, belongs to the Service Employees International Union--one of the two maverick unions that quit the AFL-CIO this week.
"I don't even know what that is," she said of her union's disaffiliation. "All I know is they take money out of my check."
Lasota, the building engineer, agreed that "unions are not as strong as they used to be.
"I mean, you can go just around this neighborhood and there's been strike-busters," he said, standing outside a high-rise at Chestnut and Dewitt Streets. "One right next door here, they were striking there for three months. It didn't do any good.
"And you know, years ago unions were strong," he said. "Today they're nothing."
Not all workers are so pessimistic.
Byron Dumas, 34, a doorman at a Streeterville high-rise, is a member of SEIU's Local 1.
"I've been almost completely in the dark" about events at the AFL-CIO meeting, he said. "I've seen my union mentioned, but I don't know what's going on.
"But," he added, pulling his wallet out and showing off his union card, "I'm probably one of the few people who carries their union card with them. The unions definitely are necessary."
Steering a crate of vegetables from his delivery truck to a restaurant near State and Illinois Streets, Gilbert Matos, 45, said he looks forward to joining the Teamsters when his waiting period is over. He started working as a delivery driver a month ago after working both union and non-union jobs.
"I always believe union is always best," he said. "They help you. They give you better benefits."
By Barbara Rose and Erika Slife

The Journal News (Westerchester County, NY), July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 The Journal News (Westerchester County, NY)
All Rights Reserved
The Journal News (Westerchester County, New York)

July 27, 2005 Wednesday

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 5A

HEADLINE: 1 rep per H.S. to sit on boards

BYLINE: Hema Easley

BODY:
Clarkstown S. grad leads way for extra student on panels
Hema Easley
The Journal News
Andrea Vidler will not enjoy the benefit of her efforts, but she is pleased that future students in her high school will be ensured a voice in making decisions that affect them.
Vidler, 18, a Clarkstown South High School graduate, was among high school students from the state who lobbied to have a law enacted that would allow more than one student representative on the school board if the district had more than one high school. It would also allow options for choosing the student rep.
The state Senate and Assembly have approved the bill, which was awaiting Gov. George Pataki's signature yesterday. Pataki had until midnight to sign the bill into law.
"As soon as this bill passes today, we will have succeeded," Vidler said yesterday. The New City resident is studying industrial and labor relations at Cornell University. She was her high school representative to the school board in 2003-04.
Under the existing law, each school board was allowed to have one student-representative serve as a nonvoting member, although student reps could not attend executive sessions. The representative also had to be the student body president.
But in districts that have more than one high school - Clarkstown, for example - some administrators and students such as Vidler said the law didn't give adequate representation and restricted the right of students to choose their representative to the school board.
As a student-representative, Vidler alternated with Josh Mann, Clarkstown North's representative to the board, at school board meetings. But with different issues in the two high schools and their differing demographics, the two believed they could not do justice to the students they represented.
They decided to meet local leaders to try to change the law.
Vidler and Mann contacted Assemblyman Steven Sanders, D-Manhattan, and with his help drafted a bill that would allow each school to have a nonvoting student rep who could sit in on board meetings and voice opinions. These representatives would not be limited to a student government leader; they could be elected by students or the high school government body or selected by the principal or the school board.
"I think it is very important that the point of view of the ultimate consumer of our education system - the student - have input," said Sanders, chairman of the Assembly's education committee. "I think it's a situation that is a win for everyone. It's a win for the school board, a win for the school district and certainly a win for the students."
The bill does not mandate or require student representation.
All districts that want to invite students to join their boards must have voter approval. Those districts that have student representation must also have a periodic vote on the issue, under the bill.
If enacted, the law would affect all districts in the state that have more than one high school, including East Ramapo and Lakeland, which have two high schools each, and Yonkers, which has five.
Yonkers has no student reps on the board, said Eric Schoen, the district's spokesman. The district had no immediate comment on the bill.
In Lakeland, students looked forward to the bill becoming a law.
Walter Panas and Lakeland high school each had two student representatives in the 2004-05 school year. The district has had at least one representative for at least 20 years, Lakeland spokesman James Van Develde said. The district was unaware that a limit had been set on student representatives.
Staff writer Diana Belletieri contributed to this report.
Reach Hema Easley at heasley@thejournalnews.com or 845-578-2442.
Multiple high schools
Only a few school districts in the northern suburbs have more than one high school:
Clarkstown: Clarkstown North and Clarkstown South high schools
East Ramapo: Ramapo and Spring Valley
Lakeland: Lakeland and Walter Panas
Yonkers: Gorton, Roosevelt, Lincoln, Yonkers and Saunders Trades and Technical

The Washington Times, July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2005 The Washington Times
The Washington Times

July 27, 2005, Wednesday

HEADLINE: AFL-CIO eyes new sources for funds

BYLINE: By William Glanz

BODY:

CHICAGO -- Leaders of the AFL-CIO said they will cope with the loss of $ 18 million in annual dues that two renegade unions paid to the federation before they defected this week.
But it remains to be seen how the federation will make up the shortfall.
"We'll be looking at everything. Obviously you can do further cuts.
That's not what we're looking at. You can look for ways to enhance revenue.
That is something we're looking at. You can look at ways to consolidate," AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka said yesterday.
One option includes raising union dues. The AFL-CIO's 54 unions pay the federation 61 cents a month per member.
"Do not read into anything I'm saying that I prefer, that we are leaning toward" a dues increase, Mr. Trumka said.
The defection this week of the Teamsters and Service Employees International Union leaves the AFL-CIO with about 2.6 million fewer members, according to revised membership numbers released yesterday by Mr. Trumka.
The unions have said they represent a combined 3.2 million workers.
Despite the mathematic modifications by the federation, the financial loss will be significant, labor analysts said.
"There is no way this doesn't have an impact. The AFL-CIO overall is going to have to tighten its belt," Cornell University labor relations professor Richard Hurd said.
If the United Food and Commercial Workers also defect, the AFL-CIO would lose another 1 million members and $ 8 million in annual dues.
The federation already has cut costs this year. After the group's annual winter meeting in March, AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney eliminated 106 of 420 positions in response to a shift in resources that took money from the AFL-CIO's political budget to bolster its budget for organizing new members.
Mr. Hurd said he expects unions to boost contributions to the federation to help it sustain operations and avoid cuts in programs or people.
Union leaders said they are optimistic the AFL-CIO will withstand the loss of funding.
"I think within our house we can find ways to make adjustments," International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers President Thomas Buffenbarger said.
The loss of funding could hurt the state AFL-CIO groups and central labor councils, two groups responsible for organizing union efforts on the state and local levels.
When they announced their departure from the AFL-CIO, SEIU President Andrew Stern and Teamsters President James P.
Hoffa encouraged their union locals to continue participating in state and local labor efforts through the state federations and central labor councils.
But Mr. Trumka said the federation's constitution prohibits that participation, and that means state and local labor bodies will see funding from the SEIU and Teamsters evaporate.
Mr. Trumka said leaders of the federation are planning an emergency meeting to figure out how to help state federation and central labor councils avoid a cash crunch.
Laborers President Terence O'Sullivan suggested the two sides reach a compromise allowing Teamsters and SEIU locals to maintain membership in state federations and central labor councils.
"I think people need to take a step back and take a deep breath and see if this can all be worked out," he said.
Yesterday was the first day of the convention that wasn't dominated by the SEIU's and Teamsters' differences with AFL-CIO's Mr. Sweeney.
After upstaging the AFL-CIO's convention and 50th anniversary for two days, SEIU and Teamsters members were absent yesterday. Some of their supporters remained, but there was little acrimony.
"People are concerned and [ticked] off. It's a range of emotions. There's anger, but everyone's been very civil with me," said Mr. O'Sullivan, whose union joined the dissident coalition but will remain in the AFL-CIO.
Mr. Buffenbarger said he thinks most union leaders have gotten over the shock caused by this week's departure of the SEIU and Teamsters.
"The mood is pretty good. I think everybody got over it and people are ready to move forward," he said.

Philadelphia Inquirer, July 26, 2005, Tuesday

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2005 Philadelphia Inquirer
Philadelphia Inquirer

July 26, 2005, Tuesday

HEADLINE: Labor's big divorce

BYLINE: By Jane M. Von Bergen

BODY:

CHICAGO - Two of the nation's largest labor unions quit the AFL-CIO yesterday, a move that angered and disappointed hundreds of labor leaders gathered in Chicago for the labor federation's national convention.
The unions that left, the 1.7 million-member Service Employees International Union and the 1.35 million-member Teamsters, said they would respond to changing workforce conditions by pushing harder to organize workers in industries that can't be "digitized and outsourced easily."
"It's hard to take a truck driver, a construction worker, or a health-care worker's job out of the country," SEIU president Andrew L. Stern said. Many of the AFL-CIO's remaining 54 unions represent workers in manufacturing, which has seen a steady erosion in jobs as work has been moved to low-wage countries. Yesterday's split leaves the AFL-CIO with just under 10 million members.
Stern and Teamsters president James P. Hoffa have complained that the AFL-CIO has been reluctant to put sufficient resources into organizing new members. "We must have more union members to change the political climate that is undermining workers' rights in this country," Hoffa said. "The AFL-CIO has chosen the opposite approach."
Christopher Murphy, a Philadelphia lawyer who works with companies that are trying to avoid unionization, said, "It's the successful unions that are leaving." Murphy, a partner at Saul Ewing L.L.P., said it would mean more business for him and more worries for his clients "if the pro-organizing cadre comes out on top. There will be a lot more pressure for union locals to succeed at organizing."
The split comes as the AFL-CIO has tried to celebrate its 50th anniversary. The federation was founded in 1955 when two rival labor organizations reunited after an earlier and bitter split.
What effect the current split will have on the labor movement depends on how well the two unions and their allies can work with the AFL-CIO establishment on both politics and organizing, said Richard Hurd, a professor of labor studies at Cornell University.
Both sides say they will never let their division stand in the way of their cooperation at the bargaining table.
"We're prepared to bargain jointly with any union, whether they've left the AFL-CIO or not," said Larry Cohen, vice president of the Communications Workers of America and a staunch supporter of the AFL-CIO leadership. But, he said, the split is a bad idea for labor. "You have to work together to work together."
The SEIU and the Teamsters are among four unions that said Sunday that they would boycott the convention. The other two are the United Food and Commercial Workers Union and Unite Here, the merged union representing hospitality and textile workers. Both unions say they are still deciding whether to stay in the AFL-CIO.
The four unions are among seven in the Change to Win Coalition, which wants to focus more on organizing and less on Democratic-focused politics. The other three are the Laborers International Union, which plans to remain within the AFL-CIO, the United Farm Workers, and the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, which left in 2002.
The Teamsters and the SEIU made their announcement yesterday at the skyscraper headquarters of SEIU Local 1, which represents 35,000 janitors and building-service workers. At the convention a mile away on Chicago's Navy Pier, the mood was one of anger and bitterness.
In his keynote speech, AFL-CIO president John J. Sweeney received thunderous applause and a standing ovation when he said that "a divided movement hurts the hopes of working families for a better life. And that makes me very angry - the labor movement belongs to all of us, and our future should not be dictated by the demands of any group or the ambitions of any individuals."
Many took that as a reference to Stern, a former protege who replaced Sweeney as president of the SEIU when Sweeney left to head the AFL-CIO a decade ago. "I am disappointed my own union is among" the unions leaving, said Sweeney, 71, who so far faces no opposition for reelection on Thursday.
Since the dissident unions began talking about their dissatisfaction more than a year ago, the AFL-CIO has made changes to move in the direction sought by the group. It put more money into organizing, including a program to return some dues to unions with focused campaigns. But the amount of money was less than the 50 percent rebate that Stern and Hoffa had advocated.
Both Stern and Hoffa pledged to fund the new coalition with about half of what their unions pay to the AFL-CIO.
Each union pays about $ 10 million in annual dues, accounting for about a sixth of the AFL-CIO's revenue.
The AFL-CIO has recently cut its staff by about 25 percent through buyouts.
Neither union has paid its dues for several months. Stern said there are financial issues to be worked out in the process of formal disaffiliation, including a division of $ 25 million in annual royalties from the AFL-CIO's union credit card.
"We need a divorce lawyer," Stern joked.
Back in Philadelphia, Joseph Brock, a leader of Teamsters Local 830, had mixed feelings about the news.
"If all things were equal, I'd like to stay on the same page with the AFL-CIO," Brock said. "But no angle is working. The organizing angle isn't working. The political angle isn't working. We're getting clobbered every which way we turn. So maybe shaking things up can't hurt."

NBC Nightly News, July 25, 2005, Monday

Copyright 2005 National Broadcasting Co. Inc.
All Rights Reserved
NBC News Transcripts

SHOW: NBC Nightly News 6:30 AM EST NBC

July 25, 2005 Monday

HEADLINE: Two big unions leaving AFL-CIO

ANCHORS: BRIAN WILLIAMS

REPORTERS: ANNE THOMPSON

BODY:
BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:
There was a time when a union job was a fast track to the American dream, a good job at a good wage with decent benefits. The unions themselves got together under the massive AFL-CIO umbrella, and together they built much of America. But the news out of Chicago today is further proof that times have changed, and that this is not your father's labor movement. Two big unions are leaving the AFL-CIO after fighting over the future. Tonight the federation we used to call big labor might be a thing of the past. We begin here tonight with NBC News chief financial correspondent Anne Thompson with us from Chicago.
Anne, good evening.
ANNE THOMPSON reporting:
Good evening, Brian. At this convention, there is a battle over direction, whether to build political influence or membership as labor's numbers shrink. Fifty years ago, almost 1 in 3 workers belong to a union; now just 1 in 8 do.
In Chicago today, these were fighting words.
Unidentified Man: We say no. We say it's time for change.
THOMPSON: Two of the AFL-CIO's largest unions, the Teamsters and Service Employees left the federation, frustrated by the leadership's failure to change its emphasis from building political clout to building numbers.
Mr. ANDY STERN (Service Employees International Union): We have to resolve...
THOMPSON: Dissident leader Andy Stern says unions cannot stand still as the nation goes from what he calls a General Motors economy to a Wal-Mart economy.
Mr. STERN: The problem is that American workers in the 21st century are working more and making less. They have less health care and more debt. They have more hours worked and less security.
THOMPSON: Stern says the blueprint for the future can be seen in his Service Union's growth, adding 900,000 members in the last nine years. People like Kathy Osorto, a janitor and mom, who next week will get health insurance on top of an hourly wage that's almost doubled since she joined.
Ms. KATHY OSORTO: Now finally I've got $10.75, better than before, and I am so happy.
THOMPSON: AFL-CIO President John Sweeney wants to create a political operation that operates year round not just at election time to combat what he sees as a conservative anti-worker environment. Today he labeled the split a tragedy.
Mr. JOHN SWEENEY (AFL-CIO): A divided movement hurts the hopes of working families for a better life.
THOMPSON: Labor analyst Tim [should read Gene] Carroll called the secession a huge gamble. He says the further weakening of unions could affect the wages, health benefits and pensions of all employees.
Mr. TIM [should read GENE] CARROLL: Clearly, corporate America is watching this battle because I think they will be licking their chops if they see this disunity among labor continue.
THOMPSON: Today AFL-CIO President Sweeney said today the stakes have never been higher for working families, and tonight the same can be said for the labor movement. Brian:
WILLIAMS: Anne Thompson, with us from Chicago tonight, thanks.

The Washington Post, July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 The Washington Post
The Washington Post

July 27, 2005 Wednesday
Final Edition

SECTION: Financial; D01

HEADLINE: Labor Split Centers on Failure to Organize;
Unions Struggle For Formula to Revive Movement

BYLINE: Amy Joyce, Washington Post Staff Writer

BODY:
Inside or outside the AFL-CIO, convincing workers that joining a union will make life better is a tough sell.
Increasingly hostile employers, a legal structure that is increasingly anti-union, globalization and fierce competition all threaten labor's organizing attempts.
"You put all that together, and it has threatened not just the survival of unions, but unions as a powerful and political force," said Harley Shaiken, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley who specializes in labor issues.
One of the strongest forces keeping unions from organizing workers is employers who are willing to play hardball to keep unions out, as Wal-Mart proved when it eliminated a store department after a few of its employees voted to join a union, and closed a Canadian store in another case rather than negotiate.
And some of the problems stem from the labor movement itself, which critics say has been slow to adjust to the changing economy.
It also has been a long time since the labor movement produced any larger-than-life leaders who appeal to the popular imagination. The last labor leader with anything resembling a nationwide following was Cesar Chavez of the United Farm Workers, who died in 1993. And now, after this week's splintering, labor movement leaders are openly trashing one another.
"They've had a thousand excuses why they can't organize over the last 30 years. They have not put enough money into it, enough focus or muscle into it," said Patrick J. Cleary, a spokesman for the National Association of Manufacturers. He also said labor was having trouble organizing because there is not as great a divide between workers and management as in the past. "Where there is a polarized workplace, they have a lot more success," Cleary said.
The departure from the AFL-CIO of the Service Employees International Union and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters comes after a decline in union membership from 33 percent of the workforce 50 years ago when the labor federation was born, to 12.5 percent. The defecting unions, two of the movement's largest and most powerful, said they are leaving because of the federation's failure to halt the decline.
Labor's downward slide has been exacerbated by legal rulings that have gone against organized labor, and by public perception that unions are ineffective, according to several labor experts.
Last year, the National Labor Relations Board overturned three major decisions, ruling that temporary workers will no longer be able to bargain for job benefits as part of a unit with permanent employees; that graduate teaching assistants at universities are not employees and therefore cannot organize; and that employees of nonunion companies are no longer entitled to have co-workers present when they are interviewed in disciplinary investigations.
The board "is a very aggressive board that . . . interprets the law in a way that is tipped toward employers," said Kate L. Bronfenbrenner, director of labor education research at Cornell University. "The board is clearly biased towards employers and is making decisions one after another that way."
But, Bronfenbrenner said, the tough climate for organizing goes beyond the NLRB. Employers are using the threat of plant closings to intimidate workers, she said. "Employers are emboldened under the current administration to break the law or act within the law to aggressively oppose unionization efforts through a combination of threats and intimidation."
The United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which is trying to unionize Wal-Mart's 1.2 million U.S. employees, has filed more than 370 unfair-labor complaints against the retailer since 1995 -- about 90 percent of the charges filed against the company, according to NLRB records.
"There are almost endless anecdotes of what has taken place on the job that has made it so difficult to join a union," Shaiken said. "It has become an abstract right that is usually and routinely violated on the ground. Certainly for most workers, fear makes their decision."
Workers poured into unions in the late 1930s after they won the right to organize under the National Labor Relations Act in 1935. In 1981, though, in a move that bolstered the willingness of companies to take on unions, President Ronald Reagan fired 12,000 unionized air-traffic controllers who were striking for higher pay. Today, just 8 percent of private-sector workers are union members.
Unions are attempting to figure out how to strengthen organizing efforts. The UFCW recently formed Wake Up Wal-Mart, a group that is holding rallies and conducting online campaigns against the company's labor practices, after the union found that attempting to organize the company store-by-store wasn't working.
The SEIU is trying to organize on a larger scale, rather than one company or one locality at a time. "You can't improve the lives of workers by just looking at one work site," said Stephen Lerner, director of SEIU's property services division, which represents, among others, janitors and building security guards. Last week, janitors throughout the country who work for cleaning services company ABM Industries Inc. decided to honor picket lines in other cities to support striking janitors who work for the company in Houston and Indianapolis. The janitors themselves adopted the decision to honor the picket line at the SEIU's convention almost two years ago.
But despite new efforts, traditional organizing drives are being met with more resistance than ever.
The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), which has supported the current leadership of the AFL-CIO, is trying to organize about 9,000 employees of Resurrection Healthcare Corp., based in Illinois. Activist workers "are fired on trumped-up charges to send a signal that chills the organizing activity and chills people's willingness to step forward," said Jim Schmitz, AFSCME's director of organizing.
Wal-Mart has a handbook called the "Manager's Toolbox to Remaining Union Free." Marked confidential, the books include a phone number for managers to call if they believe workers are talking about organizing. The handbook includes questions and answers such as, "Can we terminate a salt [union activist] who works in our facility?" The answer is no, not based on their activism alone, followed by another question. "If we hire an applicant who is unproductive and also happens to be a salt [a union activist], can we terminate him/her?" The answer: "Yes, as long as the reason for termination is based on job performance and not his/her union affiliation. Be sure you have documentation to support the termination."
When a store is under threat of a movement to unionize, Wal-Mart also sometimes flies in executives on a corporate jet to stunt the effort. So far, it has worked. Not one of Wal-Mart's 3,500 U.S. stores is unionized.

The Washington Times, July 27, 2005, Wednesday

Copyright 2005 News World Communications, Inc.
The Washington Times

July 27, 2005 Wednesday

SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. C08

HEADLINE: AFL-CIO eyes new sources for funds

BYLINE: By William Glanz, THE WASHINGTON TIMES

BODY:
Leaders of the AFL-CIO said they will cope with the loss of $18 million in annual dues that two renegade unions paid to the federation before they defected this week.
But it remains to be seen how the federation will make up the shortfall.
"We'll be looking at everything. Obviously you can do further cuts. That's not what we're looking at. You can look for ways to enhance revenue. That is something we're looking at. You can look at ways to consolidate," AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka said yesterday.
One option includes raising union dues. The AFL-CIO's 54 unions pay the federation 61 cents a month per member.
"Do not read into anything I'm saying that I prefer, that we are leaning toward" a dues increase, Mr. Trumka said.
The defection this week of the Teamsters and Service Employees International Union leaves the AFL-CIO with about 2.6 million fewer members, according to revised membership numbers released yesterday by Mr. Trumka.
The unions have said they represent a combined 3.2 million workers.
Despite the mathematic modifications by the federation, the financial loss will be significant, labor analysts said.
"There is no way this doesn't have an impact. The AFL-CIO overall is going to have to tighten its belt," Cornell University labor relations professor Richard Hurd said.
If the United Food and Commercial Workers also defect, the AFL-CIO would lose another 1 million members and $8 million in annual dues.
The federation already has cut costs this year. After the group's annual winter meeting in March, AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney eliminated 106 of 420 positions in response to a shift in resources that took money from the AFL-CIO's political budget to bolster its budget for organizing new members.
Mr. Hurd said he expects unions to boost contributions to the federation to help it sustain operations and avoid cuts in programs or people.
Union leaders said they are optimistic the AFL-CIO will withstand the loss of funding.
"I think within our house we can find ways to make adjustments," International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers President Thomas Buffenbarger said.
The loss of funding could hurt the state AFL-CIO groups and central labor councils, two groups responsible for organizing union efforts on the state and local levels.
When they announced their departure from the AFL-CIO, SEIU President Andrew Stern and Teamsters President James P. Hoffa encouraged their union locals to continue participating in state and local labor efforts through the state federations and central labor councils.
But Mr. Trumka said the federation's constitution prohibits that participation, and that means state and local labor bodies will see funding from the SEIU and Teamsters evaporate.
Mr. Trumka said leaders of the federation are planning an emergency meeting to figure out how to help state federation and central labor councils avoid a cash crunch.
Laborers President Terence O'Sullivan suggested the two sides reach a compromise allowing Teamsters and SEIU locals to maintain membership in state federations and central labor councils.
"I think people need to take a step back and take a deep breath and see if this can all be worked out," he said.
Yesterday was the first day of the convention that wasn't dominated by the SEIU's and Teamsters' differences with AFL-CIO's Mr. Sweeney.
After upstaging the AFL-CIO's convention and 50th anniversary for two days, SEIU and Teamsters members were absent yesterday. Some of their supporters remained, but there was little acrimony.
"People are concerned and [ticked] off. It's a range of emotions. There's anger, but everyone's been very civil with me," said Mr. O'Sullivan, whose union joined the dissident coalition but will remain in the AFL-CIO.
Mr. Buffenbarger said he thinks most union leaders have gotten over the shock caused by this week's departure of the SEIU and Teamsters.
"The mood is pretty good. I think everybody got over it and people are ready to move forward," he said.

Chicago Tribune, July 26, 2005, Tuesday

Copyright 2005 Chicago Tribune Company
Chicago Tribune

July 26, 2005 Tuesday
Chicago Final Edition

SECTION: BUSINESS ; ZONE C; Pg. 1

HEADLINE: Unions' exit fuels fears in AFL-CIO;
Hoffa: `We are going to do something new'

BYLINE: By Stephen Franklin and Barbara Rose, Tribune staff reporters

BODY:
Throwing the nation's already troubled unions into an era of uncertainty, the Teamsters and Service Employees International Union walked out of the AFL-CIO on Monday, accusing the labor federation of falling behind the times.
"What was being done at the AFL-CIO was not working, and we are going to do something new," said Teamsters President James P. Hoffa as he and SEIU President Andy Stern explained their unions' departure at the start of the AFL-CIO's four-day convention in Chicago.
From high-ranking AFL-CIO officials to heads of local union labor councils, the departure of the two powerful unions and the precedent-setting rift among unions brought anger, frustration and fears that their exit will lead to a heap of problems.
Together, the two unions account for $20 million, or about one-fifth, of the dues collected annually by the AFL-CIO. The federation will lose 3.1 million members, falling to just below 10 million rank and file.
Looking ahead, AFL-CIO leaders and union officials said the growing division in their ranks could drain the federation's finances and complicate everyday union activities, from lobbying in Washington to bargaining and working on the job.
"I am going to do what I can do to make sure we can keep a united labor front," said Dennis Gannon, head of the 450,000-member Chicago Federation of Labor, the nation's second-largest local labor group and one of the oldest.
Without the two unions, the CFL will lose 147,200 members and $1.2 million in annual support, funds that Gannon said would be hard to replace.
AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney, who had tried to reach a deal with the reform-minded dissidents, called the unions' exit "a grievous insult" and added that he was "deeply disappointed" that the SEIU, which he once led, had taken that step.
The unions' departure along with two other dissident unions' boycott of the convention has cast a pall over a gathering meant to celebrate the federation's 50th anniversary and its first-ever meeting in Chicago.
Organized labor has not witnessed such a breakdown in solidarity since union leaders, impatient with the conservative ways of the American Federation of Labor, broke away in the 1930s to form the Congress of Industrial Organizations to represent unskilled workers.
The current crisis, which had been brewing for some time, came to a boil Sunday when the Teamsters, the SEIU, the United Food and Commercial Workers union and Unite Here, the merged union of the hotel workers and garment workers unions, said they would not take part in the gathering.
The SEIU was the AFL-CIO's largest union, with 1.8 million members.
The dissidents now will belong to a seven-union coalition, which plans its founding convention this fall. Other members of the coalition are the United Farm Workers union, the Laborers Union, and the Carpenters, which quit the AFL-CIO four years ago after growing frustrated over the federation's failure to stop organized labor's steady decline.
Currently, the nation's unions represent less than 8 percent of the private workforce, a modern-day low.
So far, only the 1.3 million-member UFCW has indicated it also might quit the AFL-CIO, but union officials and labor experts predicted that the momentum created by the SEIU and Teamsters might draw others down the same path.
The dissidents say unions need to spend more money on organizing, to merge so smaller unions can maximize their strength, and to focus their organizing drives on core industries rather than scooping up any available workers.
Sweeney has come back with proposals that mirrored many of their concerns. But he did not agree to a Teamsters proposal to give back to unions up to 50 percent of their annual dues so they could bolster their own organizing. Such a rebate plan, AFL-CIO officials said, would bankrupt the federation.
Sweeney also has pushed for stepped-up spending on politics, a move discounted by the dissidents as a failed strategy. Still, the SEIU is a major contributor to politicians and campaigns.
The two sides also differ on how much strength the labor organization should have.
Over the last five decades the AFL-CIO has tried to bind together its members. But the dissidents say they want a much stronger central organization.
For their own newly launched effort, Hoffa said the coalition would start collecting dues and hiring a staff. In the case of the Teamsters, he said $5 million of the $10 million in dues money earmarked for the AFL-CIO would go to the new coalition.
Similarly, Stern said he hoped that warfare would not erupt between the dissidents and the AFL-CIO and its members. "We may disagree, but we have no intention of being disagreeable," he remarked.
Cornell University labor expert Harry Katz predicted that the dissidents and the AFL-CIO would probably mend their differences down the road. But, he added, such peacemaking would probably not take place any time soon because of the angers raised.
As for the effect of the unions' departure and the creation of a rival group, Katz said that such moves might help the nation's badly troubled unions. "It adds an element of experimentation and vibrancy," he suggested.
Instead of the new opportunities, however, CFL director Gannon was worried Monday what would happen to his organization, which plans a new $8 million building in Chicago.
AFL-CIO rules require local groups like his to expel unions that no longer belong to the federation, but union officials said the AFL-CIO may try to increase the funding for local councils to make up for their losses.
"We have to evaluate what we want to do," Gannon said.
The challenge for organized labor now, said Terry O'Sullivan, president of the Laborers union, which belongs to the dissidents group but which has also vowed to stay in the AFL-CIO, is "to find out how to pull this ballgame back together again."
"The longer it takes, the more difficult it becomes," he said.
- - -
Key dates in the labor movement
1866: National Labor Union is founded.
1886: American Federation of Labor (AFL) is founded.
1919: One out of every five workers walks out in a major strike wave, involving national clothing, coal and steel strikes, a general strike in Seattle and a police strike in Boston.
1926: Railway Labor Act sets up procedures to settle railway labor disputes and forbids discrimination against union members.
1935: National Labor Relations Act and Social Security Act are passed. Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO) is formed within AFL.
1938: Fair Labor Standards Act establishes first minimum wage and 40-hour week. Congress of Industrial Organizations forms as an independent federation.
1943: CIO forms first political action committee to get out the union vote for President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
1947: Taft-Hartley Act restricts union members' activities.
1955: AFL and CIO merge. George Meany becomes its president.
1962: President John F. Kennedy's order gives federal workers the right to bargain.
1979: Lane Kirkland is elected president of AFL-CIO.
1981: President Ronald Reagan breaks air traffic controllers' strike. AFL-CIO rallies 400,000 in Washington on Solidarity Day.
1988: Teamsters rejoin AFL-CIO after being expelled in 1957.
1995: John Sweeney is elected president of AFL-CIO.
2005: Two major unions, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Service Employees International Union, break away from the AFL-CIO in a dispute over declining U.S. membership and the direction of organized labor.
Source: AFL-CIO
sfranklin@tribune.com
berose@tribune.com

NOTES: STATE OF THE UNIONS: THE CHICAGO CONVENTION

National Public Radio, Morning Edition, July 26, 2005, Tuesday

Copyright 2005 National Public Radio (R)
All Rights Reserved
National Public Radio (NPR)

SHOW: Morning Edition 11:00 AM EST NPR

July 26, 2005 Tuesday

HEADLINE: Service Employees International Union having good luck organizing home-care workers in Michigan

ANCHORS: STEVE INSKEEP

REPORTERS: JEROME VAUGHN

BODY:
STEVE INSKEEP, host:
We're going to hear more now about one of the unions that's breaking away. The Service Employees International Union says it wants more emphasis on recruiting new members. Jerome Vaughn of Detroit Public Radio reports on how that union works to expand.
JEROME VAUGHN reporting:
Virginia Burton sits on the porch of her small, well-kept home near an industrial district on Detroit's southwest side. She's just finished getting dinner together for her granddaughter and her special live-in guests, but she's a little frustrated.
Ms. VIRGINIA BURTON (Home Care Worker): The money they give you is ridiculous. It's absolutely ridiculous. Let's see, how can I put this? It's not enough, it's not enough for basic needs.
VAUGHN: Burton is a home-care worker. She takes care of two developmentally disabled patients in her home. Both are elderly, both have special needs. Burton cares for them 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and for this work, she receives roughly $520 per month from the state of Michigan. Burton is one of thousands of workers in Michigan who care for those who can't care for themselves. She attends to their basic needs, but she says the state isn't taking care of hers. Burton says that's why her interest was piqued a few months ago when an organizer from the Service Employees International Union began distributing information at the group homes in the area. After talking with SEIU officials, she said it was clear that they could help her find a level of stability she doesn't have right now.
Ms. BURTON: I would like to have retirement. I wouldn't like to work till I'm 62 or 65 and have nothing coming, you know, nothing coming, no sick time, no vacation time; no, just work, just work, work, and when you're dead you're done, you know. So with the union, I feel I--I know I'll have something to look forward to. I will.
VAUGHN: The SEIU has had a good deal of success in organizing home-care workers like Burton, as well as day-care workers and janitors. More than 41,000 Michigan home caregivers voted to join the union in April.
Marianne Woods is the program director for SEIU Local 517 in Saginaw, Michigan. She's working to recruit new members who work for Head Start programs around the state. Woods says the AFL-CIO and other unions are losing their political clout because they're losing members. She says the SEIU has a simple solution to that problem.
Mr. MARIANNE WOODS (SEIU Local 517): Organized labor in the AFL have always had a pretty strong voice amongst the rank and file in voting for people that represent workers. Our problem is, is that our rank and file is shrinking; therefore, our voice isn't as significant as it was in the past, and what we need to do is make it significant again.
VAUGHN: But some analysts say that's too simple an explanation. Rick Hurd is a professor at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. He says the SEIU is having success because it's recruiting in the service sector, where the number of jobs is growing. Hurd says the tactics aren't as effective in sectors that are losing jobs, such as manufacturing.
Professor RICK HURD (Cornell University): GM, Ford and Chrysler have been reducing employment for the past 20 years at a relatively steady pace, and so they have a situation where spending more money on organizing is almost like just running faster on the treadmill. It isn't like it necessarily gets them anywhere.
VAUGHN: Hurd says AFL-CIO leaders must recognize that if they want labor to stop shrinking and start growing again, they're going to have to make changes.
(Soundbite of traffic)
VAUGHN: Adding members like Virginia Burton is the step the Service Employees hope will keep their union strong. She says her membership will allow her to do her job better.
Ms. BURTON: How important is it? They're a human being, and they have a right to live and to enjoy life, be appreciated. You know, none of us is any lesser or any greater person because we are mentally or physically challenged. It's just that that's their lot. That's the straw they pulled. But their life is important.
VAUGHN: Burton says having the ability to take care of herself helps her take care of others.
For NPR News, I'm Jerome Vaughn in Detroit.
INSKEEP: This is MORNING EDITION from NPR News.

PR Newswire US, July 26, 2005, Tuesday

Copyright 2005 PR Newswire Association LLC.
All Rights Reserved.
PR Newswire US

July 26, 2005 Tuesday 2:00 PM GMT

HEADLINE: YMCA of the USA Chooses eCornell for Online Professional Development Certificate Programs

DATELINE: ITHACA, N.Y. July 26

BODY:
ITHACA, N.Y., July 26 /PRNewswire/ -- YMCA of the USA has selected eCornell as its first provider of online learning for the YMCA University. The choice was made based on eCornell's comprehensive professional development curriculum in human resources, management, and executive development, and "structured flexibility" delivery methodology. The eCornell system allows learners to work at their own pace within an established timeframe, ability to scale in order to serve a diverse population, and cost-effective economics that allow YMCA of the USA (Y-USA) to offer programs across the country to over 2,500 locations. Y-USA is the national resource office for the nation's 2,594 independent YMCAs.
The YMCA University provides learning and leadership development for YMCA staff and volunteers through a variety of modalities. "We entered into a long-term relationship with eCornell following a very successful pilot program," said Dan Nussbaum, YMCA Director of Leadership Development. "Participants were extremely impressed with the course content, rigor, and relevance to their responsibilities. The efficiency of the online delivery allows us to make the programs widely available, with no investment in infrastructure, and gives staff the opportunity to participate from their own community as their schedule permits."
YMCA managers and staff will enroll in eCornell courses designed to help their local YMCA succeed in their competitive environments. Courses and certificates from Cornell University are available in human resources management, supervisory skills, strategic thinking and scenario planning, and studies in proactive leadership. Many eCornell courses have also been approved to satisfy the requirements for leadership development for senior YMCA staff.
"The YMCA's large and decentralized organization provided a wonderful opportunity to leverage eCornell's ability to partner with clients in building their organizational capability. Our course format and course delivery options were a perfect match for the YMCA's Executive Development and New CEO Institute," says Chris Proulx, eCornell's President and CEO.
eCornell's partnership with the Y-USA is just the latest chapter in the movement's long association with Cornell University. John R. Mott, winner of the 1946 Nobel Peace prize for his leadership of the YMCA, graduated from Cornell in 1888.
About eCornell: eCornell provides many of the world's leading organizations with online, asynchronous professional and executive development in the areas of strategy, leadership and management development, human resources, financial management, and hospitality management. Its patent-pending course development model and proven instructor-led course delivery provide for engaging, rigorous, and interactive learning. For more information, please visit http://www.ecornell.com/ .
About YMCA of the USA: YMCA of the USA is the national resource office for the nation's 2,594 YMCAs, collectively the nation's largest not-for-profit community service organization, serving 20.1 million people of all faiths, races, ages and incomes, including 9.7 million children. YMCAs offer a broad range of programs including youth leadership and volunteerism and are collectively the nation's largest providers of child-care. To learn more about the YMCA please visit http://www.ymca.net/ .
CONTACT: Arnold Collins for YMCA of the USA, +1-312-419-8418,
arnold.collins@ymca.net ; or Ross Pearo of eCornell, +1-607-330-3334,
rpearo@ecornell.com
Web site: http://www.ecornell.com/
http://www.ymca.net/
SOURCE eCornell

Buffalo News (New York), July 24, 2005, Sunday

Copyright 2005 The Buffalo News
Buffalo News (New York)

July 24, 2005 Sunday
FINAL EDITION

SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. D1

HEADLINE: ON BRINK OF SPLITTING, AFL-CIO MULLS FUTURE

BYLINE: By Fred O. Williams - NEWS BUSINESS REPORTER

BODY:
The house of labor for 50 years -- the AFL-CIO -- may become a house divided this week, as tension between unions approaches the breaking point.
Seven unions including the Teamsters and Service Employees have joined a dissident group, and some threaten to break away from the rest of labor. The showdown comes at an AFL-CIO meeting in Chicago that begins Monday, in which president John Sweeney seeks re-election amid bitter opposition.
The split might be averted by a financial compromise, and perhaps by Sweeney's departure. But if not, the crisis in big labor would shake blue-collar Buffalo.
"You'd basically end up with two labor councils in the same area," said James Gugliuzza, president of the Niagara-Orleans AFL-CIO Council in Lockport. Dissident unions would exit his council, taking their dues payments with them.
"These are all large unions in Niagara County -- it's a big chunk of change," he said.
The AFL-CIO and the rival coalition would issue separate endorsements for local political races and might even compete for membership, union officials and labor experts said.
"It will be very sad if it happens," said Mark R. Jones, president of the AFL-CIO Buffalo Council. "I would say the future of the Area Labor Federation would be in jeopardy." The federation is the AFL-CIO's regional unit spanning Western New York.
The dissidents in the Change to Win Coalition have about 40 percent of union membership nationally, including tens of thousands of members in the Buffalo area. They are:
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Service Employees International Union, United Food and Commercial Workers, United Brotherhood of Carpenters, Laborers International Union, United Farm Workers, and the hotel and garment workers in UNITE-HERE.
Not all would necessarily leave the AFL-CIO; the Laborers and Farm Workers have pledged to remain, and the Carpenters left in 2001.
The in-house dispute is about labor's loss of clout nationally, but unions remain a force in Western New York. Union members make up 25 percent of the work force in Erie and Niagara counties, about double the national rate. Regionally, about 150,000 workers in six counties belong to the AFL-CIO.
The labor group coordinates local boycotts and organizing drives, but its biggest public role is in politics. With its influential endorsement, plus the ability to deliver canvassers and phone bank staff, labor's stamp of approval is a boon for favored candidates.
"I've always considered it very important for my candidacy," Erie County Legislator Lynn M. Marinelli said. Labor clout is what draws a bevy of political candidates to the Buffalo AFL-CIO's annual picnic, set this year for Friday at Elma Meadows Park.
"The major role of a central labor council is politics at the local level," said Richard W. Hurd, a professor at Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor relations.
What might happen to that in a split is hard to figure. Erie County Democratic Party Chairman Leonard R. Lenihan said he doesn't expect labor's traditional support for his party's candidates to waver.
"The bottom line is, we're still the party that's for working people," he said. In primary races, he said he expects the party's endorsed candidate to still have the edge.
However, local units of the dissident unions would set up their own process to review candidates and coordinate endorsements.
"I assume if there was a split, we'd be asked to leave the AFL-CIO" at the local level, said Ronald Lucas, president of Teamsters Joint Council 46 in Buffalo. The Teamster council has 14,000 members at locals in Western New York and Rochester.
Led by SEIU president Andrew Stern, the dissident coalition wants to shift more funds to organizing. Instead, Sweeney and his supporters have focused on political action to promote labor-friendly candidates and policies. Elected in 1995, Sweeney, 71, is blamed by critics for failing to reverse declining membership, which stands at 12.5 percent of workers.
Harsh words have issued from both sides, but some observers wonder how much of the vitriol is calculated bluster.
"We come from bargaining -- we know how to bargain," Gugliuzza said. "My hope is the leadership will come to an agreement."
And the damage of a split would be great. "If the AFL-CIO loses 40 percent of its revenues, it's got problems," Hurd said.
The two sides have quietly discussed compromises that would let Stern and others devote more of their dues to organizing, Hurd said. In addition to boosting organizing, the coalition seeks more mergers between unions and a slimming of AFL-CIO's governing board, expanding the power of the 13 largest members.
Even in a split, some joint efforts between unions on different sides of the divide could continue. Community groups that push for living wages and other labor-oriented issues provide forums outside the AFL-CIO where unions will continue to work together at the local level, Hurd said.
The food workers union leads a multiunion campaign against Wal-Mart, which is seen as a threat to union-represented retailers. That cooperation need not come to an end, even if the food workers leave the AFL-CIO, said Greg Gorea, a representative of the UFCW Local One in Utica.
"We're all in it for the same thing, improving people's jobs," he said. "I don't think that's going to change -- the core beliefs are the same."

U.S. News & World Report (USNews.com), July 25, 2005, Monday

U.S. News & World Report USNews.com

Career Spotlight: Union rift a revival or a collapse?
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/050725/25career.htm

Posted 7/25/05By Kim Clark

The fate of the American labor movement could be decided at the AFL-CIO meeting that will kick off today. Five of the biggest member unions, unhappy about continuing membership and political losses, are threatening to pull out of the confederation. They want to redirect the union dues they now send to the Washington organization to new kinds of membership drives and lobbying efforts. Will this rift further weaken America's already ailing unions? Or could this be the first step toward reinvigoration? Ken Margolies, a veteran of many union drives who is now director of a Cornell University labor education program, talked with U.S. News about the issue.

What effect do you think the current controversy will have?

This could stimulate some changes that would be good for the labor movement, such as more aggressive organizing. But if the split leads to unions attacking each other, I can't see that being good. Either way, it is historic: It could lead to a revival or a collapse.

Unions represent only about 12 percent of the working population now. Why should it matter what happens to the AFL-CIO?

The whole shift away from pensions to 401(k)'s would not have happened if unions were as strong as they used to be. People are paying more of their healthcare costs than they would have if unions were stronger (and could force employers to pick up more of the tab). People who are not in unions may not realize the effect it has on them until later.

Many would argue that unions are losing members—and should be losing members—because they have a sordid history of corruption and violence. But unions say that the legal deck is stacked against them.

How many Norma Raes are out there who are willing to risk getting fired for organizing a union? There are just too many ways for an employer to get away with it. If they get caught firing somebody (and thus violating a law that bans firing workers for union organizing), they just settle the case. They say, 'Here is $6,000. Don't come back to work.'

Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, July 23, 2005, Saturday

Copyright 2005 Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
All Rights Reserved
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (New York)

July 23, 2005 Saturday Metro Edition

SECTION: NATIONAL; Pg. 1A

HEADLINE: Local unions pledge unity if AFL-CIO splits

BODY:
Rochester-area union officials are vowing to stay united in purpose, even if their national unions split from the AFL-CIO.
Jim Bertolone, president of the Rochester and Genesee Valley Labor Federation, a unit of the AFL-CIO, said local labor unions are determined not to let next week's vote at the AFL-CIO national convention, whatever the outcome, "tear us apart."
But Lance Compa, a Cornell University labor specialist, sees a potential for a schism if local unions start competing to attract members.

Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, July 23, 2005, Saturday

Copyright 2005 Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
All Rights Reserved
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (New York)

July 23, 2005 Saturday Metro Edition

SECTION: BUSINESS; Pg. 12D

HEADLINE: Area unions undeterred by national animosity

BYLINE: Joy Davia, JDAVIA@DemocratandChronicle.com

BODY:
Joy Davia
Staff Writer
David Young and Dan Kuntz, organizers for different area unions, have worked together for about a year - picketing together, lobbying Washington together, volunteering for charity together.
So as they wandered the aisles of a Gates mini-mart, getting food for their hungry pickets, they said they couldn't see how the potential rupturing of organized labor nationally could tear their relationship apart.
They said this despite the fact that their unions are at different ends of the debate raging within the AFL-CIO. Seven of the nation's largest unions - including Kuntz's Laborers' International Union - have created a coalition advocating for change within AFL-CIO. Some unions in this Change to Win Coalition have even threatened to bolt from the federation.
"I am scared. I hope it doesn't happen," Young said as he grabbed a bag of pretzels and placed it into Kuntz's shopping cart. "But having (the local AFL-CIO) is such a great asset that I'm sure the groups here will continue working together."
Other local union leaders have echoed similar sentiments. In fact, they've agreed to work together, no matter what happens next week at the AFL-CIO's annual convention in Chicago, said Jim Bertolone, president of the Rochester and Genesee Valley Labor Federation, a unit of the AFL-CIO.
"We won't let this tear us apart at the local level," he said. "None of us wants to see what we've built here, and the clout we have here, weaken. We know it'll hurt us all."
The other unions in the dissident coalition are UNITE HERE, Teamsters, Service Employees International Union, United Farm Workers, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and the United Food and Commercial Workers Union. They account for 15 percent to 20 percent of the Rochester and Genesee Valley Area Labor Federation's 100,000 membership in the 11-county area.
What's at risk locally? A split could shrink unions' organizing and political clout here - maybe creating a worst-case scenario in which unions here poach members from each other, said Lance Compa, who teaches labor law at Cornell University.
"The impulse toward solidarity is a lot stronger at the local level," he said. "These people know each other personally and work with each other every day. So I do hope they hold it together at the local level if there is a split.
"But I also think statements of good intentions could fall by the wayside. It will only take one union to start raiding another, and (then) all bets are off."
Compa called a potential split "a terrible mistake," adding that a central organization is needed to boost labor's membership. Last year, 12.5 percent of the work force was unionized, compared with 20.1 percent in 1983, the first year comparable data was available, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
But that's the issue at the root of this division. The warring factions in organized labor can't agree on how to reverse the membership decline.
The coalition, for example, wants the 13 million-member AFL-CIO to stop focusing so much on political activism and instead devote more time and money to organizing.
At the forefront of this movement has been Service Employees International Union. Bruce Popper, SEIU's local leader, agreed that no matter what happens, unions here agreed to continue supporting each other. But what that exactly means will depend on what happens at next week's convention, he added.
One option, if there is a split, for unions who leave the AFL-CIO is to still allow their locals to continue paying dues and participating in local labor councils, said Bertolone, the local Labor Federation president.
In the meantime, Young, of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 86, and Kuntz, who also is business agent for the Laborers' Local 435, said they would continue to hope a split doesn't happen.
After all, unions depend on each other for support, whether it means more power at the bargaining table or help in picketing and fighting legislation.
Thursday morning, for example, unions in the Rochester Building and Construction Trades Council joined to picket at the Walgreens construction sites in Gates and Irondequoit.
"We need to band together to make the labor movement strong," Kuntz said.

GRAPHIC: Different local unions help gather support in a worker dispute with Walgreens. Despite a national schism in the AFL-CIO, local branches still want to work together. JAMIE GERMANO staff photographer

Buffalo News (New York), July 25, 2005, Monday

Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2005 Buffalo News
Buffalo News

July 25, 2005, Monday

HEADLINE: On brink of splitting, AFL-CIO mulls future

BYLINE: By Fred O. Williams

BODY:

The house of labor for 50 years -- the AFL-CIO -- may become a house divided this week, as tension between unions approaches the breaking point.
Seven unions including the Teamsters and Service Employees have joined a dissident group, and some threaten to break away from the rest of labor. The showdown comes at an AFL-CIO meeting in Chicago that begins Monday, in which president John Sweeney seeks re-election amid bitter opposition.
The split might be averted by a financial compromise, and perhaps by Sweeney's departure. But if not, the crisis in big labor would shake blue-collar Buffalo.
"You'd basically end up with two labor councils in the same area," said James Gugliuzza, president of the Niagara-Orleans AFL-CIO Council in Lockport. Dissident unions would exit his council, taking their dues payments with them.
"These are all large unions in Niagara County -- it's a big chunk of change," he said.
The AFL-CIO and the rival coalition would issue separate endorsements for local political races and might even compete for membership, union officials and labor experts said.
"It will be very sad if it happens," said Mark R. Jones, president of the AFL-CIO Buffalo Council. "I would say the future of the Area Labor Federation would be in jeopardy." The federation is the AFL-CIO's regional unit spanning Western New York.
The dissidents in the Change to Win Coalition have about 40 percent of union membership nationally, including tens of thousands of members in the Buffalo area. They are:
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Service Employees International Union, United Food and Commercial Workers, United Brotherhood of Carpenters, Laborers International Union, United Farm Workers, and the hotel and garment workers in UNITE-HERE.
Not all would necessarily leave the AFL-CIO; the Laborers and Farm Workers have pledged to remain, and the Carpenters left in 2001.
The in-house dispute is about labor's loss of clout nationally, but unions remain a force in Western New York. Union members make up 25 percent of the work force in Erie and Niagara counties, about double the national rate. Regionally, about 150,000 workers in six counties belong to the AFL-CIO.
The labor group coordinates local boycotts and organizing drives, but its biggest public role is in politics. With its influential endorsement, plus the ability to deliver canvassers and phone bank staff, labor's stamp of approval is a boon for favored candidates.
"I've always considered it very important for my candidacy," Erie County Legislator Lynn M. Marinelli said. Labor clout is what draws a bevy of political candidates to the Buffalo AFL-CIO's annual picnic, set this year for Friday at Elma Meadows Park.
"The major role of a central labor council is politics at the local level," said Richard W. Hurd, a professor at Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor relations.
What might happen to that in a split is hard to figure. Erie County Democratic Party Chairman Leonard R. Lenihan said he doesn't expect labor's traditional support for his party's candidates to waver.
"The bottom line is, we're still the party that's for working people," he said. In primary races, he said he expects the party's endorsed candidate to still have the edge.
However, local units of the dissident unions would set up their own process to review candidates and coordinate endorsements.
"I assume if there was a split, we'd be asked to leave the AFL-CIO" at the local level, said Ronald Lucas, president of Teamsters Joint Council 46 in Buffalo. The Teamster council has 14,000 members at locals in Western New York and Rochester.
Led by SEIU president Andrew Stern, the dissident coalition wants to shift more funds to organizing. Instead, Sweeney and his supporters have focused on political action to promote labor-friendly candidates and policies. Elected in 1995, Sweeney, 71, is blamed by critics for failing to reverse declining membership, which stands at 12.5 percent of workers.
Harsh words have issued from both sides, but some observers wonder how much of the vitriol is calculated bluster.
"We come from bargaining -- we know how to bargain," Gugliuzza said. "My hope is the leadership will come to an agreement."
And the damage of a split would be great. "If the AFL-CIO loses 40 percent of its revenues, it's got problems," Hurd said.
The two sides have quietly discussed compromises that would let Stern and others devote more of their dues to organizing, Hurd said. In addition to boosting organizing, the coalition seeks more mergers between unions and a slimming of AFL-CIO's governing board, expanding the power of the 13 largest members.
Even in a split, some joint efforts between unions on different sides of the divide could continue. Community groups that push for living wages and other labor-oriented issues provide forums outside the AFL-CIO where unions will continue to work together at the local level, Hurd said.
The food workers union leads a multiunion campaign against Wal-Mart, which is seen as a threat to union-represented retailers. That cooperation need not come to an end, even if the food workers leave the AFL-CIO, said Greg Gorea, a representative of the UFCW Local One in Utica.
"We're all in it for the same thing, improving people's jobs," he said. "I don't think that's going to change -- the core beliefs are the same."
-----
To see more of The Buffalo News, N.Y., or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.buffalonews.com. Copyright (c) 2005, The Buffalo News, N.Y.
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.