Worker Rights

New Hotline For Postal Service Whistleblowers

September 15, 2020 Project on Government Oversight. Resist! Corruption, US Postal Service, Whistleblowers, Worker Rights

The United States Postal Service provides safe, timely communication for all Americans. Increasingly, that includes supporting U.S. elections by handling mail-in ballots, a function of vital importance during the COVID-19 pandemic. But unprecedented turmoil has shaken the institution in recent months. Concerns are mounting that administrative changes could undermine the agency's basic mission: to deliver all Americans' mail safely and on time. This dedicated effort is being undertaken to ensure that POGO is able to help investigate and advocate for reforms relative to critical and essential Postal Service functions and operations.

University Of Michigan Asks Court To Halt Graduate Student Strike

September 15, 2020 Leah Graham, Barbara Collins, Emma Stein and Liat Weinsten, Michigan Daily. Resist! COVID-19, Graduate School, Higher Education, Michigan, Worker Rights

A day after the Graduate Employees’ Organization voted to extend its strike, University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel is seeking an injunction to get graduate students off the picket lines and back to teaching. Schlissel is asking Washtenaw County Circuit Court to require GEO members to return to work by issuing a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction. In a video released Monday afternoon, he described the request as a necessary step. “Following the announcement that GEO will continue to strike and not teach for at least five more days, I made the very difficult decision to seek help from the courts so we can resume all of our remote and in-person classes,” Schlissel said in the video.

OSHA Fines Smithfield Foods For ‘Failing To Protect Employees’

September 13, 2020 Mackenzie Huber, Argus Leader. Create! COVID-19, Meatpackers, PPE, Worker Rights

The Smithfield Foods plant in Sioux Falls, which was the epicenter of one of the nation's largest coronavirus hotspots in April, has been fined by the U.S. Department of Labor. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration announced Thursday that it was fining the Smithfield Packaged Meats Corporation for $13,494 for "failing to protect employees from exposure to the coronavirus," a news release states. The fine is the maximum amount allowed by law. At least 1,294 Smithfield employees contracted coronavirus, and four employees died from the virus, the release states.

University Of Michigan Residential Staff On Strike

September 10, 2020 Residential Staff, Popular Resistance. Resist! COVID-19, Higher Education, Strikes, Worker Rights

The bottom line is our health can’t wait. Our communities can’t wait. The University's inaction in the face of ResStaff’s explicit concerns and action items over the last few weeks has made it clear that public health is not the priority. The University has repeatedly referred to the Wolverine Culture of Care, but has not extended this same care to us. If U of M administrators do not want to live up to the Michigan Difference, we will be the difference ourselves. Health comes first. ResStaff will not stand for anything less than policies and adequate resources that reflect this priority.

Amazon Posted Job To Monitor Employee’s Efforts To Unionize

September 3, 2020 Aaron Holmes, Business Insider. Educate! Amazon, Labor Unions, Surveillance, Worker Rights

In a now-deleted job listing posted this week, Amazon advertised that it's looking to hire an "intelligence analyst" tasked with duties including snooping on workers' unionization efforts and reporting back to executives about their findings. It's a sign of Amazon's escalating fight to stop its workers from organizing. The company has previously turned to unorthodox methods to quash unionization — its subsidiary Whole Foods built a heat map tool specifically for tracking unionization threats, Business Insider reported in April.

Rotting Food, Dead Animals And Chaos At Postal Facilities

August 22, 2020 Laura J. Nelson and Maya Lau, LA Times. Educate! Congress, Louis DeJoy, US Postal Service, Worker Rights

Six weeks ago, U.S. Postal Service workers in the high desert town of Tehachapi, Calif., began to notice crates of mail sitting in the post office in the early morning that should have been shipped out for delivery the night before. At a mail processing facility in Santa Clarita in July, workers discovered that their automated sorting machines had been disabled and padlocked. And inside a massive mail-sorting facility in South Los Angeles, workers fell so far behind processing packages that by early August, gnats and rodents were swarming around containers of rotted fruit and meat, and baby chicks were dead inside their boxes.

Will COVID-19 Spur A Wave Of Unionization?

August 20, 2020 Steven Greenhouse, Dissent Magazine. Organize! COVID-19, Labor Unions, Recession, Worker Rights

In mid-March, someone asked me whether COVID-19 would spur a wave of unionization. My first reaction was no. How could workers possibly unionize when there was all this social distancing and people couldn’t even meet in groups? Moreover, I thought workers would be so cowed by the horrors of the pandemic that they wouldn’t give much thought to unionizing. That response was short-sighted. I didn’t realize how furious many workers would become about the uncaring, even callous way their companies have treated them during this crisis—about the many employers that didn’t lift a finger to provide masks or hand sanitizer.

At North Carolina Colleges, ‘Safe Jobs Save Lives’

August 19, 2020 By Calvin Deutschbein, Workers World. Resist! COVID-19, North Carolina, Student Activism, Worker Rights

The UNC-Chapel Hill administration’s communications team finally acknowledged the spread of infection half an hour later and issued a campus alert. The administrators had spent months fighting students, workers, local and state governments, the N.C. Department of Health, virtually every local community group — and the very concept of human dignity — to push forward an in-person reopening. The University of North Carolina, a statewide system of 16 colleges and universities, wields considerable indirect power over the entire higher education sector in the state. This is reflected in the in-person openings underway at nearby private schools Duke University and Elon College. All around North Carolina, workers united are saying, “Safe Jobs Save Lives!”

Campus Workers Sue UNC System Over Unsafe Working Conditions

August 16, 2020 Kate Murphy, The News and Observer. Resist! COVID-19, North Carolina, PPE, Worker Rights

North Carolina university employees are suing the UNC System, saying working conditions are unsafe as tens of thousands of students return to campuses during the coronavirus pandemic. “Essential workers across UNC System campuses continue to report to work with inadequate protective equipment to ensure their safety,” the UE150, NC Public Service Workers Union said in a statement Monday. Some university employees, including housekeepers and other campus workers, are provided one or two masks per week and many don’t have access to face shields or gowns, according to the union.

Largest Private-Sector Strike Of The Year Is Headed For Union Victory

August 15, 2020 Jeremy Gantz, In These Times. Organize! Labor Union, Maine, Strike, Worker Rights

Bath, Maine - It’s no coincidence that the first strike in 20 years at Bath Iron Works (BIW) began months into the Covid-19 pandemic. While Maine has one of the lowest Covid transmission rates in the country, the spread of the deadly virus helped spark the strike that has largely shut down the shipyard at BIW — one of Maine’s largest employers. In June, when around 4,300 Machinists Local S6 union members at BIW voted overwhelmingly to strike, many had already soured on management over its handling of the pandemic.

The Daily Life Of Those Fighting For $15 And A Union

August 15, 2020 Al Neal, People's World. Organize! Fight for 15, Low Wage Workers, Racism, Worker Rights

The rank and file workers that came before us said a union was not the union hall nor the labor temple, nor was it the elected union officials that come and go. The union was its people—the honest, hardworking membership. Comrades of sweat and toil pushed and prodded too far for the sake of an industrial tyrant’s profits. Workers who reached a point and said, “enough is enough,” who joined together, demanded change, and organized. And in the current moment of economic turmoil and political upheaval, workers are experiencing quaint evocations of moments gone by—as if looking through an open window and scanning through the decades of militant union history, scouring the past to understand and confront today’s clear and present danger.

School Bus Drivers: ‘No Reopening Without Safety First!’

August 11, 2020 USWA Local 8751, Workers.org. Resist! Bus Driver, COVID-19, School reopening, Worker Rights

Boston school bus drivers say, “No school reopening without Union-planned and -designed health and safety procedures!” Teachers, nurses, bus drivers and monitors, custodians, paraprofessionals, food workers demand a seat at the planning table, now! First step: Nurses in every school, bus yard, and food and nutrition facility to ensure frontline Emergency COVID-19 Worksite Standard Operating Procedures. Transdev: Stop the fraud! Hire professional bus and facility disinfecting companies, now!

Empower Home-Based Workers By Investing In Co-operatives

August 8, 2020 David Browne, Equal Times. Create! Asia, Cooperatives, COVID-19, Worker Rights

South Asia is home to over 50 million home-based workers, most of whom are women. From agarbhatti incense stick rollers in India to piecework garment workers in Sri Lanka, they contribute immensely to national economies in addition to their families and local communities as working from home allows them to take on care responsibilities. Despite working long, irregular hours for low pay and often with no proper contract, home-based workers are often the only income providers in their households.

Brute Force Approach To Reopen Benefits Reckless CEOs, Endangers Workers

August 5, 2020 Sarah Anderson, Inequality.org. Educate! Congress, COVID-19, PPE, Worker Rights

In late April, poultry processor Pilgrim’s Pride transferred Maria Hernandez from her usual job to another department at its plant in Lufkin, Texas. Her sons say Hernandez’s bosses didn’t give her proper protective gear. And they didn’t warn the 63-year-old that she would be working in a hot spot where other workers had already fallen ill from COVID-19. When Hernandez, who worked at the plant for 30 years, started feeling sick, she continued to show up for her shift for fear of being fired. On May 8, she was found dead in her home — one of more than 90 meat and poultry plant workers who’ve succumbed to the virus.

Child Care Workers Now Have A Huge New Union

August 1, 2020 Hamilton Nolan, In These Times. Organize! California, Child Care, Labor Union, Worker Rights

A 17-year organizing campaign in California culminated this week in the successful unionization of 45,000 child care providers—the largest single union election America has seen in years. The campaign is a tangible achievement that brings together union power, political might, and social justice battles for racial and gender equality. Now, the hard part begins. Child Care Providers United (CCPU), the umbrella group now representing workers across the state, is a joint project of several powerful SEIU and AFSCME locals in California.

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