Northwest Indiana Discussion

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said Wednesday he is crafting a new plan to remake the American labor movement, which is struggling to retain clout in Washington and state capitals amid a steep decline in membership.

In an interview taped for C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers” program, Trumka said he was seeking a more formal alliance with other key elements of the Democratic Party’s liberal base, including civil rights organizations and women’s rights groups. The hope, he said, is to then broaden union membership beyond the traditional realm of workplace-based organizing.

“The labor movement is definitely in a period of change,” Trumka said. “We’re no longer going to allow employers to decide who our members are. We’re going to decide who our members are. We’re going to open up our arms to people who want to join our movement.”

Trumka’s initiative is a response to what has been a difficult time for labor unions. State lawmakers across the country have moved to scale back organizing rights for public employees and others. A shrinking base of manufacturing jobs that once formed the backbone of organized labor has further depleted the pool of potential members. And despite high hopes four years ago that President Obama and the Democrats would pass legislation making it easier for workers to organize and perhaps laying the groundwork for rebuilding union power, the measure never made it to fruition. Moreover, thorny issues such as immigration have exacerbated tensions among some unions in the labor federation and between the AFL-CIO and other union groups.

From the “What On Earth Where They Thinking?” files: Union boss Rich Trumka, head of the powerful AFL-CIO, has taken the White House to task for the president’s support of a Walmart program to expedite hiring of military veterans,according to the Hill. Seriously.

You may recall that, in January, Walmart announced a hiring initiative to provide jobs (at least part-time) to any veteran who passed a basic background check. Iwrote supportively of the program at the time.

It may not be a comprehensive and enduring answer to the problem of veterans’ unemployment, but it’s a start, and it’s driven entirely by private-sector initiative. To their credit, the Obama administration offered praise for Walmart’s effort.

Enter Trumka with his ham-handed critique of this well-meaning initiative. Why would a union leader go on record criticizing a veterans’ hiring initiative? Could it be that he has a personal axe to grind with Walmart because they haven’t caved to his every demand? Either way, we wondered if maybe something had been lost in translation, so we checked out Trumka’s full statement at the AFL-CIO website.

WASHINGTON (AP) — When President Barack Obama pushed his health care overhaul plan through Congress, he counted labor unions among his strongest supporters.

But some unions leaders have grown frustrated and angry about what they say are unexpected consequences of the new law — problems that they say could jeopardize the health benefits offered to millions of their members.

The issue could create a political headache next year for Democrats facing re-election if disgruntled union members believe the Obama administration and Congress aren’t working to fix the problem.

“It makes an untruth out of what the president said, that if you like your insurance, you could keep it,” said Joe Hansen, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union. “That is not going to be true for millions of workers now.”

The problem lies in the unique multiemployer health plans that cover unionized workers in retail, construction, transportation and other industries with seasonal or temporary employment. Known as Taft-Hartley plans, they are jointly administered by unions and smaller employers that pool resources to offer more than 20 million workers and family members continuous coverage, even during times of unemployment.

The union plans were already more costly to run than traditional single-employer health plans. The Affordable Care Act has added to that cost — for the unions’ and other plans — by requiring health plans to cover dependents up to age 26, eliminate annual or lifetime coverage limits and extend coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.

“We’re concerned that employers will be increasingly tempted to drop coverage through our plans and let our members fend for themselves on the health exchanges,” said David Treanor, director of health care initiatives at the Operating Engineers union.

Workers seeking coverage in the state-based marketplaces, known as exchanges, can qualify for subsidies, determined by a sliding scale based on income. By contrast, the new law does not allow workers in the union plans to receive similar subsidies.

Bob Laszewski, a health care industry consultant, said the real fear among unions is that “a lot of these labor contracts are very expensive and now employers are going to have an alternative to very expensive labor health benefits.”

Unionized local employees repeatedly harassed and intimidated non-union workers of a private disaster cleanup firm that won a government contract to restore Long Island, New York, in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.

The vice president of the union even made threats against the wife and kids of one of the workers. That worker felt it necessary to call the police and pursue other security measures to protect his family, a source told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

After Hurricane Sandy devastated the New York and New Jersey shoreline in late October, Looks Great Services (LGS) won a bid to haul away debris, clear roads, and remove damaged trees. New York’s Nassau County hired the company to complete $70 million worth of repairs.

Soon thereafter, representatives of Local 138, a union representing heavy equipment operators, began visiting construction sites, demanding that the company hire unionized employees to help with the job.

But LGS was paying its workers — some of whom came from out of state — market-based wages, rather than union wages, in compliance with federal law regarding disaster recovery jobs.

“If the contract is union, we are union, if it’s not, we’re not,” said Kristian Agoglia, president of LGS, in an interview with The Daily Caller News Foundation.

His answer didn’t satisfy the union, which began making inflammatory statements to workers at LGS construction sites.

“What they would say is, ‘It sure would be sad if your trucks caught on fire,’” recalled the LGS worker, who spoke to TheDC News Foundation on condition of anonymity because the union also made threats against his wife and children.

Local 138 Vice President Phil Capobianco made the threats, said the source.

“He called and said, ‘Look you have to get us involved,’” recalled the source. “I said, first of all I don’t have to, second of all we’ve tried, and third you’ve said you refuse to work for the rates we can pay.”

Then Capobianco said something that the source would never forget.

“He said, ‘I would just hate for anything to happen,’” recalled the source. Capobianco then rattled off a list of the source’s home address, his wife’s name, his kids, and their current whereabouts.

A judge ordered one of Chicago’s most politically powerful labor unions to suspend picketing against 16 funeral homes last week after receiving reports that striking Teamsters had, among other things, disturbed a child’s funeral.

SCI Illinois Services, Inc., one of the nation’s largest funeral home chains, asked a district court to intervene after striking funeral directors and drivers with Teamsters Local 727 allegedly harassed grieving families.

“We are grateful that the court agreed to issue this temporary restraining order, and we are hopeful that it will help protect grieving families who are experiencing the most difficult times of their lives,” Larry Michael, managing director for SCI Illinois Services, Inc., said in a release. “While we recognize and respect the Teamsters’ right to lawfully picket, we have been shocked and saddened by their attempts to make grieving families the target of the cruel and outrageous attacks.”

The company testified in its filing that union members blocked grieving family members from leaving its parking lot, used bullhorns to shout obscenities at workers and mourners, and unleashed a German Shepard on a dead woman’s daughter and husband.

The funeral home was eventually forced to call the police when picketers allegedly disrupted a child’s funeral with laughter. The officer asked the Teamsters to leave, but protesters returned when he drove away.

“We will be here for the visitation; we will be here for your funeral,” Teamster driver Lester Plewa allegedly shouted into a bullhorn as a funeral director met with a dying man planning his arrangements with family members.

Beggars once again have become choosers it would appear. As Bloomberg reports, a Detroit city union is demanding that the bankruptcy judge reinstate a policy that enables a “13th” monthly check to be cut for pensioners every year. The policy, which was ended in 2001, cost the city $1.92 billion, according to a reporty commissioned by the city.

Via Bloomberg:

Detroit’s bankruptcy judge should allow a state employment panel to reinstate a pension program that gave an extra check to retirees every year using excess earnings, a city union said in court papers.

Before it ended in 2001, the policy of issuing a “13th” check and related payments cost the city $1.92 billion between 1985 and 2008, according to a report commissioned by the city.

The former president of California’s biggest union local was sentenced Monday to 33 months in federal prison for stealing from his low-income members to finance an expensive lifestyle that included being married to two women at the same time.

Declaring that Tyrone Freeman betrayed the “sacred trust” of the workers he represented, U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins also ordered him pay to about $150,000 in restitution and barred him from holding office in any union for 13 years after he is released from prison.

“He lost sight of his mission,” Collins said of Freeman, once a rising star in the national labor movement who headed a Los Angeles-based local of the powerful Service Employees International Union.

Before Collins imposed the sentence, Freeman stood before the judge and cried as he asked for leniency, acknowledging that his “bad decisions” hurt the workers and his family.

“May God have mercy on me,” said Freeman, 44, wearing a dark business suit. “I am accountable for these bad decisions.”

The case grew out of a series of Times reports on Freeman’s financial practices as president of SEIU Local 6434. Beginning in 2008, the stories focused on his actions to direct tens of thousands of dollars from the union and a related nonprofit to relatives and friends, in addition to his lavish spending on a Four Seasons Resort golf tournament, restaurants and a Beverly Hills cigar club.

The resulting scandal quickly cost Freeman his job and rippled through the SEIU, leading to the ouster of several other union officials.