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IT workers at USDA unionize with AFGE

SMART 100 signs CBA with Bernward Mechanical

West Virginia chemical workers join ICWUC/UFCW

What do you care about? Make your voice heard!

SAVE THE DATES: VA & MD/DC AFL-CIO conventions; CSA Golf tourney

Labor Quote: Cesar Chavez

Today's Labor History

 


Labor Calendar: [link removed] click here for complete and latest listings

[link removed] Union City Radio: 7:15am daily
WPFW-FM 89.3 FM; [link removed] click here to hear today's report

DMV-area Labor Notes Meet-up: Sat, July 30, 12pm - 3pm
Denizens Brewing Co., 1115 East-West Hwy, Silver Spring, Maryland, 20910
Get-together for union activists who came to the Conference, and anyone who wants to hear more about what the Labor Notes network is all about.

Merriweather Lakehouse Hotel leaflet (UNITE HERE 7): Sat, July 30, 4:30pm - 6:30pm
Corner of Little Patuxent parkway and Divided Sky Lane

APALA Summer Meet and Greet: Sun, July 31, 2pm - 5pm
832 Trinity St, Baltimore, MD 21202

Rally for a Fair Contract for Shoppers workers (UFCW Local 400): Wed, August 3, 4:45pm - 5:45pm
Shoppers, 7790 Riverdale Rd, New Carrollton, MD 20784, USA (map)

Union City Radio: Your Rights at Work: Thu, August 4, 1pm - 2pm
WPFW 89.3 FM or listen online.

Union City will be on break next week (August 1-5).

On The Air: [link removed] Click here to catch this week's Your Rights At Work radio show (WPFW 89.3FM, Thursdays 1-2p): Get up, stand up; features Jonah Furman on the DMV-area Labor Notes Meet-up. Fired by The Washington Post; a 50-year-old case. Plus music from Bob Marley.

IT workers at USDA unionize with AFGE
More than 800 workers at the Department of Agriculture (USDA) have joined AFGE after their election to form a union. [link removed] The campaign was exciting and posed unique challenges as these IT workers all worked remotely and had limited engagement with each other before the organizing drive began. But through phone banking, sending texts, holding virtual meetings and, most importantly, tasking activists to contact their co-workers, they overwhelmingly voted "Union Yes." "They became organized under the basic principle of wanting a say in their working conditions because they saw firsthand what a difference having a seat at the table could mean," said John Dean, AFGE's lead organizer for the campaign. "This election was the workers' chance to stand up to the agency, and they did." [link removed] Read more here.

SMART 100 signs CBA with Bernward Mechanical
SMART Local 100 recently celebrated signing a contract with new contractor Bernward Mechanical. A veteran-owned business located in Severna Park, MD, Bernward -- provider of general and mechanical contracting services and Distech Controls in the Mid-Atlantic region and beyond -- is also "signatory to the Plumbers, Steamfitters, Electricians, Laborers, Painters and, I believe, the Carpenters," reports SMART 100's Tom Killeen. "In addition, Bernward's principal owner, Carl Neimeyer, is running for the 5th Anne Arundel district County Council seat."
photo (l-r): Chuck Sewell, Chris Taylor, Carl Neimeyer and Tom Killeen.

West Virginia chemical workers join ICWUC/UFCW
Workers at Elementis Specialties Inc., in New Martinsville, West Virginia, joined International Chemical Workers Union Council/United Food and Commercial Workers (ICWUC/UFCW) Local 566C for the better wages and benefits that come with a union contract. Elementis is a global chemical company, and the 25 workers are employed as chemical operators, lab technicians, material handlers and maintenance technicians.

"The ICWUC is proud of the solidarity the workers of Elementis displayed with their [link removed] unanimous election win," said ICWUC/UFCW President Lance Heasley (pictured above, right). "We are looking forward to getting to the bargaining table and working to secure a contract for these workers."
- AFL-CIO Daily Brief

What do you care about? Make your voice heard!
Union members need to be talking to each other about the issues so we can work together to advance our shared agenda. That's why the AFL-CIO is asking: "What do you care about?" [link removed] Please click here now to let us know, and together we can improve the lives of working people across the country. This is part of the AFL-CIO's Week of Action around the theme "Protect our Freedoms": the freedom to stand together in a union. Freedom to participate in and preserve democracy. Freedom to earn fair pay in return for our labor. Freedom of a safe workplace & a voice on the job. Freedom of control over our own bodies.
"Union members worked together across the labor movement to win many important victories for working people last year," says the AFL-CIO. "We secured historic funding and investment in our nation's infrastructure, saved our pensions, helped striking workers secure better contracts and unleashed a wave of union organizing. We kept our country moving forward through a global pandemic. But there's still so much we can do together. Passing pro-worker laws will strengthen us at the bargaining table so we can care for ourselves and our families."
[link removed] Please click here to let us know what you care about.

SAVE THE DATES: VA & MD/DC AFL-CIO conventions; CSA Golf tourney

August 18-20: Virginia AFL-CIO Convention
Williamsburg, VA. Details to follow.

September 12: CSA Golf Tourney
The 25th annual Metropolitan Washington Council Community Services Agency's golf tournament will be held on Monday, September 12, 2022 at the Enterprise Golf Course, 2802 Enterprise Road, Mitchellville, MD 20721. Registration begins at 7:00 a.m. More info/details: Letycia Pastrana, mailto:[email protected] [email protected] or call 678-429-8174.

October 13-15: Maryland State and DC AFL-CIO Convention
The Maryland State and DC AFL-CIO 33rd Biennial Convention is scheduled for Thursday, October 13 - Saturday, October 15, 2022 at the Baltimore Marriott Waterfront Hotel. Details to follow.

Labor Quote: Cesar Chavez

"The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people."

TODAY'S LABOR HISTORY

This week's Labor History Today podcast: [link removed] A cold wind and a hot summer sit-down. Last week's show: [link removed] Tragedy and Resistance at Port Chicago Naval Magazine. photo: 1948 government cafeteria worker strike.

July 29

A preliminary delegation from Mother Jones' March of the Mill Children from Philadelphia to Pres. Theodore Roosevelt's summer home in Oyster Bay, Long Island, publicizing the harsh conditions of child labor, arrives today. They are not allowed through the gates - 1903

Models picketed to announce that beer was back. Twenty-five young women marched in front of the Blatz Brewing Co. on July 29, 1953, to celebrate the return of the brand of beer, then joined a street celebration at E. Highland Ave. and N. Broadway, where a band played for dancers. The events marked the end of a 76 day strike by some 7,100 Milwaukee brewery workers.

Following a five-year table grape boycott, Delano-area growers file into the United Farm Workers union hall in Delano, Calif. to sign their first union contracts - 1970

July 30

President Lyndon Johnson signs the Medicare Act, providing federally-funded health insurance for senior citizens - 1964

Former Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa disappears. Presumed to be dead, his body has never been found - 1975

United Airlines agrees to offer domestic-partner benefits to employees and retirees worldwide - 1999

July 31

Members of the National Football League Players Association begin what is to be a two-day strike, their first. The issues: pay, pensions, the right to arbitration and the right to have agents - 1970

Fifty-day baseball strike ends - 1981

The Great Shipyard Strike of 1999 ends after Steelworkers at Newport News Shipbuilding ratify a breakthrough agreement which nearly doubles pensions, increases security, ends inequality, and provides the highest wage increases in company and industry history to nearly 10,000 workers at the yard. The strike lasted 15 weeks - 1999

 


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Published by the Metropolitan Washington Council, an AFL-CIO "Union City" Central Labor Council whose 200 affiliated union locals represent 150,000 area union members.

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