SEIU’s Mega-Local Meltdown: Size Matters, But Members Matter More
Submitted by seachange on Wed, 2010-03-03 05:58.
Nearly one year after Massachusetts local makeover, California follows suit. Steve Early, In These Times, March 1, 2010 When rank-and-file members run for office in the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), it’s not easy to win - or even run. And that’s not by accident. In Los Angeles Local 6434, for example, officials installed by President Andy Stern adopted an election rule found illegal by the US Department of Labor, but approved by Stern. The by-laws required would-be candidates to collect nearly 5,000 names on nominating petitions. In a “local” of 160,000 - most of whom are home-based workers who never see other members ... SEIU
Is democracy afoot in the labor movement?
This article highlights a stunning similarity to what has happened at the Massachusetts nurses association; unresponsive leaders, appointed leadership positions in a new larger national organization, and a disaffected/ disenfranchised membership. The similarities continue with calls by reformers for greater democracy and accountability, financial transparency, rebuilding from the bottom up and better communication and access to information (such as printing dissenting positions in the MNA newsletter and limiting the Board of directors ability to make its monthly meetings “confidential”).
Is democracy afoot in the labor movement? I sure hope so.
Afoot
Ah, Michael! Is democracy afoot in your bargaining unit? - Sandy
Is democracy afoot in my bargaining unit?
Sandy, the outcry for democratic reform within the MNA from the members of our bargaining unit should be loud enough even for the Board of Directors in Canton to hear. And I know we are not the only members within the association to express dissatisfaction with how things have been run of late. Is democracy afoot in my bargaining unit? The elected representatives at the local level work side by side with the members who elected them. As you well know from your experience at Quincy Medical Center, pulling off a disenfranchisement campaign and running roughshod over their democratic rights is simply not possible, on the local level anyway. On the other hand, this is much easier to do at the larger organizational level… as we have all witnessed over the last year or so.
The MNA simply calling itself a democratic organization does not make it so. The institutional behavior leading up to the sham vote to merge with the NNU last October is pretty solid evidence of that. Only 515 members were able to vote on what was touted by the MNA as the most important issue facing the membership in its history. Only 515 members out of a 23,000 member association! No one can argue that this was democratic, can you? Even the Association for Union Democracy questions the motives and methods of the MNA.
Ruth Milkman and Kim Voss say in their book Rebuilding Labor: Organizing and Organizers in the New Union Movement, “…lasting transformation does require genuine rank-and-file participation, so that members come to sense their ownership of the organization."
That’s the philosophy our committee has intuitively taken on the local level. The uproar you hear from our bargaining unit is because we have enfranchised our members and they have a profound sense of ownership of it. This is a philosophy that our greater union needs to adopt on the association level.
Grassroots Democracy
On Tuesday evening, March 9th, between 180 and 200 members of MNA's Quincy Medical Center bargaining unit, out of 240, met in the cafeteria to vigorously debate the crisis confronting them: give back 3% across the board, together with serious reductions in earned time accrual and major health insurance cost shifting, or the hospital will close at the end of the current fiscal year on September 30th. So far, at the bargaining table, there has been no offer of a quid pro quo. Staffing levels are precarious, despite an agreement reached with the prior management team on appropriate staffing levels. Grievances and arbitrations mount. Negotiations are open to members, who then can come together face to face to consider their options. After each session of negotiations, an email blast notifies the bargaining unit of what happened. Does this happen in every bargaining unit? Or is the degree of progress at the table kept secret? - Sandy
I am disappointed to hear
I am disappointed to hear of the plight of the hard working nurses at Quincy Medical Center. I have worked there myself and fully understand the political and work environment at QMC, I know firsthand the good work the nurses there do under some very trying conditions.
I’m not sure what you are asking or suggesting, or even if it’s regarding my comment above... if you are asking me what we do:
The BWH negotiating committee keeps its bargaining unit apprised of negotiations while they are ongoing. After a negotiation session, members of the negotiating committee stand at the main entrances to the facility leafleting updates. Every member of the committee takes a turn handing out the leaflets and answering questions at every shift change. This goes on for a couple of days until we feel we have blanketed the hospital. We also post our leaflets on a Brigham specific MNA website. The address of this site is printed on the bottom of every leaflet.