WSLC
Reports Today
Updated DAILY...
Almost Every Day™ by 9 a.m.
Links are functional at date of posting, but sometimes expire. Some links require free registration. WSLC Reports Today links to stories of interest to organized labor; some positive, some negative. The intention is to inform.
FRIDAY,
DEC. 8 ▪
WSLC
Executive Officers, Board elected to four-year terms
-- WSLC President Rick Bender and
Secretary-Treasurer Al Link re-elected; seven new
faces join Board.
Employee Free Choice Act news:
FCC media consolidation news: Local
news: National
news:
▪ In today's NY
Times --
Labor
presses for measure to ease unionizing -- With Democrats capturing
Congress, labor and its allies voice confidence that the EFCA will pass in
the House, but they fear a formidable battle in the Senate, where some
foresee a Republican filibuster.
▪ Today from AP -- Labor
sees opening to reverse declines -- Incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
says she expects Congress will move in early 2007 toward passage of the EFCA.
▪ In today's Washington
Post --
Labor
to push agenda in Congress it helped elect -- Despite being more divided
and depleted than it has been in decades, labor produced record
participation in the 2006 campaign, contacting 13.4 million voters in 32 key
states and supplying 187,000 volunteers to help Democrats match the GOP's
get-out-the-vote machine, which was far better financed.
▪ Also
see yesterday's posting -- AFL-CIO
convenes major Organizing Summit on Friday
▪ In today's Seattle
Times --
America's
democracy at risk (Frank Blethen op-ed) --
We are in the later stages of one of the most important
battles that will determine whether we survive. It is the battle that pits
democracy against the powerful. The powerful, who seek to co-opt our free
press, control the news, and control the access to news, journalism and
information.
▪ In today's Seattle
Times --
Media-consolidation
foes make wonderful bedfellows (Ryan Blethen
op-ed)
-- FCC commissioners will hear compelling testimony from
across the political spectrum on Monday in Nashville as to how the media
have been damaged by consolidation.
▪ WSLC
President Bender's latest column -- Bad
news for democracy: Big Media may get bigger
▪ Today
from AP -- Boeing
health plan dropped -- Health insurer Regence
BlueShield is dropping a planned “select” network for thousands of
Boeing employees in the Puget Sound area, following workers’ complaints
and a lawsuit from some of the 500 doctors kept out of the network. “This
is extremely good news for the people we represent. They get to keep their
doctors,” says SPEEA.
▪ From
KPLU Radio -- Newly
unionized
foster parents prepare to lobby lawmakers
-- Preparing for their first session as union members, it's a chance to
lobby for more rights and more respect.
▪ In today's Tri-City
Herald --
Hanford
funding remains in limbo -- With Congress close to adjourning for the
year, Sen. Murray warns that last-minute GOP maneuvering could slow its
funding.
▪ In today's Everett
Herald --
State
lawmakers to address housing affordability -- "It's a very
difficult issue to deal with," says Rep. Mike Sells. "How do we
afford housing in a Wal-Mart economy?"
▪ In today's Seattle
P-I --
Supreme
Court: A deal's a deal (editorial)
-- The court has correctly turned back assaults on Sound
Transit bond revenues and on decades of legal precedence.
▪ In today's NY
Times --
Long
a laggard, wages start to outpace prices -- After four years in which
pay failed to keep pace with price increases, wages for most American
workers have begun rising significantly faster than inflation... with the
number of unemployed Americans actively seeking work at a five-year low,
help-wanted signs are proliferating again.
▪ In today's NY
Times --
Changes
are expected in voting by 2008 election -- Voters around the country are
likely to see sweeping changes in how they cast their ballots and how those
ballots are counted, including an end to the use of most electronic voting
machines without a paper trail.
▪ Today from AP -- House
expected to vote on extending state sales-tax exemption today
▪ In today's LA
Times --
Bush
to Iraq Study Group: Thanks, but no thanks
FRIDAY,
DECEMBER 8, 2006
WSLC Executive Officers, Board elected
to four-year terms
The Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO -- the state's largest union organization, representing some 400,000 rank-and-file union members -- on Thursday announced its election results for the WSLC Executive Officers and Board as certified by the WSLC Teller Committee (new officers are listed in bold; the rest were re-elected):
EXECUTIVE OFFICERS
President
Rick Bender (Laborers International Union of North America)
Secretary-Treasurer
Al Link (USW - United Steelworkers)
VICE PRESIDENTS
1st District (King County)
Mark Blondin (International Association of Machinists)
Chris Elwell (United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters)
David Freiboth (Inlandboatmen's Union)
Sharon McCann (United Food and Commercial Workers)
Sandra Schroeder (AFT Washington)2nd District (Island, San Juan, Skagit, Snohomish, Whatcom)
Darrell Chapman (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers)
Allan Darr (International Union of Operating Engineers)
Don Houtchens (USW)3rd District (Clark, Cowlitz, Grays Harbor, Lewis, Mason, Pacific, Skamania, Thurston, Wahkiakum)
Cager Clabaugh (International Longshore and Warehouse Union)
Bob Guenther (IBEW)
Mike Phillips (International Association of Fire Fighters)4th District (Adams, Asotin, Benton, Chelan, Columbia, Douglas, Franklin, Garfield, Grant, Kittitas, Kickitat, Okanogan, Walla Walla, Yakima)
Rick Barrickman (IUOE)
Howard Ocobock (American Federation of State, County
and Municipal Employees)
Mark Reavis (LIUNA)5th District (Ferry, Lincoln, Pend Oreille, Spokane, Stevens, Whitman)
Kandy Kraig (AFSCME)
Beth Thew (Communications Workers of America)6th District (Clallam, Jefferson, Kitsap, Pierce)
Vance Lelli (ILWU)
Rick Johnson (IBEW)
Patty Rose (IBEW)Constituency
James Davis (A. Philip Randolph Institute)
Andrea deMajewski (Pride at Work)
Ligia Velazquez (Labor Council for Latin American Advancement)
Mari Wyatt (Coalition of Labor Union Women)
Fred Monroe (Coalition of Black Trade Unionists)At Large
Kristin Farr (Int'l Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers)
Officers of the WSLC are elected by affiliated union organizations every four years. The current Board is composed of President Rick Bender, Secretary-Treasurer Al Link and 25 Vice Presidents, 19 of whom are elected by district to the WSLC Executive Board. In addition, any international union that has WSLC per capita membership of 10,000 or more rank-and-file members is entitled to an At-Large Vice President, if that union is not already represented on the Board. AFL-CIO affiliated constituency groups also have Vice Presidents elected to represent their unique interests.
The Board meets quarterly and establishes the WSLC's policies and programs in between conventions.
For more information, contact WSLC Communications Director David Groves at (206) 281-8901 x28.
If you have news items regarding unions or workplace issues in Washington state that you would like to see posted here, please submit them via e-mail to David Groves or via fax to 206-285-5805.
Copyright © 2006 Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO