Workday Magazine (https://workdaymagazine.org/category/organizing/page/14/)
Holding signs and placards, a small group of restaurant workers and allies gathered on Tuesday in front of Bonchon Korean Fried Chicken in Dinkytown. They came to celebrate a final settlement resulting in over $10,000 in back wages, tips, and damages paid to former Bonchon workers.
“President Gabel has been lauded for breaking the glass ceiling, becoming the first female president in the 150-year history of the U,” said AFSCME 3800 vice-president Steph Taylor. “Clerical, technical and healthcare workers are predominantly women. We are always told to wait, well we are done waiting.”
Workers for Eulen America, a subcontractor for American Airlines, are on strike, saying the company is intimidating workers who are trying to form a union.
Teachers said they’re disappointed that the administration of Mayor Lori Lightfoot has not yet followed through on campaign promises to increase school staffing, shrink class sizes, create an elected school board and otherwise bolster public education.
No details have been made available, but rank-and-file workers on the picket lines have made it clear that the major priority for them is abolishing the tiers that have fractured the auto workforce.
At the beginning of the academic year in mid-September, eight tenured professors at St. Cloud State University (SCSU); three philosophy, one from theatre and four from the university library found out they were being laid off. Their academic appointments are scheduled to end on May 2020.
The response from workers in Sacramento and Eagan, while not coordinated, suggests that growing disillusionment with Amazon’s employment practices will inspire greater unrest among workers.
In a major victory for nursing home workers, members of SEIU Healthcare reached an agreement with Elk River-based Guardian Angels. The agreement was reached Friday and ratified in overwhelming numbers Monday afternoon.
After two weeks on the picket line outside General Motors’ Hudson, Wis., facility, members of United Auto Workers Local 722 are still standing together as their international union seeks a fair deal in nationwide contract talks with the automaker.
“This strike is about providing safe patient care. I can’t do that when I am assigned four patients, two of whom are intensive care (ICU) patients and two of whom are very sick. Someone may be on a ventilator to breathe for them. Someone may be septic and require intravenous antibiotics and require constant monitoring. Some people are getting their first diagnosis in the ER and I can’t educate them about their disease or medication.”