Today's unions, central labor councils and state federations are reaching out in new and expanded ways to women workers, workers of color, immigrants and community activists—including clergy and lawmakers. They are building new partnerships with students struggling to end sweatshop labor, pass living wage laws and gain a voice on the job. And they are fueling the momentum to create a strong movement in states and communities across the nation.

Union Cities

In 1997, the unions of the AFL-CIO joined with central labor councils in launching the Union Cities initiative to strengthen local unions and the union movement community by community. Central labor councils reoriented their priorities and set strategies to better focus on organizing and building a movement that would take working families' struggles to their community.

Delegates to the 2001 AFL-CIO Convention will recognize communities that have met the Union Cities goals and acknowledge local central labor councils that have done outstanding work in implementing at least one of the key Union Cities strategies.

Organizing
Activists working to create Union Cities have been key to connecting the union movement's political strength with union organizing campaigns. In 1999, the San Mateo (Calif.) County Central Labor Council brought together its affiliate unions and the San Francisco Labor Council to explore a collaboration to help six unions—HERE, IAM, OPEIU, IBT and CWA—organize workers at San Francisco International Airport. More than 2,000 service workers are now union members as a result of the campaign.

Central labor councils also played an important role in helping build support for organizing drives in such cities as Baltimore; Charleston, S.C.; Chicago; Kansas City, Mo.; Milwaukee; New York City; Portland, Ore.; Seattle; and Syracuse, N.Y.

This past summer, activists from the Greater Syracuse (N.Y.) Labor Council helped gather signatures from workers at Syracuse University in support of a bargaining to organize clause in the school's contract with SEIU Local 200United.

In December 2000, the King County Labor Council helped build solidarity among unions and in the community for a UAW organizing campaign among University of Washington graduate student employees.

Back to the Top

Street Heat
The mass mobilization of workers and allies to apply "Street Heat" in support of workers' struggles is key to boosting bargaining, organizing and legislative efforts and to building a Union City.

In one massive Street Heat action, more than 8,000 Los Angeles union members—construction workers and janitors, public employees and actors, hotel employees and bus drivers—joined with community allies in an unprecedented show of solidarity in March 2000 to highlight upcoming contract negotiations for some 300,000 workers.

By joining together, workers from diverse jobs and unions unified their voice and strengthened their efforts to improve the lives of working families. The march was organized by the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, which in 1998 made a strategic decision to reach out to local unions to better coordinate political and organizing efforts.

The joint mobilization effort helped propel several unions to organizing wins and contract gains and showed the power and potential of building a strong Union City. "In the past, when your contract was up or you went on strike, you were basically on your own," says Mike Cherry, a vice president of United Teachers Los Angeles, a merged AFT/National Education Association local. "It's different now. Unions have become a real power in Los Angeles."

Other labor councils have shown the power of mobilizing workers:

• The Metropolitan Washington (D.C.) Council mobilized more than 100 activists during last year's World Bank/International Monetary Fund meetings in support of parking lot workers—many of whom are African immigrants—linking their struggle to organize with HERE and win a strong contract to the dislocations caused by unfettered globalization. The Savannah (Ga.) and Vicinity, AFL-CIO Trades and Labor Assembly and the Atlanta Labor Council mobilized union members and the community to persuade the city council to recognize 800 city workers seeking to join SEIU Local 1985.

Back to the Top

Political Action
When unions grow through organizing, they are able to increase the union vote and elect worker-friendly political leaders who address the concerns of working families. In the 2000 elections, central labor councils working to create Union Cities demonstrated successful political strategies by promoting coordination among unions. In Colorado, the state federation and the Denver Area Labor Federation, the Northern Colorado Central Labor Council and the Western Colorado Trades and Labor Assembly turned out the union vote to win seven of 10 key state senate seats in the 2000 elections, ensuring defeat of any upcoming "right to work" proposals. Also in 2000, through a year-round member education and mobilization effort, the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council replaced an anti-union congressman with a champion of working families. And the Greater Hartford (Conn.) Labor Council organized a get-out-the-vote campaign that helped elect worker-friendly state legislators, including one labor council board member.

Community Alliances
In 1999, the Big Sky Central Labor Council in Helena, Mont., mobilized its members and the community to assist Steelworkers locked out at the local ASARCO steel mill. They reached out to religious, political and community leaders to support the workers on their picket line. On the first day of the mobilization, a priest blessed the workers as they began to picket. The next day, local politicians visited the picket lines and endorsed the workers' cause. On the third day, affiliate unions placed food barrels in five markets that continued to be filled by the public for four weeks.

"The company couldn't believe the public's visible show of support for the workers and their cause," says Tom Huddleston, secretary-treasurer of the Big Sky labor council. The dispute was settled, in large because of the strong support from the community, he says.

The following labor councils also are among those building support for organizing, collective bargaining and political campaigns through community outreach.

• The Quad City, Illinois and Iowa Federation of Labor formed a living wage coalition, made up of unions, religious and student organizations, to develop a living wage plan for the city of Davenport, Iowa.
• The Kent-Ionia Labor Council in Grand Rapids, Mich., organized the West Michigan Network for Global Trade with Justice that includes environmental, union, religious and community groups. The network in April organized a demonstration to coincide with the visit of the Mexican ambassador.

Back to the Top

Launching a New Alliance

Seeking to create a strong and unified union movement better able to win a voice for working families, delegates to the 1999 AFL-CIO Convention endorsed a strategy to revitalize state and local labor councils so they can better coordinate unions' organizing, legislative and political strength. Union leaders in New York and North Carolina pioneered this New Alliance, voting to approve statewide coordination plans in June 2001.

Leaders from all levels of the union movement developed the New Alliance after traveling throughout the country in 2000 to meet with activists at international unions, state federations and central labor councils, who shared their ideas for working together more effectively. Drawing on the collective experience of hundreds of activists, the AFL-CIO's State and Local Advisory Committee, led by IAM President R. Thomas Buffenbarger, drew up a framework to define the roles of state federations and central labor councils, map each state's union structure with an eye toward tailoring relationships that will fit states' differing needs and encourage local unions to more fully participate in their state and local councils.

"If we are going to have a union movement that is going to effectively deal with large and powerful employers," says Sarah Palmer Amos, executive vice president and director of collective bargaining of UFCW, "then we're going to have to have a movement that is integrated at all levels."

New Yorkers brought the New Alliance plan from drawing board to reality when they approved a proposal for creating five powerhouse area labor federations to better coordinate the work of 25 central labor councils. In North Carolina, leaders redrew labor council boundaries to maximize working families' political strength and created a state chapter of the AFL-CIO Alliance for Retired Americans. Maryland and Washington, D.C., union leaders finalized their New Alliance at a spirited convocation in October 2001.

Activists there approved changes to leadership structures that will increase diversity, creating seats for representatives of AFL-CIO constituency groups. The local groups also will benefit from increased commitments from international and local unions to fully affiliate with labor councils and state federations, boosting the size and strength of each state's union movement.

Currently, union activists in Oregon and Colorado are developing New Alliance blueprints, and additional states are laying the groundwork to begin revitalizing their union movements. Together, the five states with or near New Alliance plans are home to 20 percent of the union members in the AFL-CIO. New Alliance efforts are reinvigorating the union movement across the country: State federations report a 6 percent increase in union affiliations between June 2000 and June 2001—following a comparable upsurge in 2000—which leaders attribute to the excitement generated by the New Alliance initiative.

Back to the Top

Working Women Working Together

Working to ensure the concerns of women—who make up nearly half the workforce—are a key part of the nation's agenda, the union movement continues to mobilize women, channeling their political strength on working family issues. Through organizing, bargaining and legislative and political action, America's unions are fighting for women's top concerns: equal pay, paid family leave, job security and family health care.

Building on its 1997 nationwide survey of working women, which helped set the union movement's action agenda around working family issues, the AFL-CIO Working Women's Department in 1999 hosted 5,000 group discussions in homes, workplaces, conference rooms and town halls around the country. In January 2000, the AFL-CIO followed up with a national telephone survey of a large and nationally representative random sample of working women age 18 and older. In a yearlong survey, working women around the country said that to meet their obligations at home and at work, they need more time, pay and benefits. And their top legislative priorities are equal pay, paid family leave, health care and retirement security. The results were distributed through union publications, websites and by community partners and are being incorporated as a key part of the AFL-CIO's working families agenda.

After an overwhelming percentage of women in the 1997 survey said stronger equal pay laws are "important," the union movement began a national equal pay campaign to educate the public about pay inequality—women are paid 73 cents for every dollar a man makes—and to force politicians to discuss the issue. The work was reinforced when the 2000 Ask a Working Woman survey showed 87 percent of respondents placed a very high priority on equal pay. Concern about pay likely is one reason more than half of new union members each year are women and organizing campaigns in workplaces staffed mostly by women are more likely to succeed than others.

In the 2000 election year, women—who make up 52 percent of voters—were in a strong position to influence the political debate. More than 5,000 women attended Working Women Conference 2000 in March of that year to develop an action agenda on equal pay, health care, pensions and other issues affecting women. The women expressed their concerns to then-Vice President Al Gore and other political leaders.

The action agenda developed at the Working Women Conference, combined with a vigorous Working Women Vote campaign, energized women voters to meet with candidates and union members, describe their own experiences in the workplace and hold politicians accountable for dealing with their concerns.

As Kristi Hyde, a member of AFT Local 400 in Macomb, Ill., told conference participants: "The president of the university where I work [Western Illinois University] said women don't need a raise because their husbands support them. I'm a single parent with a college degree, and I make enough to qualify for welfare. If we can tell our members what we heard here, they'll get more involved in our union."

Unions also have advocated strongly for rights of women around the world. While women make up 45 percent of the world's workforce, they are 70 percent of the population living in poverty. Yet women fuel the global economy in multiple ways: 90 percent of Export Processing Zone workers are women and in the United States, women make 85 percent of purchasing decisions. America's unions have joined with other unions and women's organizations to demand that international financial institutions and governments support core workers' rights. In a world where most women work for pay, women's rights and workers' right cannot be separated.

Back to the Top

Union Community Fund

The Union Community Fund offers a unique opportunity for union members to ensure their charitable dollars benefit working families in their communities. The fund provides resources to programs that relieve or solve specific community needs, work for fairness in the use and distribution of community resources and give working people the tools to find long-term solutions to community problems. The fund embarked on its first major fund-raising drives in Arizona, Houston, New Orleans, North Dakota, Seattle and Washington, D.C.

But in the midst of this crucial, everyday work came Sept. 11. When terrorists attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, hundreds of union members lost their lives and thousands more lost jobs and loved ones. The Union Community Fund provided aid and relief to many of those in need, raising more than $2 million in contributions. The money was distributed—with the guidance of the New York City Central Labor Council and the Metropolitan Washington (D.C.) Council—to groups that provided hands-on assistance to individuals affected by the tragedy.

The Sept. 11 tragedy was the fourth time the Union Community Fund has been a key part of disaster relief efforts since it was launched in February 2000. The fund raised $70,000 to respond to specific working families' needs brought about by the Washington State earthquake and floods in Houston and West Virginia.

When the earthquake hit Washington State last February, the Union Community Fund provided almost $25,000 for workers and community agencies hit hard by the disaster. "When you live from paycheck to paycheck and suddenly you're out of work, there is nothing more frightening than not knowing where the rent is coming from or if you can do a simple thing like buy groceries," says Kathy Timmerman, who is "thankful for the union and the Union Community Fund" for their support during the two weeks she was out of work.

While the Union Community Fund is flexible enough to respond to disasters, normally its work is focused locally. State federations and central labor councils play a key role in developing the goals of local Union Community Fund efforts, setting up advisory boards with representatives from unions and the community. The boards develop and implement plans for workplace fund-raising, conduct studies of community needs and determine which organizations to support. Because the fund does not compete with the United Way, it provides an opportunity to expand the pool of money available to economic and social justice groups.

"Union members work hard for their money, and when we give our money to a cause, we want it to be used for something that leaves a lasting impact on our lives and our community," says Joslyn N. Williams, president of the Metropolitan Washington Council.

AFL-CIO Constituency Groups: Coordinating and Mobilizing

The six constituency groups of the AFL-CIO for the first time adopted a joint agenda in 2000 that reflects common areas of concern in their efforts to obtain social and economic justice for all workers. The groups pledged to work together to support union organizing campaigns, fight discrimination, make women and minorities count in the 2000 elections, defend immigrant rights, build the Union Cities program and defend retirement security.

Those efforts have borne fruit. In the past two years, the constituency groups have mobilized their members and community groups for 7 Days in June activities in support of a voice at work and in organizing efforts around the country:

• The A. Philip Randolph Institute is working closely with religious and community groups on Delaware's eastern coast to support organizing in the poultry industry.
• The Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance has mobilized on behalf of the multiunion organizing campaign at San Francisco International Airport, aiding a workforce that includes a large number of Asian Pacific Americans.
• Coalition of Black Trade Unionists members have marched and reached out to community groups in difficult organizing efforts, such as among Avondale shipyard workers in New Orleans and in support of the Charleston 5, Longshoremen in South Carolina who faced potential federal prison terms for what observers say are trumped-up charges. The five were arrested in January 2000 when 130 ILA members, peacefully protesting a ship using nonunion labor in the Charleston port, allegedly were attacked by 600 police officers in riot gear wielding clubs and tear gas.
• The Coalition of Labor Union Women has been involved in the campaign to help Delta Air Lines flight attendants organize a union. CLUW members have distributed campaign materials in their communities, attended rallies and participated in other activities to help Delta workers gain a voice on the job with the Flight Attendants.
• Several Labor Council for Latin American Advancement chapters are working systematically with affiliated unions to organize immigrant workers in Michigan.
• Pride At Work, the constituency group for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender workers, recently mobilized its members for rallies and demonstrations on behalf of 2,800 striking Electrical Workers at Raytheon Corp. in Boston. >

Many constituency group members came together during the national labor celebrations of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday to plan strategies to further the common goals of the union and civil rights movements. During the past two celebrations, held in Atlanta and Greensboro, N.C., union members focused on the political enfranchisement of the poor and people of color. Participants also marched in Atlanta to support striking Overnite Transportation Co. workers seeking a voice at work with the Teamsters and held town meetings on the political impact of the 2000 census and strategies for bridging the gap between the hip-hop generation and those who fought for civil rights.

As the union movement reaches out to a diverse workforce, the constituency groups are in a unique position to serve as bridges to communities of workers and to ensure that all workers' voices are heard. "The fact that constituency groups are becoming more active can only help the union movement," says Cylister Williams, a retired UAW member from Louisville, Ky., who is president of the local APRI chapter and treasurer of the local CBTU. "We live in the same communities as the new workforce," he says. "Not only can we bring the union message to them, we can deliver their concerns to the unions."

Back to the Top

Strengthen Our Common Bonds with Immigrant Workers

After arriving in New York City from the Ivory Coast, Siaka Diakite worked at least 60 hours a week delivering groceries for Hudson Delivery and Hudson Trucking in Manhattan. His pay averaged roughly $110 a week, more than half of it in tips.

Diakite pushed 90- to 100-pound loads of groceries for as many as 12 blocks in rain, snow or heat, without a back brace and without being allowed to take a lunch break. He and his co-workers received little dignity or respect—until they voted for the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union/UFCW in February 2000. Now they receive higher wages and are able to take breaks and work under safer conditions.

"We were treated like slaves," says the 33-year-old Diakite. "We wanted to strike, but the majority got fired" when they tried to form a union.

Many immigrants like Diakite come to the United States to escape a cycle of poverty perpetuated by a corporate profit-driven global economy in which employers move operations to developing countries where workers often are not paid enough to survive. For those workers, coming to this country is the only way to create a better life for themselves and their families. Once here, though, many face harsh working conditions, harassment and fear. To counter the effects of the corporate-driven global economy, the AFL-CIO has launched new initiatives to create a fair economy for all workers, wherever they live.

As part of that effort, delegates to the 23rd AFL-CIO Biennial Convention in 1999 formed a Special Committee on Immigration to study and recommend changes to the federation's immigration policy. Adopted in 1985, that policy supported the current system of immigration enforcement, which includes employer sanctions for hiring undocumented workers.

In February 2000, on the committee's recommendation, the AFL-CIO Executive Council called for replacing the nation's immigration laws, which include sanctions, with fair immigration reform for the millions of undocumented men and women who work, pay taxes, support their families and contribute to their communities. In seeking strategies to address immigrant worker issues, the federation held a series of forums across the country where immigrant workers told of their struggles to find a better life through unions.

"The reality is that these immigrant workers are being cheated," says Richard Shaw, secretary-treasurer of the Harris County (Texas) Central Labor Council. "And when one worker is cheated, all workers are cheated." In Harris County, which includes Houston, immigrants make up one-third on the population, and the labor council has been involved in helping unions organize immigrant workers.

After the forums, the AFL-CIO launched a new initiative to stand up for the rights of immigrants and expand outreach to immigrants through organizing and greater use of bilingual educational materials. Many of the unions of the AFL-CIO, especially in the food, service and building trades, began restructuring their organizing efforts to include immigrant workforces. As support for immigration reform gained momentum across a wide spectrum of policymakers and the public in the summer of 2001, the union movement reaffirmed its commitment to a fair immigration policy and legal status for undocumented workers.

When hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., Sept. 11, the news that foreigners were behind the attack recast the debate on immigration and tolerance in the United States. In their grief, some Americans have chosen wrongly to blame Arab Americans, South Asian Americans, Muslim Americans and other immigrants for the deaths of thousands. In doing so, they have overlooked the losses immigrant workers sustained during the attacks, including the loss of loved ones and the loss of jobs, especially in the hotel, restaurant and services sectors. Many of the immigrant workers also heroically helped rescue other workers after the blasts.

The union movement has spoken out sharply against intolerance in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks and union members across the country are determined that terror will not set back a growing national consensus that immigrant workers who work hard, earn their way and pay taxes need a new, fair immigration system to protect them.

Back to the Top

The New Student Activism

Hungering for social justice, hundreds of students over the past two years have gotten involved with a wide range of workers' rights campaigns—anti-sweatshop mobilization, graduate student employee organizing and campus living wage crusades—and have infused the union movement with their energy and dedication. Many of these students learned the skills they later used in those campaigns during Union Summer, the AFL-CIO's training internship for aspiring organizers.

As a 2000 Union Summer intern in Omaha, Neb., Chris Langford worked on campaigns to bring justice to workers in the meatpacking industry. "Union Summer boosted my confidence and helped me develop my communications skills," he says. After the internship, he stayed on with UFCW, helping with organizing efforts at ConAgra Foods Inc. and Nebraska Beef. Back at Texas A&M University, Langford became more involved with progressive groups and helped develop an e-mail listserv. The next summer, he was one of four students chosen to participate in International Union Summer. Langford traveled to Romania, where he helped research the effect on workers of that nation's integration into the European economy.

Union Summer alumni were among the leaders of the victorious 21-day sit-in at Harvard University in support of a living wage for low-paid campus workers. In May 2001, students convinced the Harvard administration to create a living wage committee with worker participation, grant retroactive wage increases, issue a moratorium on subcontracting and outsourcing and create a process for building a uniform wage floor. Their activism inspired other students at campuses nationwide, including the University of Connecticut, where students held a successful 55-hour sit-in days after the Harvard victory to win a living wage for janitors, members of SEIU Local 32BJ.

Anti-Sweatshop Action
The student anti-sweatshop movement has continued to mature over the past two years, with many successful campaigns at universities to establish codes of conduct covering the conditions under which logo-bearing clothes, such as sweatshirts and caps, are made. Members of United Students Against Sweatshops, a network of more than 200 like-minded groups nationwide, convinced administrators at more than 80 colleges and universities to join the Worker Rights Consortium, an independent monitoring agency that oversees sweatshops making clothes for student stores. Many of these same students were allies in the global fairness rallies in Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Quebec City. Students are key players in a new anti-sweatshop coalition, Global Justice for Garment Workers, formed in August 2001 that for the first time is bringing together union leaders in the developing world and union leaders in the United States and working to hold specific retailers accountable for clothes made in sweatshops.

Back to the Top

A Voice@Work for Graduate Student Employees
Just as they are standing up for workers' rights around the world, students are standing up for their own rights as workers. Graduate employees grade tests, write exam questions and teach undergraduates—but often earn low wages and have few benefits. At the University of Washington in Seattle, 1,600 graduate employees organized with UAW in December 2000. Building community and political support, graduate employees at Temple University in Philadelphia and at Michigan State University in East Lansing came together with AFT, both in April 2001. And after a contentious legal battle, graduate employees organizing with UAW at New York University broke new ground in 2001 to become the first such workers at a private university to form a union. "The structure of universities is becoming more like corporations," says Amy Jones, vice president of the Graduate Employees Union/AFT at MSU. "Forming a union was the only way we would ever be able to make any long-term, comprehensive changes in our working conditions and employment benefits." Jones says students she talked with during the organizing campaign "felt that they wanted to change something about their working conditions, but had never felt as if they had the power or ability to express these ideas"—a sentiment that has changed since the union victory.