In a surprise move, the Michigan Department of Social Services announced Tuesday it would no longer be withholding “union dues” from the checks of 16,500 home child care providers. In 2006, these providers were forced into “Child Care Providers Together Michigan”, a joint venture between the UAW and AFSCME. Since that time, the CCPTM has done next to nothing for their new “members” except to collect over $3.7 million in dues from them.
A lawsuit filed on behalf of three providers by Mackinac Center for Public Policy has drawn intense scrutiny to the scam over the past year. Last fall the Department of Social Services admitted the providers were in fact not state employees, (they are hired and fired by the parents of the children they care for) thus validating the Center’s contention that the state had made the unprecedented move of requiring union membership from independent businesspersons.
First used by SEIU to “organize” 100,000 independent day care providers in California, this new form of “unionizing” accounts for all the phenomenal growth of Andy Stern’s SEIU. (under Stern’s leadership SEIU has become the second largest public employee union in the country). Sadly, even with the UAW/AFSCME day care scam “defunded” another 45,000 Michiganders still pay dues to SEIU while providing adult day care (most often to family members) through the state’s Medicaid funded “Home Help” program.
After a deceptive card drive and union run “election” (with less than 15% turnout) the providers were “unionized” through an “interlocal agreement” between the unions, the Democrat run state government and a community college. This agreement created an “employer” with whom the unions could then “bargain”– the sham Michigan Home Based Child Care Council. (This Mackinac Center video shows then Governor Granholm bragging to an AFSCME audience about their “partnership” in the deal.)
The resulting “contract” is non-binding except in one very chilling way — it guarantees the deduction of dues from any child care provider receiving state subsidies for the care of children from low income families. This cynical union ploy has resulted in the forced “organizing” of well over half a million independent day care and home care providers over the past decade. Fourteen state governments have since poured tens of millions of dollars into a few union coffers with all “representational” costs going to re-elect union friendlies willing to look the other way and push labor’s agenda.
First used by SEIU to “organize” 100,000 independent day care providers in California, this new form of “unionizing” accounts for all the phenomenal growth of Andy Stern’s SEIU. (under Stern’s leadership SEIU has become the second largest public employee union in the country). Sadly, even with the UAW/AFSCME day care scam “defunded” another 45,000 Michiganders still pay dues to SEIU while providing adult day care (most often to family members) through the state’s Medicaid funded “Home Help” program.Several bills in the new Republican controlled Michigan House and Senate have been introduced of late to ban the “unionization” of independent providers but no word yet on the fate of those 45,000 SEIU “members” who continue to contribute over $3 million a year to SEIU.
