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In this issue:
Union Bailout Update Bill Would Permit Merit Pay in Union Shops Machinists Striking Once a Member Always a Member Labor Relations Insight, Sticky Fingers and more…
NOTICE: You can make a PDF of this issue of INK directly from the post. Click here for instructions on how to do so.
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Labor Relations Insight by Phillip Wilson
What have we learned in the first week of the “ambush election” rules?
There are two questions I’ve been asked a lot over the last couple of months, and especially in the last week:
Will petitions increase after the new “ambush election” rules go into effect? How far will election times decrease under the new “ambush election” rules?
Here’s what we’ve seen
Continue reading INK May 10, 2012
SEIU is collecting signatures in California to put two measures on the ballot this fall. Both measures are written in a manner that rewards the two major hospital chains with SEIU contracts and punishes hospitals the union has been unsuccessful in organizing.
 Dignity Health, the state’s largest hospital chain, and Kaiser Permanente, the largest HMO, will not be subject to the proposals. SEIU represents nearly 60,000 workers in those two systems. The measures would prohibit their private competitors from charging more than 25% above the actual cost of providing care and require nonprofits to devote at least 5% of their patient revenue to free care for the poor.
At least a quarter of California’s private hospitals would be exempted from the measures, according to the state’s
Continue reading SEIU Watch
Oh to be a fly on the wall in an Indiana union hall!
 Fox News is reporting that Indiana union locals are in a mad scramble to persuade as many members as possible to willingly pay for union representation after Right to Work legislation kicks in and grants workers the power and the freedom to withhold their union dues.
“We’re gonna push them pretty hard and let them know this is what our services provide,” said Brett Voorhies, legislative director for the United Steelworkers District 7, which has 35,000 active members in steel mills along the Lake Michigan shore. It’s interesting that USW members need a “pretty hard” reminder of the value of their USW representation, especially after the avalanche of union propaganda triggered by the introduction of RtW legislation in the state over a year
Continue reading Panic in Indiana
 Since 2009, a Change to Win campaign, Warehouse Workers United, has been running attacks on employers in California’s “Inland Empire.” WWU is a joint venture of SEIU, UFCW, and the Teamsters. This week, Labor Notes gives us a glimpse into how corporate campaigns are built and, more importantly, why certain employers and not others are in the crosshairs.
In what is certainly no coincidence, the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement has been investigating cases of wage theft by employers who just happen to employ WWU activists. The campaign has also solicited workers into class-action lawsuits against those same employers to collect “stolen” wages. (Suits are based on the charge that workers paid by the piece were
Continue reading A Peek Into Inland Empire Corporate Campaign Tactics
SEIU announced it would be sponsoring a nationwide webcast on “the dangers of for profit colleges” on February 2. “Good for Wall Street, Bad for Students” will concentrate specifically on the Art Institutes, Argosy University, Brown Mackie College and South University — all of which are owned by Pittsburgh-based Education Management Corporation.
According to the union’s press release, the purpose of the webcast will be to “expose” questionable recruiting practices at EMC schools that allegedly “target” low income students, using scholarships to lure their victims into otherwise inaccessible private school educations, only to then get them hooked on learning and convinced that the most attractive path out of poverty is a college degree (and not just a $9/hr SEIU union janitor job), while tricking them into applying for student loans, all so private school 1% fat cat Wall Street types can buy more Super Bowl tickets and further enslave
Continue reading SEIU Watch: Teachers Unions! Look Out!
 Union propaganda. There’s an app for that!
A quick search of the Apple app store has turned up five interesting union related apps.
Most intriguing, an app called “Labor News” does not appear sponsored by any one union entity and much of its content seems to come straight from the Department of Labor. However blog posts read like union press releases and the news feed seems to pull from a range of sources nothing but positive stories about unions, in both English and Spanish. And yet there is no logo, other than that of the app developer. We are slowly reaching right now for our tin foil hats.
The “UFCW 5” app allows members access to union news stories, job postings, enrollment cards, negotiation updates, ways
Continue reading Social Media Spotlight
Just when you thought SEIU watching could shock you anymore, get ready for this -
 Back in 2008 at the International’s last convention in Puerto Rico, both Andy Stern and Mark Kay Henry praised from the podium the formation of SEANC, the State Employees Association of North Carolina SEIU local 2008. SEANC, a newly restructured local for 55,000 state public employees, was described at the time as “the prototype of a 21st century” SEIU affiliate.
Fast-forward to this year to the leak of an internal memo on SEANC by two SEIU California sent to evaluate the local and better understand it as a model. In that memo Chuck Waide, Regional Director of SEIU Local 521, writes “the primary function” of SEANC is “selling insurance.” Records show SEANC employees 14
Continue reading SEIU Watch
In this video interview with an Occupy Wall Street organizer, we learn more about the protests direct ties to SEIU. As we reported last week, evidence is mounting that Occupy Wall Street was planned for months by the labor movement.
Be sure to visit the LRI Union Free YouTube Channel to view this and other entertaining and informative videos.
  
 Well, it’s been a fun few months for the employees at Luther Manor Nursing Home in Saginaw, MI. By a two to one margin, Luther workers voted on Sept. 23 to dump SEIU and go with Sal Roselli’s NUHW in his first raid of an SEIU shop outside of California. SEIU members at Muskegon’s Hackley Hospital are waiting for their election date.
Coming into the Luther election SEIU tried a number of fat carrot and pointy stick tactics to win back the hearts and minds of fed up Luther workers. SEIU organized barbeques called “backyard bashes” where Luther workers could win a flat screen or bike just for showing up to meet the union hierarchy. Earlier, SEIU held a number of “vote until you get it right”
Continue reading SEIU Watch
 A U.S. District judge has denied SEIU’s motion to dismiss racketeering charges filed on it by Sodexo. The ruling clears the path to discovery and trial in the claim that SEIU conspired to extort by threatening financial damages unless Sodexo gave into the union’s demands.
An SEIU press release called the lawsuit ”part of a much grander and larger assault on the rights of workers to bargain collectively,” as if SEIU is beyond reproach. Sadly, two internal SEIU documents have recently surfaced that tell quite a different story — a corporate campaign manual that cojoles members to break the law and a 485 page organizer training manual that teaches SEIU staff to “steal, steal, steal” and “get vicious” with those who won’t support the union.
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