Posts tagged Newberry Library
Workers at more Chicago cultural venues are unionizing, even during a precarious moment for museums
December 12, 2025 // Still, the process of unionization may not be smooth at every site. At Chicago Botanic Garden, there’s a disagreement between workers and management with what steps should be required to establish a union. Employees who are advocating for better pay, health care and safety on the job and are represented by CMRJB Workers United say they are asking employees to sign union cards. However, Chicago Botanic Garden leadership opposes that approach in favor of a secret ballot election to vote on the union. “To skip that step would really be disenfranchising those eligible employees,” Chicago Botanic Garden President and CEO Jean Franczyk told the Chicago Sun-Times. “The process has multiple steps and options that you can pursue. But the one that we think protects individual eligible workers’ rights is that supervised election.”
Chicago History Museum workers want to join an arts industry unionization wave
February 17, 2025 // Hannah Johnson, who works in member relations at the museum, is on the organizing committee. She said she and others at the Chicago History Museum have been inspired by cultural workers who have recently unionized, both locally and nationally. “We felt that now was a really good time to really seek out that sense of stability and security regarding our jobs, our wages and our benefits, and also request higher degrees of transparency from management,”
Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum employees vote to unionize
May 30, 2023 // The vote was 31-4 in favor of unionizing in an election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board, AFSCME said. Ballots were mailed in recent weeks and counted Thursday. Two ballots were not counted because of management challenges. The employees will join AFSCME’s Council 31. The bargaining unit will cover 45 workers at the museum’s Lincoln Park location and at a collections facility in Ravenswood. The unit will include full- and part-time employees, according to its filing with the labor board.
Notebaert Nature Museum workers urge support for union
March 27, 2023 // Unions typically need to show via signed cards support from a substantial majority of workers before scheduling an election with the National Labor Relations Board. An employer can voluntarily recognize a union, but most want an election that will give them time to make anti-union arguments to the workers. While known for representing government workers, AFSCME also counts more than 10,000 members at museums nationwide.