Posts tagged PHILADELPHIA
Former Philly union leader Chris Woods found not guilty of fraud
June 11, 2026 // Christen “Chris” Woods, the former leader of one of Philadelphia’s largest labor unions, was acquitted of theft and conspiracy charges Wednesday by a judge who rejected prosecutors’ allegations that he used a union-funded renovation project to secretly funnel money into local political campaigns. In delivering her verdict, Common Pleas Court Judge Tracy Brandeis-Roman said prosecutors had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Woods — who once led District 1199C of the National Union of Hospital and Healthcare Employees — acted criminally when he hired longtime political operative Tracy Hardy to oversee the renovation of a bar inside the union’s Center City headquarters in 2019. The case against him, she said, relied on circumstantial evidence that did not definitively tie Woods to any wrongdoing.
PECO union “overwhelmingly” votes to authorize strike as contract negotiations continue
June 2, 2026 // Members of the union representing about 1,600 PECO workers voted Saturday to authorize a strike. The move would give union leaders the power to call a work stoppage if ongoing contract negotiations fail to produce an agreement. A spokesperson tells CBS News Philadelphia the strike was "overwhelmingly" approved with 94% of the votes in favor. More than 1,000 members voted. As of now, there are no plans to walk off the job Saturday.
Several Philly hotels could see workers strike next month as FIFA and America’s big birthday grow near
May 27, 2026 // Their strike deadline falls just before two long-anticipated tourism events. Philadelphia is hosting visitors for the FIFA World Cup games, which begin June 14. And Philadelphia is celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence throughout the year, with events clustered around the July Fourth holiday. “If we have to, we are prepared to strike all the way through the World Cup, all the way through the 4th of July,” Maciah Magloughlin, who works at the Wyndham Historic District, said in a union statement. “We want this summer to be one for the history books. But its success will not be on the backs of hotel workers.” The remaining five hotels where a contract has not been reached are: Sheraton Philadelphia Downtown, Wyndham Philadelphia Historic District, Hilton Philadelphia at Penn’s Landing, the Warwick Hotel Rittenhouse Square Philadelphia, and Hilton Garden Inn Philadelphia Center City.
Johnny Doc took the stand and asked a federal judge to release him from prison early to care for his ailing wife
May 20, 2026 // Dougherty, 65, was sentenced in 2024 to six years in prison after being convicted in separate trials — the first in 2021, after a jury found that he had spent years bribing former Philadelphia City Councilmember Bobby Henon, the second in 2023 over nearly $600,000 he and others embezzled from the union. The former leader of Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Dougherty was known as a gregarious and chatty political player, with influence from City Hall to Harrisburg. And some of those traits were evident during Monday’s hearing, including the fact that one of the spectators in a crowded gallery was his brother, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Kevin Dougherty. John Dougherty’s testimony was also reminiscent of the freewheeling style he displayed before he was incarcerated. He delivered long anecdotes about his wife’s condition, which dates back to 1999, and described ways in which he sought to care for her, including by living with her at rehabilitation facilities for years before his federal indictment.
PHILADELPHIA: Prosecutors in District Attorney Larry Krasner’s Office move to unionize
March 24, 2026 // In addition to the ADAs, more than 100 paralegals and victim witness coordinators in the office are also seeking to unionize, according to people familiar with the plans, though it was not immediately clear which union would represent them. The unionization effort could represent a major shift in the culture at the district attorney’s office, where prosecutors make up a significant portion of the 600-person staff. It could also be a flashpoint for Krasner, a three-term progressive Democrat who has cast himself as a supporter of organized labor.
Op-ed: ‘The issue is the revolution’: Who is running your city’s teachers union?
March 4, 2026 // Under the banner of “social justice unionism,” teachers’ unions are increasingly treating classrooms, teachers, and even students as instruments in a wider ideological project — one organized, replicated, and funded across the nation. This shift helps explain why contemporary political controversies are now being filtered into elementary, middle and high schools. As one activist leader put it during the NEA Educators for Palestine webinar, the anti-ICE movement is “the spark that could ignite the fire under Labor.” As the saying goes, “The issue is never the issue — the issue is the revolution.”
Union membership dipped in Pa. and NJ amid Trump’s anti-labor push, data suggests
February 24, 2026 // In New Jersey, 14.7% of workers were unionized last year, and in Pennsylvania, it was 10.9%. In both states, that was a decline of around one percentage point from 2024, but BLS noted that state-level data “should be interpreted with caution,” due to the shutdown-related incomplete data.
After Nearly Three Months, NYC Starbucks Workers Quietly End Strike
February 9, 2026 // Starbucks workers at 10 unionized New York City stores quietly returned to work on Thursday, ending their nearly three-month strike after failing to force management back to the bargaining table for a first contract. Workers in more than 85 cities nationwide have walked off the job since Nov. 13 in what the union called a “Red Cup Rebellion,” to protest the company’s alleged refusal to finalize a collective bargaining agreement with their union, Starbucks Workers United.
Commentary: In the Glass Hive of Art News: Dark Clouds at the Met, Boston’s MFA
February 5, 2026 // Two weeks ago, unions grabbed the pot of gold at the end of the phony-baloney rainbow when the Metropolitan Museum of Art staff voted 542–172 to join the United Auto Workers. Counterintuitive, I know, but the UAW has a portfolio of bargaining units that includes boutique left-wing, white-collar culture workers such as the curators, conservators, librarians, archivists, designers, marketeers, visitor-services coordinators, and fundraisers at the Met. Along with bread-and-butter issues, these workers can be mobilized to wail over false values like open borders, which suppress working-class wages, the climate change hoax, Black Lives Matter, Celebrate Your Abortion, Me Too, No Kings, From the River to the Sea, any or all while wearing “pussy hats,” which, ladies and real wannabe ladies, don’t flatter. So, a juicy, fresh plum is now added to the UAW stash.
Year in Review: Wave of campus labor organizing gains momentum, brings one new union to Penn
December 12, 2025 // From graduate student workers to research associates and postdoctoral scholars, 2025 marked an unprecedented surge in labor organizing at Penn. The past 12 months saw the formation of a new union on campus, alongside a strike authorization vote amid ongoing negotiations. The Daily Pennsylvanian compiled a timeline of unionization efforts on and around campus over the last year.