Posts tagged public-sector employees
Va. firefighters, medics press city for union rights
August 2, 2023 // Virginia Beach is considering collective bargaining for its employees and officers. In 2020, Portsmouth was the first Hampton Roads city to authorize collective bargaining for city employees thanks to a unanimous City Council vote. The resolution at the time called for a working group of city leaders and subject matter experts to explore procedures on how to make it happen when the law became effective the following year. But City Council reversed course when that time came after then-Chief Financial Officer Mimi Terry, now interim city manager, informed members that such efforts would likely cost the city $2 million to begin the process while limiting expansion of other services. The council then adopted a resolution to no longer grant employees the ability to collectively bargain.
Conservative Supreme Court hands down a rare pro-union decision
June 5, 2023 // Unlike appearing before lower courts, lawyers at the Supreme Court not only argue the application of the law, but also “what the law should be” because the justices can overturn precedent. The Ohio decision, he said, is important because it reinforces “the rights of federal-sector unions to exist and to collectively bargain and to work in a civilian capacity.”
Four states advance bills prohibiting union dues deductions
April 21, 2023 //
National Right to Work Foundation Issues Special Legal Notice to Rutgers Professors Impacted by Union Officials’ Strike Order
April 13, 2023 // In regards to union members, the Foundation’s notice informs workers that they maintain the right to resign from union membership at any time. The notice also suggests, if employees wish to continue working during the strike and avoid union discipline such as fines, that current union members resign their union membership at least one full day before returning to work. “It is Foundation attorneys’ best legal opinion that public sector employees have the right to resign their membership in a union at any time. At least two federal district courts have reached that conclusion,” mentions the notice. “If you are now a union member and want to work during the strike, you should seriously consider resigning your union membership at least one day, if not more, BEFORE you return to work during the strike.” “By initiating a strike that affects thousands of Rutgers employees, these union bosses are not only threatening the education of students, but are also potentially upending the livelihoods of countless families,” commented National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “Rutgers professors should know that they have the right to reject union boss strike orders and can continue working.”
Union to Defense Chief: You Aren’t Using Your Own Employees Enough to Help Meet Global Threats
April 4, 2023 // AFGE called on the Biden administration and Congress to align the Federal Wage System’s locality pay map with that of the General Schedule and advance legislation to improve Defense Department civilian police pay. elley called for the Biden administration to waive laws that AFGE claims favor non-competitive contracts, as well as reform the compensation of tens of thousands of underpaid Defense Department employees. Specifically, AFGE renewed its call for the Biden administration to align the locality pay map of employees on the Federal Wage System, commonly called wage grade workers, to that of the General Schedule. At issue is the fact that, unlike the General Schedule’s locality pay areas, which are tweaked on a nearly annual basis to account for changing regional costs of living and commuting patterns, the Federal Wage System’s map is still based mostly on a decades-old map of domestic military bases and other facilities.
Florida Republicans introduce bills prohibiting paycheck deductions for public-sector union dues
March 14, 2023 // Vincent Vernuccio, a representative for the Mackinac Center’s Workers for Opportunity initiative, said, “[SB 256] is about transparency, accountability, good bookkeeping, and democracy. … This bill is about the rights of public employees: making sure they’re informed and they can exercise them.” Freedom Foundation representative Rusty Brown said, “There’s nothing in this bill that curtails organizing or collective bargaining for wages, benefits, or working conditions, which is what a union should be doing. And when you have a union whose membership is half [the people they represent] … then that could be indicative of a problem. … [This bill] gives the employees represented by the union the opportunity to vote … if they would like to continue allowing that union to represent them.”
Gov. Newsom is poised to sign a bill that would allow tax dollars to fund a third of worker union dues
September 30, 2022 // Section 3 of Assembly Bill 158, also known as the Workers Tax Fairness Credit, promises to subsidize up to a third of annual union dues for public sector workers. “Governor Newsom has a bill on his desk right now enacted by the California legislature that’s just waiting for his signature to become law,” said Timothy Snowball, litigation counsel with the Freedom Foundation, a union watchdog.
OREGON STATE GOVERNMENT, SEIU ENGAGING IN STATE-SANCTIONED FRAUD
September 28, 2022 // “In Ms. Wright’s case, SEIU 503 forged the employees’ signature electronically,” continued Millard. “Despite the fact the court accepted that the forgery took place, the decision means neither the State of Oregon nor the Union have any constitutional duty to obtain consent from the employee.” The decision is an unadorned get-around of Janus, in which the Supreme Court ruled that states cannot force public employees to pay money to the union unless the employee provides affirmative consent in the form of a waiver of their First Amendment rights. Zielinski v. SEIU 503, Jason Dudash,
BIG LABOR’S AGENDA PUTS UNIONS FIRST, POLITICIANS SECOND, WORKERS LAST
September 23, 2022 // The only way to ensure real prosperity for Pennsylvania is for workers to leave their unions, taking their dues with them and spending it to improve their own lives rather than lining the pockets of union leaders and politicians who see them only as a piggy bank to be cracked open. The more public-sector employees the Freedom Foundation helps opt out of their union and stop paying dues, the less money the unions have to buy out their radical candidates and, in turn, create a fairer, more limited government through individual liberty and free enterprise.
Op-ed: Hunter Tower: In Pennsylvania, Janus is more relevant than ever
June 21, 2022 // Government employee unions responded to Janus by adopting a variety of still-being-litigated defensive strategies, including: only processing opt-out requests during a two-week annual window; challenging each request in court, forcing individual workers to battle the union’s well-financed legal team; subjecting union defectors to workplace harassment; and, when all else fails, forging the worker’s signature on membership documents. HB-2042, Charles Lane