Public Employee Press

Battle states
AFSCME activists fired up

Against a backdrop of major setbacks for public service workers, recent victories and growing fightback campaigns, more than 500 activists from DC 37's national union gathered in Washington to recommit themselves to the battle to preserve the working class against the assault from the right.

Gerald W. McEntee, president of the 1.6 million-member American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, kicked off the June 6-8 State Battles Summit conference with a warning and a call to action:

"We face a well-funded and well-coordinated campaign of brutal attacks on public employees as corporate-backed politicians privatize public services and jobs," he said. "They want to wipe our union off the map to have an America where no one stands up for the poor and the working middle class and no one fights to protect Social Security and Medicare."

But his conclusion was optimistic: "What happens next is up to us," he said, calling on participants to "mobilize and organize and continue to take the lead to win this fight and build a better future for our members and their communities."

AFSCME has designated 12 "battleground states" where the attacks on public service workers are the worst. All have Republican governors, except New York.

Conference participants studied the agenda of the right-wing ideologues and their corporate billionaire backers, which would shrink public services, cut the pay, benefits and pensions of public workers and eliminate their collective bargaining rights, thwart health care reform and reverse regulations that protect the environment in order to cut taxes on business and the wealthy.

"As a union of public service employees, we are the guardians of every community, the last line of defense against this culture of greed," said AFSCME Secretary-Treasurer Lee Saunders.

DC 37 Executive Director Lillian Roberts led a delegation of local leaders and activists that included President Eddie Rodriguez and Treasurer Maf Misbah Uddin.

"The fighting spirit of the activists and leaders from Wisconsin, Ohio and the other frontline states and the recent victory in Puerto Rico are inspiring," said Roberts.

Marty Biel of Wisconsin Council 24 told how "Tea Party Republican" Gov. Scott Walker ignored rallies of up to 135,000 Wisconsinites as he rammed through a law canceling public employees' bargaining rights. Now a labor-community-church alliance has collected enough signatures to make six of the state senators who voted with Walker face recall votes July 12 that could eliminate the governor's Senate majority.

In Ohio, where the infamous Senate Bill 5 eliminated bargaining rights, longevity increases and dues collection for government workers, the union ran a "citizens' veto" petition campaign with labor and community allies. About 200,000 signatures were needed to freeze the law until a public vote on it is held in November; members collected over one-half million!

Progressive pollster Celinda Lake explained that a majority of Americans oppose cutting the pay, benefits and bargaining rights of government employees to reduce budget deficits and said the public is coming to understand that the attacks on public workers are more to weaken unions than to reduce deficits.

Wade Henderson, president of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, which counts Saunders as its treasurer, closed the summit with a stirring speech. The civil rights movement, he told participants, "stands with you as you have stood with us. We are united against those who are using America's debts and deficits as a pretext for dismantling the middle class and destroying the American Dream."