By The PA. AFL-CIO

– This year, Staples and the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) cut a deal called the “Approved Shipper” program, which is essentially a cloaked attempt at privatization of postal retail operations. The program sets up “mini post offices” inside of 82 Staples office supply stores, staffs them with low-wage Staples employees and eliminates the need for highly-trained USPS workers who get paid a living wage.

Staples and the USPS intend to expand the program to 1,500 locations throughout the country. This further threatens the jobs of well-trained, well-paid, uniformed post office workers who take an oath to safeguard Americans’ mail. There have already been cutbacks in service hours at dozens of post offices around San Francisco, which is one of the test areas for the program.

Due to Staples and USPS’s continued efforts to move this program forward, the president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) Randi Weingarten recently wrote a letter to Staples’ CEO Ronald Sargent to notify him that the 1.6 million member AFT will no longer shop at Staples for school supplies until further notice.

“As you know, teachers are critical to your profits. Last year, educators spent over $1.6 billion of their own money on school supplies and a lion’s share of that money was spent at Staples stores all across the country. Some of our local affiliates have even entered into partnerships with Staples to offer discounts to teachers and other school-related staff with a goal of reducing costs to benefit the communities and families we serve,” Weingarten wrote.

On July 21, 2014, the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO has also sent a letter to the CEO of Staples regarding this outsourcing attempt and our endorsement of the boycott. We urge our affiliates and their members to write similar letters and let it be known that we will not stand for this attack on good union jobs. If you do write a letter, please copy us when you do so.

It has recently been revealed that the USPS has extended the “Approved Shipper” program to 44 additional Staples locations mainly in Connecticut, as well as New York and Massachusetts. This shows that they are charging ahead with the destructive program, which means labor and all the people who care about the integrity of the USPS must fight back harder.

The American Postal Workers Union (APWU) have been devout to pushing the Staples boycott. The boycott has already won the endorsement of the AFT, American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU). The letter from Weingarten is another stand against this outsourcing attempt, letting Staples and USPS management know that “we’re not buying it.“

Source: http://www.paaflcio.org/?p=4628

The dedicated nurses at Chester Crosier Medical Center have been locked out of their place of work and have been replaced with non-union workers from out of state. Please attend a rally today and a show of SOLIDARITY to support them and their efforts to increase patient care, avoid pay cuts and securing their pensions.

RALLY DETAILS:

When: Today, Thursday, September 25, 2014

Time: Join us on the Picket Line at 4 pm
Rally at 5:30 pm

Where: Crozer-Chester Medical Center
1 Medical Center Drive, Upland, PA

In Solidarity!

Philly Labor

(Listen) 9/24 Today In PhillyLabor Radio Podcast Featuring Keith Holmes, President, Gas Worker’s Employees Union 686 and Union Attorney, Jim Runkle, Spear Wilderman

This Week’s Featured Topic – The Real Story Behind Mayor Nutter’s Attempt To Sell PGW!

To Listen to The Podcast, Go To: http://wwdbam.com/2014/09/24/jk092414_mono/

– This Week’s Special Guest on Today In Philly Labor Radio (LIve in the Studio) is Keith Holmes, President, Gas Workers Employees Union 686.

This week’s featured topic is Mayor Nutter’s attempt to sell PGW and put the jobs of thousands of hard working PGW employees in jeopardy within 3 years of the sale of the utility and more…..GET THE REAL STORY ON TODAY IN PHILLYLABOR RADIO!!!

Tune in today/Wednesday 9/24 at 6pm To WWDB 860 AM (or online at: http://wwdbam.com/streamer/) And See What All The Talk Is about!

By Kevin McCorry

– In a 114-84 vote, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Monday once again approved the $2-per-pack Philadelphia cigarette tax for city schools.

The measure could get a vote in the Senate as soon as Wednesday. Gov. Tom Corbett has pledged to sign the bill upon passage.

The Philadelphia School District is counting on the cigarette tax to generate $49 million this fiscal year to avoid a slate of more than 1,000 layoffs that district officials warn would turn schools into “empty shells.”

In order to generate this revenue, the district says collections must begin by Oct. 1.

House Majority Leader Mike Turzai, R-Allegheny, assured school Superintendent William Hite in August that the district could count on cigarette tax revenue by October.

The House first passed the cigarette tax on July 2, but disagreements with the Senate over unrelated items trapped the omnibus measure in a game of legislative pingpong.

That game may not yet be over.

Senate leaders may want to stick with the bill as they’ve already twice passed it. This iteration includes provisions that allow hotel taxes to be hiked in some counties and allow some cities to apply for tax credits for community revitalization improvement zones (CRIZ).

House leaders dislike these provisions, lamenting the fact that expanding CRIZ eligibility could cost the state general fund $70 million.

The Senate leadership’s spokesman said another end run is not likely.

“We are very eager to get this issue resolved, to get a bill to the governor’s desk,” Erik Arneson said in a telephone interview shortly after the House vote. “I don’t see any movement to try to put those issues back into the Philadelphia cigarette tax bill.”

Arneson said lawmakers have started work on separate bills for the hotel taxes and CRIZs.

What’s the difference between now and early July?

“The passage of time,” said Arneson. “People being able to get a better understanding of the importance of the issue to Philadelphia, people being able to better express their viewpoints on the other issues that had been in the same bill.”

If the Senate doesn’t vote Wednesday, its next chance will be a session scheduled for Oct. 6.

If the House and Senate had reached consensus in early July, the levy would have generated an additional $13 million for schools this year, according to the district’s revenue projections.

Council President Darrell Clarke, who watched the preceedings from the balcony of the House, said he had his “fingers crossed” that the Senate would move the bill quickly.

He praising the bill’s bipartisian support in the house, but warned that Philadelphia’s schools were still far from out of the woods.

“With all due respect to a lot of people, it’s still a short term solution,” he said. “We still need to work on a broader funding formula, but that’s a conversation for another day.”

The bill as passed by the House gives lawmakers the option to end the levy after five years. It also includes an amendment from Rep. John Taylor, R-Philadelphia, that makes it easier to start a new charter school in Philadelphia.

The amendment allows new charter applicants to petition the state charter appeals board (CAB) if they are rejected by the Philadelphia School Reform Commission.

As is, appeals in Philadelphia are the sole purview of the SRC, which was exempted from the CAB process in the state-takeover legislation of 2001.

The SRC last approved a batch of independent charter schools in 2009. Since then, the commission has converted 21 traditional district schools into Renaissance charters.

Proponents of the measure say it will give Philadelphia citizens better educational options. Opponents worry the change could lead to unfettered charter expansion, which would further deplete the district’s resources, undercutting the short-term gains of the cigarette tax.

Source: http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/homepage-feature/item/73070-pa-house-passes-2-per-pack-philly-cigarette-tax-on-to-senate?linktype=hp_impact