By Jay Riestenberg and Mary Bottari

– As the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2014 session comes to a close, one of the major cases left for a decision is Harris vs. Quinn,which could effect some 7 million public sector workers in the United States.

The case originates in Illinois, where home health care workers have been successfully organized by public sector unions. Now, a small group of these workers, represented by lawyers from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, have sued and their lawyers contend that the agency fees, or the fair share dues that even non-union members of a bargaining unit are required to pay to unions that bargain for higher wages on their behalf, violate the First Amendment. Agency fees are barred in so-called “right to work” states, which have much less unionization and lower wages and benefits.

Joel Rogers, a professor of law and sociology at the University of Wisconsin, calls it “the most important labor law case the court has considered in decades.” This is because when the Supreme Court decided to take on the case, the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation dramatically expanded the scope of the case beyond the home health care workers to include all public sector workers, from teachers and firefighters to sanitation workers to librarians. If the court follows National Right to Work’s lead, every state in the country would essentially turn into an anti-union “right to work” state, which would be a significant blow to public sector unions’ collective bargaining efforts and also complicate thousands of existing contracts between organized workers and municipalities, cities, counties, and states across the country.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTWLDF) is the 501(c)(3) arm of the National Right to Work Committee (NRTWC), a 501(c)(4) organization. Additionally, the National Institute for Labor Relations Research is an affiliated anti-union research shop. Founded nearly 60 years ago, the NRTWC has been a national leader in the effort to destroy public and private sector unions. The groups have increased their funding and staffing in recent years. In 2012, the three groups combined reported over $25 million in revenue, making them a powerful instrument of the corporate and ideological interests that want to keep wages low and silence the voice of organized labor in the political arena.

NRTWC’s success and the demise of unions in the United States has directly contributed to the erosion of high-paying middle class jobs and to growing inequality, as this chart from the Economic Policy Institute graphically illustrates.

National Right to Work’s Deep Connections to the Koch Brothers and the John Birch Society

The NRTWC has deep connections within the national right-wing network led by the Koch brothers. Reed Larson, who led the NRTW groups for over three decades, hails from Wichita, Kansas, the hometown of Charles and David Koch. Larson became an early leader of the radical right-wing John Birch Society in Kansas, which Fred Koch (the father of Charles and David) helped found. Several other founders and early leaders of the NRTWC were members and leaders of the John Birch Society, specifically the Wichita chapter of which Fred Koch was an active member.

The groups remain tied to the Kochs. In 2012, the Kochs’ Freedom Partners group funneled $1 million to the National Right to Work Committee, while the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation gave a $15,000 grant to the NRTWLDF, which has also received significant funding from the Koch-connected DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund. Today, at least three former Koch associates work as attorneys for the NRTWLDF.

In June 2010, Mark Mix, the current head of the NRTW groups, attended the Kochs’ exclusive Aspen strategy meeting to give a presentation on how to mobilize conservatives for the 2010 election, along with representatives from Koch-backed groups such as the Center to Protect Patient Rights (now called American Encore) and Americans for Prosperity.

In addition to the Koch brothers, the NRTWLDF has received significant funding from many big name conservative donors, including the Walton Family Foundation (of Walmart), the Coors family’s Castle Rock Foundation, Wisconsin’s Bradley Foundation, the John M. Olin Foundation, and the Searle Freedom Trust.

A $33 Million Anti-Worker Lobby Shop with Ties to ALEC, SPN, and More

In order to push their extreme agenda, the NRTWC has launched a massive lobbying effort at both the state and federal level. In the U.S. Congress alone, the NRTWC has spent over $33 million on lobbying between 1999 and 2013. NRTWC has lobbied Congress to pass a national “Right to Work Act,” which is sponsored by Senator Rand Paul (R-KY). Paul has lent his name to several NRTWC advocacy and fundraising letters and received over $27,000 in campaign contributions from the NRTWC’s federal political action committee. The NRTWC also strongly opposed the Employee Free Choice Act, which would have made it easier for workers to organize, while supported legislation that would weaken the regulatory authority of the National Labor Relations Board over employers.

The NRTWC also does extensive lobbying on the state level. In 2012, lobbyists registered with the NRTWC were on the ground in Indiana and Michigan when both states passed anti-union “right to work” bills and are big supporters of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and his efforts to crush public sector unions. The NRTWC was an exhibitor at the 2011 annual conference of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the corporate bill mill exposed by CMD in 2011. ALEC’s “Right to Work Act,” which has been in the ALEC library since at least 1980, is one of its most commonly used “model” bills. When Republicans took trifecta control of 26 state houses in November of 2010, it was a top agenda item at the December 2010 ALEC meeting. According to a 2010 email from ALEC to Wisconsin legislators that CMD obtained, ALEC referred to its “Right to Work Act” as a “solution… for your state’s most pressing issues.” Currently 24 states are so-called “right to work” states. In 2013, 15 states introduced legislation based on ALEC’s “Right to Work Act.”

The NRTWLDF is also an associate member of the State Policy Network (SPN), an $84 million dollar network of 64 state-based “think tanks.” The State Policy Network’s affiliate in Michigan, the Mackinac Center, was one of the major supporters behind “right to work” when the legislature passed the bill in 2012. Through its board, staff, and other activities, the NRTW groups also have close connections to Americans for Prosperity, the Cato Institute, the American Conservative Union, and the Republican National Committee.

Crossing the Line: Whistleblower Alleges New Election Law Violations

From the beginning, the NRTWC had a focus on influencing U.S. elections. The NRTWC has spent millions in dark money electoral ads, including $7 million during the 2012 election. Although a leading group on the right, the NRTWC has also attacked Republicans such as John Boehner and Bob Dole for not adhering to their extreme policy agenda.

The NRTWC’s long history of pushing the line in campaign finance and electoral activity as a nonprofit led to an FEC case against it at the U.S. Supreme Court in 1982, in which the court ruled against the NRTWC for illegally raising money for electoral activities. The NRTWC continued to engage in controversial campaign-related activities, and evidence suggests that the National Right to Work Committee spent $100,000 on private detectives in 1984 to infiltrate the AFL-CIO, NEA, and Walter Mondale’s presidential campaign. By the time that case was brought to court, the statute of limitations had expired.

Today, the NRTWC continues to generate controversy for engaging in campaign related activities. In January 2014, the Center for Responsive Politics detailed whistleblower allegations that the NRTWC was running “a massive off-the-books mass mailing operation” attempting to influence the 2010 election in Iowa and possibly other states. The NRTWC did not disclose that it was participating in political activity that year to the IRS. The whistleblower also alleged that the NRTWC was coordinating its activities with candidates’ campaigns during the election. Former IRS official Marcus Owens commented to the news outlet that “people have gone to jail for precisely the facts that you are describing.” At the center of the controversy was then-NRTWC Vice President Doug Stafford, who is the former chief of staff for U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY).

NRTWC Lawyers Push Their Agenda through the Courts

The legal arm of NRTWC was launched in 1968 to take the anti-worker agenda to the courts. With the Harris v. Quinn case, the NRTWLDF is seeking to re-litigate the Abood vs. Detroit Board of Education Supreme Court case it lost in 1977, which upheld the constitutionality of fair share dues. Over the years, the NRTWLDF has done little to improve wages, benefits, health or safety protections for American workers, but has tried scores of cases against unions and organized labor revealing its political agenda. With a large team of lawyers and millions in funding from national right-wing sources, the NRTWLDF is currently trying cases in Arkansas, Missouri, California, Michigan, Colorado, and Ohio.

NRTWLDF’s also recently filed suit to block workers in the Volkswagen Chattanooga plant from voting for union representation and to prevent Volkswagen from voluntarily consenting to any future organizing drives.

Professor Rogers and other labor experts contend that the NRTWC’s success in the U.S. Supreme Court “would be a disaster for labor, particularly for the public sector unions that traditionally rely more heavily on agency shop agreements.” As Rogers points out, it is technically possible to form a union in a “right to work” state, but when union members are free to stop paying their dues, the union becomes a weak and ineffective organization. The results for American workers are clear. Research shows that “right to work” states have lower wages, less health care and more poverty.

– See more at: http://www.progressive.org/news/2014/06/187725/who-behind-national-right-work-committee-and-its-anti-union-crusade#sthash.xHhArhdq.dpuf

Source – http://www.progressive.org/news/2014/06/187725/who-behind-national-right-work-committee-and-its-anti-union-crusade

By the PA. AFL-CIO

– On Thursday Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President submitted written testimony on behalf of several unions to avoid a circus like committee hearing conducted by State Representative Daryl Metcalfe on House Bill 1507 paycheck deception bill.

The testimony was submitted on behalf of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO, AFSCME Council 13, AFT Pennsylvania, PSEA, SEIU State Council and UFCW 1776 to set the record straight with the facts and to counter the myths of the corporate front groups that are trying to silence the voice of working families.

An example of the most extreme and outrageous rhetoric was uttered on the floor of the Pennsylvania State Senate with freshman State Senator Scott Wagner comparing unions to Hitler and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

President Bloomingdale in his written remarks for the record dismantled the false premises used by the supporters of this bill, including challenging the argument that payroll deductions are costly to taxpayers and pointing out that only payroll deductions by labor unions are being attacked while similar deductions to insurance companies and banks that spend money on political action and lobbying are excluded.

“Make no mistake about the disingenuous arguments the right-wingers make in support of this bill are nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to mask their crusade to defund labor unions and silence the voices of nurses, teachers, store clerks, firefighters, case workers, mill workers, steel workers, construction trades and other public and private sector employees who put the brakes on unbridled corporate greed through collective bargaining and political action,” Bloomingdale said.

Secretary-Treasurer Frank Snyder said, “Instead of staging bogus hearings and holding inflammatory rallies, Representative Metcalfe’s time would be better spent working on a budget that doesn’t gut public education, pensions and other vital public services in favor of giving corporations $4 billion in tax breaks and giving gas drillers a pass on paying a fair extraction tax. Representative Metcalfe and his right-wing allies would rather spew hate, fear and division and pursue an ideological agenda that stands in the way of open discourse and democracy.

Source: http://www.paaflcio.org/?p=4162&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook

By Andrew Harrer

– Organized labor has embarked on a project to develop legislation that would expand collective bargaining rights of private-sector workers, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said.

During and after a meeting with Wall Street Journal reporters and editors Wednesday, Mr. Trumka wouldn’t provide specifics about labor’s plan or timing. But he suggested employers should be required to bargain over wages with all private-sector workers — union members and nonunion workers alike.

“We believe nonunion workers should be able to come together and negotiate with their employer without fear of retaliation or firing to get a better wage, to get a fairer share of what they produce,” he said. “Without collective bargaining, how do we close that gap” of income inequality? Mr. Trumka asked.

“We’re going to try to get … enacted in the law that every worker should have the right to bargain collectively with their employer, whether they have a union or not,” he said.

Any legislative proposal to expand bargaining rights is likely to draw a backlash from business groups, and would have no chance of clearing Congress anytime soon.

One labor official familiar with the effort said the bill would be unveiled as part of a long-term education and messaging campaign intended to “start a conversation” about expanding workers’ bargaining rights. “As politics changes, maybe it will get through” Congress, the official said, adding that while a bill is not imminent, it is under “active discussion,” including with congressional aides.

The 1935 National Labor Relations Act already extends collective bargaining rights to private-sector workers, but it does so under a set of circumstances that are more limited than what organized labor wants.

Existing law doesn’t require workers to be represented by a union to collectively bargain — at least not in the traditional sense of what a union is. Employees have the right to collectively bargain if they can demonstrate that they’re part of a “labor organization” that represents a majority of the workers, labor lawyers say. The term “labor organization” is broader than a union, including any organization, agency, committee or plan, in which employees participate for the purpose of dealing with employers about labor disputes, wages, work schedules or other working conditions.

It isn’t clear if organized labor would seek to legally require employers to bargain without a labor organization in place. Under existing law, private-sector workers can take collective action on their own, such as approaching their employer to try to improve wages, benefits or other working conditions. Employers can’t retaliate but aren’t required to negotiate with the workers.

Some worker advocates contend that under current law, employers could be made to bargain with a labor organization that represents only a minority of workers. But the National Labor Relations Board, which enforces the 1935 labor law, doesn’t order employers to do so. It’s not clear if organized labor would raise that issue in the legislation it plans to propose.

Union membership has fallen sharply since the 1980s. Last year, 11.3% of wage and salary workers belonged to a union, down from 20.1% in 1983. The rate remained flat last year compared to 2012, when unions managed to add members in the private sector, driven by gains in industries such as construction, manufacturing , health-care and food services. Still, rates remain far below what unions want, sapping them of membership dues they use in part to build political power.

Source: http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/06/05/unions-set-high-goal-collective-bargaining-for-all-workers/

By Kevin McCorry

– In a bipartisan 16-8 vote, the Pennsylvania House Education Committee has greenlighted a bill that would eliminate state-mandated seniority protections for teachers.

HB 1722, sponsored by state Rep. Tim Krieger, R-Westmoreland, would require districts to base layoffs on a teacher’s performance as measured by the state’s new teacher evaluation system.

Now, 499 of Pennsylvania’s 500 school districts are required to base teacher layoff and recall decisions on the inverse order of seniority, sometimes referred to as “last in, first out.”

The Philadelphia School Reform Commission, flexing its “special powers,” suspended the state code that protects teachers based on longevity. The school district has called on the state Supreme Court to provide a ruling that would affirm that the SRC has this right.

The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers has petitioned the court to reject the district’s position – arguing that work-rule changes should be negotiated at the bargaining table. The union’s contract expired at the end of August; since then, negotiations have screeched along without any signs of progress.

HB 1722 also would allow districts to eliminate staff based on budgetary shortfalls. Aside from Philadelphia, state school districts now can order layoffs only when student enrollment declines or by eliminating specific programs.

Critics of the status quo say this leads many Pennsylvania districts to make wholesale cuts to programs such as art, music and kindergarten when revenues decline.

All Republicans on the education committee voted to advance the bill. Two Democrats, James Clay, D- Philadelphia, and Jake Wheatley, D-Allegheny, joined them.

Krieger, the bill’s sponsor, said the measure will “protect good teachers and make schools better.”

“If you’re a young teacher, and you’re doing a great job, you shouldn’t be furloughed because you haven’t been there that long,” he said.

Krieger lamented that the Pittsburgh School District had to cut 16 young teachers last year who carried a “distinguished” evaluation.

This is not an issue that has particularly affected schools within Krieger’s legislative district.

“We hear more of the complaints and more of the requests for this, frankly, from places like Pittsburgh and Philadelphia,” he said.

Why didn’t a legislator representing one of those districts propose the measure?

“I don’t know. I guess none of them were willing to do it,” Krieger said. “And I thought it was a good idea.”

Krieger’s original bill proposed increasing the time it takes teachers to earn tenure from three to five years. That provision died before leaving committee.

Minority chair James Roebuck, D-Philadelphia, argued that teacher seniority has “traditionally worked” and that the proposed bill has “a lot of problems.”

“I don’t get the idea that somehow there’s such great teachers coming in that are largely unseasoned that are somehow trumping well-established teachers in the classroom,” he said. “I’ve seen very little evidence of that.”

Roebuck contends that the debate over seniority has been manufactured by what he sees as the state’s underfunding of public education.

“If you fund schools properly, you don’t have to [lay teachers off],” he said. “I think this is looking at a self-created problem of saying, ‘because we created this problem, now we’ve got to do something else.'”

The state’s new teacher evaluation system will grade educators based on principal observation, evidence provided by teachers themselves, and students’ standardized test scores as averaged over a three-year period.

Roebuck worries that the new system isn’t ready.

“The problem is taking this new system that hasn’t even been fully tested or implemented and using that to make rather major decisions,” he said.

Jonathan Cetel, executive director of the school-reform advocacy group PennCAN, exalted the committee’s action.

“The house leadership said something that I’ve often heard — that voters would be shocked to learn that this already isn’t law, that we’re not already making important personnel decisions based on how well a teacher is doing with students,” said Cetel.

Gov. Tom Corbett has long supported changing teacher tenure.

Gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf has gone on the record in favor of the state’s existing teacher seniority rules.

“Are there teachers who may not be teaching up to par? Yeah. There are in any organization,” he said at an education panel discussion in Philadelphia in April. “The system we have now has a way to identify those teachers and relieve them of their duties.”

The bill will now go before the full House of Representatives, where leaders have been receptive to its aims.

Source – http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/homepage-feature/item/68852-bill-that-aims-to-curtail-teacher-seniority-clears-hurdle-in-the-pa-house?linktype=hp_impact

By Jobs With Justice

– The Supreme Court could issue a decision as early as Monday that could repeal collective bargaining rights for home-care workers. Learn the potential impact the ruling could have on care workers, care consumers and working people.

You can make your voice heard by adding your name to our petition and stand with these caregivers now!

What is the Supreme Court case Harris v. Quinn about?

On October 1, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a hearing in the case Harris v. Quinn. The case was brought by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTW), an extremist group with ties to the ultra-conservative Koch Brothers and ALEC. This case is the latest in a decades-long right-wing attack on the rights of working people to join together to improve their jobs and the quality of services they provide.

The NRTW lawsuit started as a specific challenge against Illinois home-care workers’ collective bargaining rights, but the case has now expanded to attempt to repeal the right of all public sector home-care workers from banding together and collectively bargain with states over core terms of their employment. In the suit, NRTW is also asking the Supreme Court to bar other independent care providers, like family child-care providers, from forming a union by arguing that independent providers are independent contractors – and not public service employees – who cannot bargain collectively. The lower courts have already rejected this argument.

When is a decision expected from the Supreme Court on Harris v. Quinn?

The decision could come at any point between next Monday and the end of the month.

Why do home-care workers need collective bargaining rights?

As more states are allowing Medicaid to fund in-home care, millions of paid caregivers deliver home-based care for children, the elderly and people with disabilities. From administering medicine to preparing meals, home-care workers allow the millions of people they care for to live independently at home with dignity and respect. Despite an increasing demand for home-based care providers, this workforce – made up of mostly women, immigrants and people of color – faces low pay, few benefits and little job security. The median hourly wage for home-health and personal-care aides is $9.70 an hour.

Given these poor job standards, many providers have sought to form unions. Hundreds of thousands of these caregivers have now earned collective bargaining rights, and nearly two million home-care workers finally secured the right to earn a minimum wage and overtime just last year. A Supreme Court ruling limiting their collective bargaining rights opens the door for home-care workers to lose hard fought gains in hours, benefits, training opportunities and wages.

Why don’t all care workers have collective bargaining rights?

The 1935 National Labor Relations Act gives most private sector employees the right to form unions and collectively bargain with their employers. The federal law does not, however, extend to public employees, although most states have laws that grant union rights to public sector employees as well. But for those workers in the gray area of providing home-based care and receiving reimbursements through state and federal programs, there was no established structure in which to form unions. While the consumers of this care or their family members typically do the hiring and often supervising of these workers, a significant percentage of the workers receive their income through state or federal reimbursements (largely Medicaid). So these care workers couldn’t be categorized as independent business owners since they have no control over the reimbursement rates, but they weren’t employed by the private sector either. Still, state governments were ignoring their obligation to serve as the “employer of record” for providers.

How did care workers gain a voice on the job?

Despite the structural impediments, care providers began joining unions anyway to secure a voice on the job. And since the 1990s, care workers and their unions began mobilizing consumers and other allies to pressure elected officials to raise reimbursement rates and create public authorities that controlled state and federal funding streams and could recognize and bargain with providers’ unions. Now, as of 2013, nine states have granted rights to home-care providers.

How could this case affect the people that home-care workers care for?

The dismantling of union rights for providers would also be a blow to the consumers of care who benefit from a stable workforce – studies have shown that increased wages and benefits lead to reduced turnover among home-care providers. With the demand for home care predicted to soar in the coming years as baby boomers age, a decision limiting these rights will compromise care standards at the moment our aging nation needs it most.

What are the implications of the case on income inequality and economic justice?

A decision limiting these rights could also directly drive down the wages and the basic rights of care workers. Public workers could have fewer resources to stand up for good jobs and quality care. If our friends and neighbors can’t join together in strong unions, it will become harder for all workers to gain better wages and benefits, increased job security and safer workplaces. We all need the freedom to have a voice at work and to speak up for decent jobs and quality services.

The Supreme Court will issue a decision in the coming weeks – and possibly as early as this Monday. Click here to sign our petition to stand with care workers! We will deliver your petition to the workers who could be hit hardest by this ruling.

Source: http://www.jwj.org/supreme-court-may-gut-care-workers-collective-bargaining-rights