By The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers

PHILADELPHIA–“In light of the unmitigated fiasco that is Source4Teachers, the District’s plan to repeat the same failed experiment with Kelly Services is absolutely mind-boggling.

“When the District first announced plans to outsource substitute services to Source4Teachers, I publicly made it very clear that this experiment would be a failure. All school year, the PFT has held press conferences, issued statements and testified before City Council about the extent of Source4Teachers’ failure to provide substitutes.

“The collaboration between the District and Source4Teachers was an even bigger disaster than we anticipated. While the District was failing to fill a stunning number of teacher vacancies, Source4Teachers left hundreds of Philly classrooms uncovered for months at schools like Muñoz Marín (0% fill rate from September through December).

“The District has been hearing from angry parents, educators and elected leaders, rightfully so, about the Source4Teachers debacle for nearly a year. The logical course of action would be to return to the previous–and far more effective–system of substitute services. And, since Kelly plans to pay substitutes at the originally contracted rates (and pass management costs to the District), millions of dollars would be saved by reverting to the old system.

Instead, the District is doubling down on its original mistake by hiring–and paying more for–Kelly Services, which, like Source4Teachers, has no experience in providing substitutes for a large urban school district like Philadelphia.

“The District’s actions are made more outrageous by the fact that we have already seen how this will end. It’s the proverbial definition of insanity: spending millions to repeat the same failed experiment to provide our schoolchildren with adequate substitutes, but hoping for a different result.

“Educators in Philly and across the nation routinely express frustration at having a lack of voice in the decisions that affect our schools. It’s ironic that, at the very end of Teacher Appreciation Week, Superintendent Hite is once again demonstrating the District’s steadfast refusal to consult, or even share their plans, with Philly’s educators.

“Along with the parents of our city’s schoolchildren, we are determined to fight back against the District’s privatization agenda, since it seems they are incapable of learning from their own mistakes.”

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By Joseph N. DiStefano

– Citing a loss of U.S. call-center jobs that companies have moved to foreign countries amid a Presidential campaign that has candidates for both parties decrying job losses tied to trade treaties, a labor union representing call-center workers at former Bell phone companies has asked Congress to back U.S. Senator Bob Casey, D-Pa.’s, latest version of the “United States Call Center Worker and Consumer Protection Act.” House version here. Earlier iterations of the bill have failed to pass the last few sessions in Congress.

Casey’s bill would force call centers to tell Americans where they are located, give Americans the option of having their calls transferred to a U.S.-based call center, and “make U.S. companies who off-shore their call center jobs from the U.S. ineligible for certain federal grants and taxpayer-funded loans,” according to a summary posted by the Communications Workers of America labor union..

Nearly 40,000 CWA members are on strike against Verizon Corp., and the union wants Verizon to stop threatened “offshoring” as part of a settlement. Verizon says the workers have a competitive contract offer.

An affiliate of the CWA union represents writers and editors, among other workers, at the Inquirer and philly.com.

Source: http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/inq-phillydeals/Pa-Senators-bill-would-.html

By The Pa. AFL-CIO

– Rally with CWA/IBEW Verizon workers, joined by CWA District 2-13 Vice President, Ed Mooney; Central Pa Area Labor Federation Director, Zach Hause; Harrisburg Region Central Labor Council President, David Gash; Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Rick Bloomingdale & Secretary-Treasurer Frank Snyder; Invited Guests.

WHEN: May 3 @ 11:00 am – 12:00 pm

WHERE: State Capitol Steps, 3rd & State Streets, Harrisburg PA

DOWNLOAD A FLYER TO DISTRIBUTE at: http://www.paaflcio.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/HBG_RALLY_MAY3_CWA.pdf

Source – http://www.paaflcio.org/?p=6883

By John J. Dougherty

– The Philadelphia building trades mourn the loss of Samuel Staten Sr., 80, the former business manager of Laborers Local 332, former secretary-treasurer of the Laborers’ District Council of the Metropolitan Area of Philadelphia and Vicinity, and a pioneer of the city’s labor community.

Staten was a legend in the labor and civic communities. He was more than a mentor; he was an inspiration to me and countless other labor leaders in this city. His courage, leadership, and vision helped make Philadelphia one of the nation’s great union towns.

For Staten, the labor movement was more than a job; it was a way of life. His contributions to the labor movement and to workers’ rights were immeasurable. One of our last conversations was about institutionalizing pre-apprenticeship programs to create employment opportunities for all Philadelphians.

On behalf of all members of the Philadelphia building trades, we send our deepest condolences to the Staten family.

John J. Dougherty is the Business Manager of IBEW Local 98 and the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council

Source: http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20160501_Letters__Samuel_Staten_Sr___Phila__labor_legend.html#UcRO2zcOjvgoABCU.99

By Jane M. Von Bergen

– The tears were there, as usual, under a gray sky that wept along with those gathered Friday by the Delaware River for Workers’ Memorial Day to honor people killed on the job.

But there was anger as well, and it boiled over at the annual breakfast that preceded a solemn march on Columbus Boulevard to a rainy memorial service at Penn’s Landing.

With a roar not unlike the sound of the train that mowed down two Amtrak workers on April 3, waves of railway workers rose to their feet Friday in rage and sadness in response to a call from their union leader.

“Stand up if you think it is time to strike Amtrak and shut down the Northeast Corridor to force Amtrak to provide a safe workplace and to protect our lives,” shouted Jed Dodd.

“Let me hear you say Union,” he said.

Dodd, who leads the union that represents rail repair workers in Pennsylvania, took the microphone at the fund-raising breakfast for PhilaPOSH, a group that advocates for workers’ safety. He had another question for members of the Pennsylvania Federation of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, and it was key:

“Are you ready to risk arrest and go to jail to ensure that every member of our union can return home safely to their family?”

“Union,” they shouted.

Federal law makes it difficult for railway workers to strike, partly because of the importance of railroads to the economy.

And so Dodd described what happened in 1994, after two union members were killed and a third mutilated on the job.

“Many of us risked arrest and jail as our tactics escalated into civil disobedience,” he said. “Finally . . . we rose up and struck . . . shutting down hundreds of trains in 17 states.”

A federal judge, he said, ordered them back to work that night, putting Conrail’s safety rules under federal court jurisdiction, which led to new safety regulations in 1997. In the 16 years since then, until 2013, three of his union’s members have been killed on the tracks, Dodd said.

But in the last 18 months, he said, four have died, two when the train slammed into a backhoe on an Amtrak line in Chester April 3, ending the lives of Joseph Carter and Peter Adamovich.

Dodd laid the blame for their deaths on a change in corporate culture that began when Joseph Boardman was appointed Amtrak chief executive in 2008.

Boardman withdrew management’s participation in a joint safety committee, reduced training, fired experienced senior executives, and intimidated middle managers and workers from identifying hazards, Dodd said.

Later Friday, an Amtrak spokesman said the passenger railroad “is continuously working to improve the safety culture within . . . the entire company. The most effective way to make that happen is true collaboration between Amtrak management and union leadership.”

Dodd was joined on stage at the Sheet Metal Workers Local 19 banquet hall by David Michaels, assistant U.S. labor secretary for occupational safety and health.

Michaels expressed frustration with what he described as weak penalties under the Occupational Safety and Health Act for employers who allow conditions that kill or injure workers.

The fines they face, $100,000 or $200,000, “are like petty cash,” he said.

“I believe if we had more criminal prosecutions, we’d have a much bigger impact in changing these employers,” Michaels said. Jail, he noted, would sharpen their focus on safety.

His remarks came the same day roofer James McCullagh, 60, was to report to federal prison in connection with the death of his friend and employee, Mark T. Smith.

Smith had not been given any fall protection. He died on June 21, 2013, while repairing a church roof on Broad Street in Philadelphia.

McCullagh pleaded guilty to lying to inspectors about the fall-protection gear and asking his other employees to lie. On March 29, he was sentenced to 10 months in prison.

Among the speakers Friday was union official Jim Whitehead, of SEIU Local 32BJ District 1201, which represents school maintenance workers and engineers.

Whitehead said Chris Trakimas, the Philadelphia School District employee badly burned Jan. 15 while trying to fix a boiler at F.S. Edmonds Elementary School, remains in a coma. Whitehead blamed Trakimas’ injury on the “budget cuts, politics, neglect and callousness” that have led the district to delay infrastructure repairs.

Representing the families of those who have died was Rosalie Hetrick, whose husband, Thomas, a Verizon repair worker, was killed in 2008. Hetrick said her husband told supervisors the job was unsafe, but was ignored.

“I hate Verizon for the way they disrespected him in his death,” she said. “It’s really easy to blame the dead guy.”

Hetrick sued Verizon on behalf of her family, but lost the case.

Source – http://www.philly.com/philly/business/labor_and_unions/20160430_Railway_union_members_rage_against_Amtrak_at_Workers__Memorial_Day.html