Friday, March 8, 2013

Unions Fight Foreclosure Epidemic

 Home Is Where the Fight Is

 
757 117
It took police four tries to evict the Cruz family in Minneapolis. After 39 arrests, the police broke the door down at 4 a.m. Many defense attempts have prevented evictions and saved homes. Photo: Peter Leeman.
Ramon Suero fell behind on his mortgage payments after he got fired for organizing a union.
Suero, a hotel worker and UNITE HERE Local 26 member in Boston, got his job back after a year. But then his wife had to quit hers and travel to the Dominican Republic to care for her sick mother—and they fell further behind.
They applied to modify their home loan, but federally sponsored mortgage company Freddie Mac said no, foreclosed, and demanded the family get out by February 1.
The Sueros aren’t leaving.
“I want to send a message to the banks: we deserve a second chance,” Suero said. “That’s why I decided to fight—not only for my family, but for our community.”
Local 26 members and activists from the housing justice group City Life/Vida Urbana vow to thwart the eviction with a human blockade if necessary.

BATTERING RAM

In the wake of Occupy, the tactic is spreading. Activists around the country are placing their bodies in the way of police doing the banks’ dirty work.
In the Twin Cities, supporters get text-message alerts from the grassroots group Occupy Homes MN and mobilize quickly to stop surprise evictions.
It took Minneapolis police four attempts—and 39 arrests—to evict the Cruz family last spring. When they showed up at 4 a.m. and attacked the front door with a battering ram, 60 volunteers held them off.
The whole effort cost the city $40,000, and activists carried the battered door down to city hall to shame elected officials for the misuse of public resources.
“It becomes really politically costly—both to the banks who are creating this kind of chaos, and also to city politicians,” said organizer Nick Espinosa.
Many foreclosure resisters his group works with are current or former union members—like Monique White of Service Employees (SEIU) Local 26, who lost her youth-counselor job to state budget cuts. White kept her house after she confronted the U.S. Bank CEO in front of 200 shareholders.

DUMPSTER DEFENSE

When they evict you in Detroit, they bring a dumpster to throw away your belongings. That’s how the Cullors family found out they were being evicted last Halloween: the dumpster showed up.
The family had struggled to pay its mortgage after Jerry Cullors, a retired bakery truck driver, suffered wage and pension cuts in the run-up to Wonder Bread’s bankruptcy.
So Eviction Defense Committee activists improvised: they filled the dumpster with bags of leaves. The sheriff had to call for another dumpster—buying allies just enough time to win a stay of eviction in court that morning.
A month later, after a march on the bank and a packed court hearing, Fannie Mae backed off and told Bank of America to negotiate a modified mortgage.

‘MORAL HAZARD’

Like millions of other homeowners, at the time of their default the Sueros were “underwater”: they owed more on their mortgage than the house was worth.
Freddie Mac has already lost the money. It will have to resell the house at today’s fair market value, about $80,000, down from $283,000. The question is who will benefit from Freddie’s loss: the Sueros, or some hedge fund investor who buys up the property?
The Sueros want “principal reduction”: a new loan based on the house’s current value. A community bank has offered to buy the house from Freddie for $90,000 and sell it back to the Sueros on those terms.
Fannie and Freddie, which own or insure a majority of home loans in the U.S., could save taxpayers billions by adopting principal reduction, a Federal Housing Finance Agency study found last year.
This is because, when a homeowner defaults on a mortgage backed by Fannie or Freddie, taxpayers are on the hook to pay back to the bank all the money still owing on the original mortgage. If the principal is reduced, odds are better the homeowner will be able to keep making payments and avoid default (or re-default).
Bush appointee Ed DeMarco—who still heads the FHFA—says no to principal reduction. His policy is not to sell back to foreclosed homeowners, because that would create a “moral hazard,” encouraging others to follow their example.
“They’re concerned that people will get the wrong idea and strategically default,” said Steve Meacham, lead organizer for City Life. “From our point of view, it’s the right idea. The banks caused the housing crisis. They should pay for it.”
And talk of morality seems laughable from an institution that fueled the rampant financial speculation that caused the housing collapse. Community groups are lobbying the president to replace DeMarco.

DOWN FOR DIRECT ACTION

Supporting the Sueros was a no-brainer for UNITE HERE Local 26 President Brian Lang. The union has long worked on housing issues. It negotiated a housing trust fund in the late ’80s to help members make down payments—and lobbied Congress to allow this.
Help from the fund “has made the difference for many in being able to own homes,” Lang said. “We see our union as trying to transfer wealth to our neighborhoods and communities.” Local 26 has begun comparing its member list against foreclosure lists to identify other potential resisters.
Grassroots group Occupy Our Homes Atlanta is helping Gulf War veteran Mark Harris fight for principal reduction to keep his home.
Harris was a Teamster for 20 years, so organizers encouraged him to reach out to his union brothers. Teamsters and Jobs with Justice members started coming to rallies to support Harris, doubling or tripling Occupy Our Homes’ usual turnout.
“It’s exciting working with Teamsters, because they’re more than down,” Occupy Our Homes organizer Tim Franzen said. “They understand direct action. The lengths they’re willing to go to protect one of their brothers is pretty far.”

NO SHAME

You don’t have to look far to see the connection between workplace and housing struggles. People lose their homes or get evicted from rentals because of unemployment, underemployment, low wages, or health care bills.
“Anyone who’s facing a housing crisis will also have a job crisis story to tell you,” said Tony Romano, organizing director of the national coalition Right to the City Alliance, many of whose member groups fight foreclosures.
So political education is key. “One of the big things is always breaking down the shame,” said Malcolm Chu, lead organizer for the Massachusetts group Springfield No One Leaves. “So many members come into our space and say, ‘It’s my fault. I should have done better.’”
In reality, “everybody who got a loan in the bubble is a predatory loan victim,” City Life’s Meacham argues, since housing prices were inflated by rich speculators. “When the 1% don’t know what to do with their money, they speculate and cause bubbles.”
“It’s another example of the banks trying to generate ridiculously huge profits for investors, at great cost to everyone else,” agreed Ron Patenaude, president of United Auto Workers Local 2322, representing health and human services workers in Western Massachusetts.
His union supports Springfield No One Leaves with turnout and what financial support it can muster. A few union members are working with SNOL to fight their own foreclosures.
The solidarity goes both ways. When Verizon workers struck against concessions in 2011, SNOL invited union members to explain their issues to housing activists.

NOT ASKING NICELY

Activists occupied the sheriff’s office in Portland, Oregon, in January until he agreed to pursue a moratorium on foreclosure evictions.
The win showed that “what works is demanding and taking action, not asking nicely,” said Angela MacWhinnie, organizer with We Are Oregon, a branch of SEIU’s Fight for a Fair Economy, “because we had asked nicely for over a year.”
In We Are Oregon’s network of rapid responders, volunteers take shifts answering the distress hotline and staying at resisters’ houses, so no one has to be home alone when the riot cops show up to evict—“and the people getting support commit to come help others,” MacWhinnie said.
The freedom of strategy is a refreshing change from worksite fights, she said. Labor law imposes heavy penalties for some of the most effective union tactics, such as sit-downs or intermittent strikes.
Housing struggles offer “a lot more openness to think creatively and make effective uses of our strength,” said MacWhinnie.

BIGGER DREAMS

Many of the groups described here borrow City Life’s organizing model: the Sword (legal defense), the Shield (public protest), and the Offer (alternative financing).
Last year City Life toured to 12 cities to spread the model. Romano says Right to the City Alliance plans to invite unions to join a national campaign, One Million Homes for People Not Profit—targeting not only foreclosures but also high rents, unstable public housing, and homelessness.
He hopes to train unions in eviction defense and vacant home takeovers.
Organizing works: activists consistently force the banks and mortgage lenders to back off specific homes. “But for every case we win, there’s probably a thousand people who don’t fight back and who lose their house,” said Dianne Feeley, active with Detroit’s Eviction Defense Committee. “We need a systemic solution.”
Her group calls for Fannie and Freddie to halt all evictions and start doing principal reductions. The committee is also launching a federal court challenge, arguing that Fannie Mae’s foreclosures violate the constitutional right to due process.
In Atlanta, Franzen too is envisioning next steps.
In neighborhoods that are falling apart, it wouldn’t be hard to “liberate” vacant homes—whether buying them cheap, getting them donated, or “straight-up taking them in militant direct action,” he said. But the houses need serious rehab.
He’d like to unite with unions and “force the city to invest in those communities by hiring folks in those neighborhoods to fix up the houses,” he said. “We need a solution like that, that creates jobs and puts people in homes at the same time.”

Home Is Where the Fight Is

757 117
It took police four tries to evict the Cruz family in Minneapolis. After 39 arrests, the police broke the door down at 4 a.m. Many defense attempts have prevented evictions and saved homes. Photo: Peter Leeman.
Ramon Suero fell behind on his mortgage payments after he got fired for organizing a union.
Suero, a hotel worker and UNITE HERE Local 26 member in Boston, got his job back after a year. But then his wife had to quit hers and travel to the Dominican Republic to care for her sick mother—and they fell further behind.
They applied to modify their home loan, but federally sponsored mortgage company Freddie Mac said no, foreclosed, and demanded the family get out by February 1.
The Sueros aren’t leaving.
“I want to send a message to the banks: we deserve a second chance,” Suero said. “That’s why I decided to fight—not only for my family, but for our community.”
Local 26 members and activists from the housing justice group City Life/Vida Urbana vow to thwart the eviction with a human blockade if necessary.

BATTERING RAM

In the wake of Occupy, the tactic is spreading. Activists around the country are placing their bodies in the way of police doing the banks’ dirty work.
In the Twin Cities, supporters get text-message alerts from the grassroots group Occupy Homes MN and mobilize quickly to stop surprise evictions.
It took Minneapolis police four attempts—and 39 arrests—to evict the Cruz family last spring. When they showed up at 4 a.m. and attacked the front door with a battering ram, 60 volunteers held them off.
The whole effort cost the city $40,000, and activists carried the battered door down to city hall to shame elected officials for the misuse of public resources.
“It becomes really politically costly—both to the banks who are creating this kind of chaos, and also to city politicians,” said organizer Nick Espinosa.
Many foreclosure resisters his group works with are current or former union members—like Monique White of Service Employees (SEIU) Local 26, who lost her youth-counselor job to state budget cuts. White kept her house after she confronted the U.S. Bank CEO in front of 200 shareholders.

DUMPSTER DEFENSE

When they evict you in Detroit, they bring a dumpster to throw away your belongings. That’s how the Cullors family found out they were being evicted last Halloween: the dumpster showed up.
The family had struggled to pay its mortgage after Jerry Cullors, a retired bakery truck driver, suffered wage and pension cuts in the run-up to Wonder Bread’s bankruptcy.
So Eviction Defense Committee activists improvised: they filled the dumpster with bags of leaves. The sheriff had to call for another dumpster—buying allies just enough time to win a stay of eviction in court that morning.
A month later, after a march on the bank and a packed court hearing, Fannie Mae backed off and told Bank of America to negotiate a modified mortgage.

‘MORAL HAZARD’

Like millions of other homeowners, at the time of their default the Sueros were “underwater”: they owed more on their mortgage than the house was worth.
Freddie Mac has already lost the money. It will have to resell the house at today’s fair market value, about $80,000, down from $283,000. The question is who will benefit from Freddie’s loss: the Sueros, or some hedge fund investor who buys up the property?
The Sueros want “principal reduction”: a new loan based on the house’s current value. A community bank has offered to buy the house from Freddie for $90,000 and sell it back to the Sueros on those terms.
Fannie and Freddie, which own or insure a majority of home loans in the U.S., could save taxpayers billions by adopting principal reduction, a Federal Housing Finance Agency study found last year.
This is because, when a homeowner defaults on a mortgage backed by Fannie or Freddie, taxpayers are on the hook to pay back to the bank all the money still owing on the original mortgage. If the principal is reduced, odds are better the homeowner will be able to keep making payments and avoid default (or re-default).
Bush appointee Ed DeMarco—who still heads the FHFA—says no to principal reduction. His policy is not to sell back to foreclosed homeowners, because that would create a “moral hazard,” encouraging others to follow their example.
“They’re concerned that people will get the wrong idea and strategically default,” said Steve Meacham, lead organizer for City Life. “From our point of view, it’s the right idea. The banks caused the housing crisis. They should pay for it.”
And talk of morality seems laughable from an institution that fueled the rampant financial speculation that caused the housing collapse. Community groups are lobbying the president to replace DeMarco.

DOWN FOR DIRECT ACTION

Supporting the Sueros was a no-brainer for UNITE HERE Local 26 President Brian Lang. The union has long worked on housing issues. It negotiated a housing trust fund in the late ’80s to help members make down payments—and lobbied Congress to allow this.
Help from the fund “has made the difference for many in being able to own homes,” Lang said. “We see our union as trying to transfer wealth to our neighborhoods and communities.” Local 26 has begun comparing its member list against foreclosure lists to identify other potential resisters.
Grassroots group Occupy Our Homes Atlanta is helping Gulf War veteran Mark Harris fight for principal reduction to keep his home.
Harris was a Teamster for 20 years, so organizers encouraged him to reach out to his union brothers. Teamsters and Jobs with Justice members started coming to rallies to support Harris, doubling or tripling Occupy Our Homes’ usual turnout.
“It’s exciting working with Teamsters, because they’re more than down,” Occupy Our Homes organizer Tim Franzen said. “They understand direct action. The lengths they’re willing to go to protect one of their brothers is pretty far.”

NO SHAME

You don’t have to look far to see the connection between workplace and housing struggles. People lose their homes or get evicted from rentals because of unemployment, underemployment, low wages, or health care bills.
“Anyone who’s facing a housing crisis will also have a job crisis story to tell you,” said Tony Romano, organizing director of the national coalition Right to the City Alliance, many of whose member groups fight foreclosures.
So political education is key. “One of the big things is always breaking down the shame,” said Malcolm Chu, lead organizer for the Massachusetts group Springfield No One Leaves. “So many members come into our space and say, ‘It’s my fault. I should have done better.’”
In reality, “everybody who got a loan in the bubble is a predatory loan victim,” City Life’s Meacham argues, since housing prices were inflated by rich speculators. “When the 1% don’t know what to do with their money, they speculate and cause bubbles.”
“It’s another example of the banks trying to generate ridiculously huge profits for investors, at great cost to everyone else,” agreed Ron Patenaude, president of United Auto Workers Local 2322, representing health and human services workers in Western Massachusetts.
His union supports Springfield No One Leaves with turnout and what financial support it can muster. A few union members are working with SNOL to fight their own foreclosures.
The solidarity goes both ways. When Verizon workers struck against concessions in 2011, SNOL invited union members to explain their issues to housing activists.

NOT ASKING NICELY

Activists occupied the sheriff’s office in Portland, Oregon, in January until he agreed to pursue a moratorium on foreclosure evictions.
The win showed that “what works is demanding and taking action, not asking nicely,” said Angela MacWhinnie, organizer with We Are Oregon, a branch of SEIU’s Fight for a Fair Economy, “because we had asked nicely for over a year.”
In We Are Oregon’s network of rapid responders, volunteers take shifts answering the distress hotline and staying at resisters’ houses, so no one has to be home alone when the riot cops show up to evict—“and the people getting support commit to come help others,” MacWhinnie said.
The freedom of strategy is a refreshing change from worksite fights, she said. Labor law imposes heavy penalties for some of the most effective union tactics, such as sit-downs or intermittent strikes.
Housing struggles offer “a lot more openness to think creatively and make effective uses of our strength,” said MacWhinnie.

BIGGER DREAMS

Many of the groups described here borrow City Life’s organizing model: the Sword (legal defense), the Shield (public protest), and the Offer (alternative financing).
Last year City Life toured to 12 cities to spread the model. Romano says Right to the City Alliance plans to invite unions to join a national campaign, One Million Homes for People Not Profit—targeting not only foreclosures but also high rents, unstable public housing, and homelessness.
He hopes to train unions in eviction defense and vacant home takeovers.
Organizing works: activists consistently force the banks and mortgage lenders to back off specific homes. “But for every case we win, there’s probably a thousand people who don’t fight back and who lose their house,” said Dianne Feeley, active with Detroit’s Eviction Defense Committee. “We need a systemic solution.”
Her group calls for Fannie and Freddie to halt all evictions and start doing principal reductions. The committee is also launching a federal court challenge, arguing that Fannie Mae’s foreclosures violate the constitutional right to due process.
In Atlanta, Franzen too is envisioning next steps.
In neighborhoods that are falling apart, it wouldn’t be hard to “liberate” vacant homes—whether buying them cheap, getting them donated, or “straight-up taking them in militant direct action,” he said. But the houses need serious rehab.
He’d like to unite with unions and “force the city to invest in those communities by hiring folks in those neighborhoods to fix up the houses,” he said. “We need a solution like that, that creates jobs and puts people in homes at the same time.”
 

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Venezuelan Participatory Democracy

THE BOLIVARIAN EXPERIMENT
Venezuelan Community Councils are Direct, Participatory Democracy
by William Floyd, PDWA

Throughout Caracas and greater Venezuela there are COMMUNITY COUNCILS
(Consejos Comunales) of 200-400 families. They sponsor free suppers, organize water committees, decide neighborhood planning and many, many local issues. They are also responsible for conducting Social Audits (Contraloria Social) of local elected Officials and Administrations. (!)

In 2005 there were 3,700 Community Councils. The Federal Government funds all local County, City and Town Councils, Mayors, etc. In 2005 the Bolivarians split the funding: 30% for Community Councils, and 70% for elected Officials. The 3,700 Community Councils received about $1.5 billion in 2005.

By 2007, Community Councils had blossomed to 16,000. The Bolivarians raised the funding of the Councils to 50%, or about $5 billion. Today, according to SOA Watch activists, there are 37,000 Venezuelan Community Councils.

Democratic decisions of Councils are final. When Council votes conflict with local Mayors or Town Halls, the CC takes precedent over these elected officials.

75% of TV and Daily Newspapers are 24/7 "Hate Chavez". To counter this propaganda, many Community Councils have their own local Radio stations.

Key Accomplishments of Bolivarian “21st Century Socialism”
Tripled social security retirement payments
  • Free food, clothing, free healthcare and dental care
  • 2 million illiterate adults have gained elementary school degrees
  • Land redistribution to poor farmers (7.5 million acres to 200,000 families
  • Worker-owned/controlled plants 2006 (500), 2010 (7000)
  • Army units are encouraged to help out on social projects.
  • This integrates soldiers in the social transformation.
  • 10-15 Social Missions for the poor, handicapped, single women
On September 26, 2010, Venezuela elected a new National Assembly (Congress).
The State Department poured $50 million of US "Depression" dollars to steal the election from the Bolivarians. When will our US Congress call for a HEARING?

Someday in the future, “Citizen Assemblies,” consisting of (term-limited) Reps from all the Community Councils, will eventually replace elected representatives of the National Assembly.

Ref: “Changing Venezuela” by Gregory Wilpert - web "www.Venezuelanalysis.com"

PROGRESSIVE DEMOCRATIC WORKERS PDWAmerica.blogspot.com

Friday, March 1, 2013

State of ILL Reaches Agreement With AFSCME Union

Illinois State reaches contract deal with AFSCME

The State of Illinois and its largest employee Union have reached tentative agreement on a new contract.
Both Gov. Pat Quinn's office and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, commonly known as AFSCME, put out statements today announcing the deal for a new, three-year pact covering roughly 35,000 state workers.
Details were not immediately available, though the union is believed to have won a pay hike of some size, despite the state's rocky financial condition.
"AFSCME is very pleased that we were able to reach an agreement that protects our members' standard of living, and is fair to them and all Illinois citizens, even in these very challenging economic times," Henry Bayer, president of AFSCME's Illinois Council, said in a statement.
"This agreement is fair to both hardworking state employees and all taxpayers of Illinois," Mr. Quinn said, also in a statement.
The sides have been engaged in often very contentious talks for well over a year. Among issues that have been on the table are the closure of facilities the state says are not needed, pay, health care benefits and pensions.
I'll give you more details if and when I get them.
11:15 a.m. update — I now have some details, from sources familiar with the negotiations.
Agreement was reached at 1 a.m. this morning after what I'm told was the longest negotiation process in state history.
Workers will get a pay raises — assuming they ratify the pact. I'm told they're around the current inflation rate, which would be about 1.5 percent a year or a tad lower. In exchange, retirees would begin paying toward their state-provided health care, something that recently was mandated by lawmakers but has not been implemented. That's said to be worth some hundreds of millions of dollars, but I'd like to read the fine print.
There are no new limits on management's (Mr. Quinn's) power to close what he views as unneeded facilities and programs and force layoffs. But neither is there any agreement on pension reform, which is being left to the General Assembly to resolve.


Follow Greg on Twitter at @GregHinz.
- See more at: http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130228/BLOGS02/130229742#sthash.3G9DzGmZ.dpuf
February 28, 2013

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Sequester Is a Moral Right for the Extreme Right



Why Ultra-Conservatives Like the Sequester

By George Lakoff, Reader Supported News
26 February 13

aul Krugman, Joe Stiglitz, Robert Reich and other major economists have pointed out that the deficit is not an urgent economic problem and that, to the contrary, the economy would be helped by an increase in public investment and harmed by drastic cuts. The Sequester would hurt the economy, millions of people, and the country as a whole.President Obama has detailed the vast range of harms that the sequester would bring. They are well-known. And they are not necessary. The president sees the sequester, if it happens, as an enormous self-inflicted wound, inflicted on America by a Republican-dominated House elected by Americans.

But pointing out Republican-caused harms to millions of people -- many of them Republicans -- does not sway the ultra-right. Why? Democratic pundits say that Republicans want to hurt the President, to show government doesn't work by making it not work, and to protect "special interests" from higher taxes. All true. But there is an additional and deeper reason. Ultra-conservatives believe that the sequester is moral, that it is the right thing to do.

Progressives tend to believe that democracy is based on citizens caring for their fellow citizens through what the government provides for all citizens -- public infrastructure, public safety, public education, public health, publicly-sponsored research, public forms of recreation and culture, publicly-guaranteed safety nets for those who need them, and so on. In short, Progressives believe that the private depends on the public, that without those public provisions 

Americans cannot be free to live reasonable lives and to thrive in private business. They believe that those who make more from public provisions should pay more to maintain them.

Ultra-conservatives don't believe this. They believe that Democracy gives them the liberty to seek their own self-interests by exercising personal responsibility, without having responsibility for anyone else or anyone else having responsibility for them. They take this as a matter of morality. They see the social responsibility to provide for the common good as an immoral imposition on their liberty.

Their moral sense requires that they do all they can to make the government fail in providing for the common good. Their idea of liberty is maximal personal responsibility, which they see as maximal privatization -- and profitization -- of all that we do for each other together, jointly as a unified nation.

They also believe that if people are hurt by government failure, it is their own fault for being "on the take" instead of providing for themselves. People who depend on public provisions should suffer. They should have rely on themselves alone -- learn personal responsibility, just as Romney said in his 47 percent speech. In the long run, they believe, the country will be better off if everyone has to depend on personal responsibility alone.

Moreover, ultra-conservatives do not see all the ways in which they, and other ultra-conservatives, rely all day every day on what other Americans have supplied for them. They actually believe that they built it all by themselves.So for them the sequester is not a "self-inflicted wound." It is justice. The sequester is not merely about protecting "special interests." It is about the good people who pursued their self-interest successfully, got rich, and have acted "morally" in avoiding taxes that pay for public provisions by the government.

They are not merely trying to harm their own constituents just to hurt the president politically. Yes, they think hurting the president politically is moral, and they believe that any constituents they are hurting need to become more personally responsible. They see the sequester as serving that purpose.

In short, the sequester is not just about money and political power for the Republicans in the House. It is mostly about what they see as the right direction for the country: maximal elimination of the public sphere.

In short, they have an ideology that partially, but only partially, fits what half of our population believes. Overall, it actually fits what about 20 to 30 percent of the population totally believes. Both total progressives and partial progressives don't want to see millions of folks hurt and the economy hurt as well. But thanks to Republican gerrymandering at the state level, Progressives and partial Progressives do not control Congress.


This is the real picture and few people in public life dare to tell it. It is more convenient, and less scary, to think that all that is involved is money and politics as usual. That's what current Democratic messaging says. Democratic messaging hasn't gotten to the heart of the problem: the real moral divide in America. Democratic messaging, in blaming Republicans in Congress for the harm to come, just offends Republicans and fails to speak to moral divide at the heart of our public life.

Would addressing it help? I think so, if it is done with the appropriate sensitivity. 

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

CWA/SEIU UNION Bargaining Update


CWA/SEIU 1021 Bargaining Update

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?id=313323630414&story_fbid=10151354991735415

The CWA bargaining team met again with SEIU 1021 management Friday, Jan. 25.

The employer brought five proposals to the table—all takeaways in health care and pension. (See reverse side for details.) The CWA team has said “NO” to all of them, although management has not withdrawn them and insists they need them.

The CWA team entered negotiations with 22 proposals, but at this last meeting pared that down to 10. (See reverse side for details.) The CWA team has been responsibly trying to find savings for the employers without actually intruding on management’s rights to structure its budget (no matter how obviously it needs the help). They are being very careful and so far the only savings they have identified of enough significance to move off a flat “no concessions” position is changing the Kaiser plan (and only the Kaiser plan) from a $10 co-pay per doctor visit to $15.

The CWA researcher estimates the concessions management wants to total $416,000—or about $4,000 per member—in one year. The CWA team is outraged that such a proposal has even been brought to the table. (One member of the management team showed up at the latest session wearing a “NO TAKEAWAYS” button from the Port of Oakland strike many of us worked on, and yet continued to argue that CWA needed to accept cuts. Among SEIU 1021’s numerous ills is not an irony deficiency.)

Every day we are urged by our supervisors and directors to fight for contracts with “no concessions.” And yet the approach of our employer stunningly parallels what we face in our contract campaigns every day:

An employer that consistently underestimates its revenues and overestimates its expenditures, budgeting for a fully staffed operation—something we know all too well not to be reality.

An employer that has way too many contracted out services that should be done by an expanded staff.

An employer that increases its top level managers—specifically three new staff directors and three new officers on lost time—while cutting line staff.

An employer with an $11 million reserve that doesn’t believe it should spend a small amount of it—in this case less than 5%--to alleviate the need for cuts to the staff that keeps its operation going.

We expect this kind of behavior from employers private and public, but for it to come from those who claim to be on the side of the fighting workers is disappointing to say the least.

The CWA bargaining team and CAT will be meeting to discuss where we go from here. You will be hearing from your CAT representatives soon.

This will not stand!

Employer Proposals

1) Eliminate the 5% 401(k) match
2) increased costs of health care to be paid by a change in the benefits provided, some kind of cost sharing, and/or other savings in staff cost
3) If an employee is on leave for six months or more, the employer can fill that position. If the employee returns before twelve months he/she can be placed in any vacant position in their classification. If there is no position available they can be placed on a recall list for six months. If they don’t return to work after twelve months they are laid off.
4) Reduction in the amount of donated leave days a employee out on catastrophic leave can receive from other employees from 80 to 60.
5) Deletion of the MOU’s side letters on Settlement Bonus, Vacation Cash-Out, Retiree Medical and Pilot Project of filling of Staff Openings and Voluntary Transfer Requests.

CWA proposals still on the table

1) Mileage and transportation
2) CompTime
3) Assignment out of Area
4) Hotel Accomodations
5) Out of jurisdiction
6) Education Allowance
7) Vision Plan
8) Salary increases
9) Probationary Period
10) Side Letter – Change of ee’s jurisdiction
11) Promotions
12) Reimbursement timelines

And new as of Jan. 25: Y-rating and the counter on health care (Kaiser co-pays)

The Great Sequester LIE



The Great Sequester Lie

By Paul Begala, The Daily Beast
25 February 13
n a column on the budget, to maintain credibility with Beltway elites, I am supposed to claim the impasse is both parties' fault. It isn't. The conventional wisdom is that Republicans won't support any more tax increases and Democrats won't support any more spending cuts. That's half right.

House Democrats have proposed some sensible spending cuts: like doing away with the billions we spend subsidizing oil companies. With gas nearing $4 a gallon, does anyone really want to send taxpayers' money to the welfare queens of ExxonMobil? House Dems would also enact the Buffett rule (I prefer "Romney rule"), ending the obscenity in the tax code that lets hedge-fund managers pay a lower tax rate than their secretaries.

Not to be outdone, Senate Democrats have proposed $110 billion in spending cuts and tax increases: again, reducing oil subsidies (though not as much as the House Dems), ending the deduction businesses take for moving jobs overseas and trimming the defense budget and farm subsidies.

Finally, the White House boasts of having eliminated 77 government programs, including 16 at the Department of Education, 10 at Health and Human Services, and 4 at Labor. The president's budget calls for $30 billion in cuts to farm programs and $25 billion in savings from the post office.

The Republicans, for their part, did allow the Bush tax cuts to expire on income over $450,000, but they seem to have dug in their heels on the Romney rule and oil subsidies. They are blaming President Obama's "failed leadership" for the sequester and arguing that it was the White House that first proposed the gun-to-the-head approach. As the kids say, 'whatever'. The 

Democrats have come to the table with spending cuts. Will the Republicans join them and support some tax increases? Um, no. "Just last month," House Speaker John Boehner said, "The president got his higher taxes on the wealthy, and he's already back for more." True. But there is still some very low-hanging fruit on the revenue side. Republicans ought to at least embrace the Romney rule-if for no other reason than to punish Mitt for running such a lame campaign.


Meanwhile, some congressional Republicans are taking a break from complaining about government spending to complain about the lack of government spending. As Politico has reported, Mississippi Republican Sen. Roger Wicker is worried about cuts to the Army Corps of Engineers, Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins is fretting over potential job losses at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, and John McCain has continued his longstanding opposition to a sequester, bringing it home by telling his fellow Arizonans, "They make the Apache helicopter in Mesa, Arizona. If they cut back, it would have to be affected there."

I would take it further. The new Tea Party senator from Texas, Ted Cruz, says, "I think we have to be prepared to go so far as to shut the government down if we don't get some serious policies to stop the out-of-control spending to tackle the debt." OK, let's start by shutting down federal spending in Texas. Federal funds account for 32 percent of the Lone Star State's budget. Oh, and how about Fort Hood? At 340 square miles, it is the biggest Army base in the free world and the largest single employer in Texas. All that federal spending must be sapping the souls of my fellow Texans. So let's move Fort Hood to, oh, say, Nevada. Sen. Harry Reid actually believes in federal investments, and the Nevada desert might provide good terrain for Fort Hood's tanks.

This could be fun. Oklahoma so hates Obama's big spending that every single county in the state voted for Mitt Romney. Oklahoma has twice the percentage of federal employees than the U.S. average, and Okies get $1.35 back from Washington for each dollar they pay in taxes. So close the massive FAA center in Oklahoma City. Move it to Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco district, where they love big government.

Two years ago I made a similar argument about Kentucky, calling on Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul to put the Bluegrass State in detox for its addiction to local pork. No such luck. But perhaps the principle can apply to the sequester: enforce it only in states whose elected representatives won't support the taxes needed to fund the spending they want.


Sunday, February 24, 2013

New Cancer Killer ?


Sodium Bicarbonate Cancer Killer


According to the American Cancer Society, sodium bicarbonate is being promoted as an alternative treatment to cancer by an Italian oncologist, Dr. Tullio Simoncini. He believes that cancer is caused by a yeast infection, and sodium bicarbonate has the capacity to kill the yeast. (See Reference 1.) Dr. Simoncini published his research thesis, entitled "Cancer is Fungus," presenting fungal infection as the main cause of cancer .

However, no scientific evidence is available to support that cancer is due to yeast infection and that sodium bicarbonate can directly cure cancers, although studies have been conducted regarding the ability of sodium carbonate to influence the pH levels of cancer cells.

Significance

    • S

      odium bicarbonate is a mainstream treatment for acidosis. Oncologists use it to neutralize the acid properties of most cancer agents in chemotherapy. The Arizona Cancer Center of the University of Arizona, the Department of Pharmacology of Wayne State University in Michigan, and H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Florida are conducting a study that indicates the capacity of sodium bicarbonate to alter the pH of tumor cells that could inhibit its spread and progression. (See Reference 2.)

    • T

      he acid environment  of tumor cells is responsible for allowing them to thrive and spread. Making the tumor cells more alkaline increases the ability of other anti-carcinogenic drugs to become more effective in preventing tumor activities. (See Reference 3.) Tumors are more acidic than other normal cells and tissues. An acidic environment is low in oxygen, and changing the pH to alkaline allows an increase of oxygen supply to the cell. This controls the abnormal function of the tumor and prevents it from metastasizing. (See Resource


    • 1.)

Benefits

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      ome chemotherapy agents have a heavy acidic nature that can pose a danger to a patient. Oncologists use the complementary benefit of sodium bicarbonate to neutralize the acid property in anti-carcinogen agents. (See Reference 3.) It also helps in bringing alkalinity to the cellular environment of tumors. Because cancer cells cannot survive in an environment that has high oxygen level, an alkaline environment prevents them from growing and spreading.

Considerations

    • Although there is lack of substantial evidence to prove that sodium bicarbonate can directly treat cancer, the researches conducted with animal tests provide some therapeutic benefits from the use of sodium bicarbonate for cancer treatment .

ARIZ. U. CLINICAL TRIAL of SODIUM BICARBONATE TUMOR KILLER