On the plus side of things we want to mention two successful union organizing drives that happened this past month. One is that the workers at Emblem Advantage & Screen Printing in Duluth have unionized with Local 106 of the Painters Union. And the second is that the casual RNs at the Chisholm Health Center have unionized with United Steelworkers Local 9460. Emblem Advantage had previously been an entirely non-union worksite, while the majority of full time workers at Chisholm Health Center had previously been unionized.
While we can't put it in the 100% win category yet, the Respiratory Techs at Aspirus/St. Luke's in Duluth have all signed cards to unionize with United Steelworkers Local 9460, however that union election hasn't been held yet. Aspirus is engaging in some stall tactics that the National Labor Relations Board hasn't ruled on yet. The dispute revolves around who the workers official employer is. They had previously worked for a separate contractor than St. Luke's, but after Aspirus took over they absorbed them. So on the day that they officially became Aspirus employees, the workers all signed union cards. But Aspirus is trying to argue that they are still no St. Luke's employees. It's a sad and frustrating situation that is all too common in health care these days. Remember the Advance Practice Providers at Essentia Health that unionized and even went out on strike last summer with that Minnesota Nurses Association? In that case a successful NLRB election was held, but Essentia has filed that the workers shouldn't be in a single contract, but instead broken up into more than 50 contracts. It's an absurd stance, since Essentia doesn't have anywhere near enough HR staff to negotiate and administer that many contracts, but it has successfully gummed up the works since the barely functioning NLRB has still not rule on the matter.
We also want to mention that the 800+ tech workers at Essentia Health in Duluth, the 150+ tech workers at Aspirus/St. Luke's hospital and the two dozen workers at the Chequamegon Clinic in Ashland are all currently in contract negotiations. The Essentia negotiations are not going well, and worker actions are expected soon. The St. Luke's and Chequamegon Clinic negotiations have just started. We'll keep you posted on how these important contract fights unfold.
On the defense side of the ledger, city workers at the Spirit Mountain ski resort are engaged in a fight for their jobs. The city is considering leasing out the facility to a private company. That is a scary enough proposition, but worse is that the city is refusing to agree to contract language that would require any new company to recognize the existing AFSCME contract.
The Spirit Mountain workers held an informational picket during the last Spirit Mountain board meeting on June 23. You can find out more about this struggle, and stay in the loop about any upcoming development at www.savespiritmountain.com.
This past month 15 anti-ICE activists were charged with felonies by the feds down in the Twin Cities. The majority of these activists were union members, and many unions have come out in support of them. You can find out more about them, and the labor movement's defense of the Minnesota 15 at the Workday Minnesota website: https://workdaymagazine.org/
Earlier this summer the Building Trades held informational pickets at the Duluth port terminal. The pickets were against the use Midwest Steel Erector. MSE is not only a non-union employer, but they also have pending labor law violations against them.
And finally, we want to make folks aware of a horrible tragedy that happened in Cold Springs at the Pilgrim's Pride chicken processing plant. Jesse Leal, a 29-year old worker from Guatemala, passed away on after being pinned under equipment in the loading dock. This was not the first death at a Pilgrim’s plant. A GoFundMe has been set up to for Jesse Leal’s family: https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-for-jesse-leals-family
>> That's it's for this roundup this month. If you have labor news you'd like shared here, feel free to message us at northwoodssocialists@proton.me. Until next month we want to urge folks to stay in the loop with the awesome Twin Cities Labor Report put out by Paul KD, as well as Duluth's Labor World newspaper edited by Catherine Conlan.
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