Labor Notes Conference Day 1 - Chicago - April 6th


I first heard of Labor Notes last year at an event the BCGEU held where they brought Michael Brunson from the Chicago Teachers' Union (CTU) and Sonia Singh from Labor Notes to talk about  "lessons from the chicago teacher's strike." I read How to Jump-Start Your Union" and then started following them online. They hold a conference every two years so when the reminder about the conference came out, a few of us started talking about attending. With the support of the local I booked my ticket and off I went to Chicago for a few days in April. 

Friday April 6th:

Women's Labour History Tour - Illinois Labor History Society

Up early and on the bus for a women's labour history tour of Chicago prior to the start of the conference. It was awesome to run into feminist and BCGEU sister Kari Michaels. We were seat buddies and it was great to spend time to get to know her. Out tour guide Julia was awesome - she is an electrician for the Chicago Transit Authority and heavily involved in the labour history society. We learn some of the basic history of Chicago. It's the heartbeat of the American labour movement. A lot of local "1"s are based in Chicago. This includes:
  • Local 1 - Bakery and Grain Workers Union
  • Local 1  - Carpenters Union
  • Local 1 - Boilermakers Union
  • Local 1 - Chicago Teachers Union
  • Local 1 - American Federation of Teachers
  • Local 1 - SEIU
  • Local 1 - Ironworkers
  • Local 1 - UNITEHERE
  • Local 1 - Laborers Union
  • Local 1 - Farm Equipment Union (McCarthyism killed it)
Chicago is also home to the founding of the Coalition of Labor Women (CLUW), Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU), Chicago Area Committee on Health and Safety (CACOHS). 

We visited a number of monuments. Our first stop was to the Forest Park Cemetery to visit the Haymarket Monument - which was connected to the 8 Hour workday strike. We had the privilege of having Alma Washington, former President of the Chicago SAG-AFTRA chapter,  play Lucy Parsons (founder of IWW and radical organizer) as she told the story of how her husband Harold Parsons was tried and executed for inciting the Haymarket riot.  The bottom of the monument reads - "the day will come when our silence will become more powerful than the voices you are throttling today."  Lucy's gravestone is right next door to the monument - small and plain. 

Next up we headed to the old meatpacking district to visit the Stockyard Gate and the Firefighter's memorial. The Union Stockyard Gate was designated a monument in 1981 (same year as I was born) and was one of the structures to survive the fire that levelled the area in 1934. Hundreds of thousands of workers would pass through that gate. There were two unions for the meat cutters - one for the white men and one for the black and Eastern European men. Next to the gate is the Chicago Firefighters Monument that is dedicated to firefighters who have lost their lives on the job since 1857. We didn't stay all that long since it was cold and windy. Back to the bus!

After the firefighter's monument, we went back on the bus on the way to Steelworker's Park. The park itself is right on the border of Illinois and Indiana. When we parked you could see the old, decrepit walls of the former docks. The park is quite large right on the rocky shore of Lack Michigan. In the distance you can see the factories and mills on the Indiana side - it reminded me of a 1980s movie montage where they show B-roll of a generic working class American city.  The park is where both May Day and Labor Day events occur. There's also a statue that is a tribute to all the sacrifices families make when they have union activists in their families. It was very moving (and very cold). 


Now it's almost time for lunch which will be delicious Stromboli host by Chicago Women in Trades - a multi union organization that is dedicated to giving Chicago women opportunity t get involved in the trades. They have different shops (carpentry, welding, electrician, mechanics) and a classroom to help women get the prerequisites needed to get an apprenticeship. They also have a closet where women can borrow or get work clothes, boots and various equipment. It was a great space that also had a lot of really cool art. Once we are done at CWIT it's time to get back to the hotel for our afternoon sessions.

Race and Labor: Let's Talk About It - April Sims (Washington State Labor Council)

April Sims is the Political and Strategic Campaign Director for the WA State Labor Council and was our facilitator for the difficult subject of racism in the workplace and in our unions. There's been a lot of work on her end to develop a workshop that tackles racism. It exists in the pacific northwest even if we all think we're so liberal here. The workshop she's developed is meant to create space for dialogue about racims and how it manifests itself in our movement. They cover things like history/definitions, skills to integrate race into all aspects of the union, taking a look at structural inequity and have people locate themselves within the intersection of race and labour. 

One thing I really appreciated were the "class rules" that we agreed to. 
  • Vegas Rules (what happens in this session stays in this session)
  • Step Up/Step Back - if you're someone who tends to talk a lot, step back and let others speak and if you're someone who likes to sit back and observe, step up and share what you're thinking
  • intent vs. impact - assumption that people are coming from a good place
  • limit side bars
  • cella on vibrate/ calls in the hallway
We broke off into small groups to discuss the question have you ever experienced racism or witnessed racism? what happened?" Before we started our conversations she took a moment to speak directly to white people. She asked white women to hold back their natural tendency to default to sexism (because it's often the only form oppression they've faced) and for white men to sit back and not talk about how they stepped in (saviour complex) - to just sit with the experiences.

People were so generous with their stories (to respect the rules I am not going to share them here). We covered things that fell into to various categories:
  • overt/malicious racism - name calling, slurs, burning crosses, acts of violence
  • microaggressions
  • calling someone out vs. calling someone in
  • coded racism - based on stereotypes, words used to talk about race without it's race
  • strategic racism - divide and conquer, dog whistle politics
  • systemic/systematic racism - system of oppression built to uphold racist systems (example: school to prison pipeline)
Then we talked about what we could do in our positions of leadership to improve things in the context of:
  • organizing
    • invite community partners to organizing institutes or other union events
    • recruit/train/support people of colour running for any office
  • union culture
    • incorporate indigenous practices into our processes/structures
    • increase translation of materials so that people are able to literally speak the same union language
    • avoid the "well spoken token" pitfall
  • bargaining
    • collect demographic information about both dominant and marginalized groups
Overall a great first session for me at this conference. 

After this it was onto hear the story of the West Virginia Teachers (which has warranted it's own post).

Opening Plenary - Fighting Back

Al Russo - VP - CWA 1101 - Verizon NY

Brother Russo represents the 39,000 workers at Verizon and they proved that a corporate giant CAN be beat. They entered into a 7 week strike in 2016 to protect their jobs from outsourcing, pensions, transfer language, healthcare and job security. Their strike coincided with the Democratic primaries and one of the most effective job action tactics was to show up at the Bernie Sanders rally where their members heard the same message from Bernie as their union - that corporate greed was at the heart of their dispute. They would picket the hotels where they knew scabs were staying and then make all kinds of noise outside until the hotel managers came out. The hotels didn't want this kind of attention so they kicked the scabs out. The mobilized their members to be in public places like morning TV shows (you know, where they pan the crowd outside the studios).  At the end of 7 weeks, they were able to negotiate the best contract they've had in a decade - all of the concessions went off the table and the union was more united than ever.  

He left us with the wise words of Martin Luther King Jr:

"If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then crawl but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward." 

WHEN WE FIGHT...WE WIN!!!

Michael Avant - AFSCME 3299 (University of California)

Michael Avant talked to us about his history in the labour movement and commitment to racial justice. Growing up in St. Louis he talked about his dad who was a Greyhound bus driver. He learned what it meant to be in a union - how to stand your ground, stick together and how to sacrifice everything but not your self-respect.

He told us the story about their AFSCME brother David Cole who was violently arrested by police during a rally earlier this year. They were pissed so they engaged in civil disobedience until all charges were dropped - this included shutting down intersections by standing in a large circle knowing that the police weren't going to arrest all of them (and they knew they would just keep coming back). 

He also talked to us about racism that exists in America. Their employer pays a black woman service worker $16/hr less than a white service worker. That Latina women on average are making 21% less than white workers. There are still many challenges workers of colour face, even in unionized workplaces and there's still a long way to go. There was a lot of solidarity in the room - and he closed with. NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE!

Erica Williams - Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival


This sister was amazing. She shared her story of poverty. Her first job she was a janitor and she worked alongside her mother who had to hold down three jobs to provide for her family.  Her mother did it so that her daughter could stay in the school district she was in to go to a better school. Then she preached! It was time to humanize the commodified! To build a fusion movement! Voter mobilization is going to save the nation!

Then we saw a videotaped message from Reverend William Barber - where he talked to us about the Poor People's Campaign. 

CJ Hawking - ARISE Chicago

Our final speaker was CJ Hawking from ARISE Chicago, an organization that supports immigrant workers when they encounter workplace abuse. In the context of #metoo she told us the story of Teresa Acevado and Balbina Ortiz, daughter and mother who work at a restaurant chain called Villa Fresh. Teresa experienced sexual harassment from one of their managers while her mother watched. Other coworkers had similar interactions with this particular dude so they organized and wrote a letter to HR. Teresa ended up losing her job and Balbina had her hours severely cut. (Keep in mind that this particular company had a suit filed against them with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and there is still no policy...when they contacted ARISE Chicago, who helped them organize even further. They called the HQ in New Jersey and complained, they spoke to elected officials and spoke to media. At the end of the day they were able to recover wage theft and help craft a new workplace sexual harassment policy.  

They were supposed to be at the session but Balbina had her hours reinstated and had to work :). In order to eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace we need to say time is up. Women need to be supported when they come forward, male coworkers need to speak out when there is injustice, we need to reject the narrative that sexual harassment is "innocent fun." TIME'S UP!

The final speaker Nicole, one of the West Virginia Teachers we heard from earlier that day. 

Overall, it was an amazing day full of inspiration - one I'll never forget. I can't think of a better way to spend my birthday. 

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