Wisconsin: Judge Rejects Delay, Brings Recall Election Closer

A judge on Friday denied Gov. Scott Walker’s request for a two-week extension to review recall petition signatures, saying the election is likely to proceed.  The judge’s ruling was a victory for recall organizers.  If Walker doesn’t appeal, the state’s Government Accountability Board could rule on recall petitions by March 19, a primary could be held May 1, and the recall election could take place as early as June 12.

Judge denies Walker request for extension
By the Associated Press
February 17, 2012
Excerpted and reposted from the Wisconsin State Journal, http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/judge-denies-walker-request-for-extension/article_430d8f48-59aa-11e1-8f14-0019bb2963f4.html#ixzz1mm3cLnpG

A judge on Friday denied Gov. Scott Walker’s request for a two-week extension to review recall petition signatures, saying the election is likely to proceed.   Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess’ ruling was a victory for recall organizers who had said there was no good reason for another extension and that Walker’s request was an attempt to delay the inevitable…

Niess’ said in a verbal order - which followed an hour-long hearing - that Walker had not shown good cause for being given another delay. Niess had already tripled the time Walker has to review the signatures to raise challenges from 10 to 30 days.

The ruling means Walker has to submit any challenges by Feb. 27. The Government Accountability Board has until March 19 to rule on whether to set recall elections against Walker, his lieutenant governor and four Republican state senators.

Niess said the elections board is likely to order the election because Walker’s campaign said it had only flagged between 10 percent and 20 percent of the 330,000 counted signatures as potentially invalid. Given that it only takes 540,208 signatures to order the election, Niess said there is “little likelihood” enough signatures will be flagged to result in an election being stopped.

That result is unlikely to change no matter how much time the Walker campaign is given, the judge said…

The elections board wouldn’t speculate when an election may be scheduled and continues to say it may end up asking Niess for more time to finish its review. However, the board’s attorney told Niess on Friday that, as of now, it was on track to finish its review by the March 19 deadline.

Board director Kevin Kennedy said after the hearing that if any recalls are ordered, elections would be grouped together so there is one date for a primary and one for a general election.

The recalls were spurred by anger over Walker’s proposal passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature last year that effectively ended collective bargaining for most public workers. Two incumbent Republican state senators lost recall elections last year, leaving the GOP with a one-vote majority in the Senate.

The recalls … target Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and Sens. Scott Fitzgerald of Juneau, Pam Galloway of Wausau, Terry Moulton of Chippewa Falls, and Van Wanggaard of Racine.

If Walker doesn’t appeal and submits his challenges by February 27, and the GAB makes its March 19 certification deadline, the primary date would, by statute, be on the 6th following Tuesday, May 1.  The earliest general election date would be June 12.  It is still possible that those dates will change, but it is unlikely that the change will be by more than a few weeks, unless there’s an unforeseen legal delay.

Michigan Activists Have Enough Signatures for Referendum on “Emergency Manager” Law

Groups collecting petition signatures to force a vote on state appointed “emergency managers” that have been running several cities and school districts say they have done it: out of 161,300 needed, they’ve collected more than 200,000. 

Michigan activists claim enough signatures for ‘emergency managers’ referendum
Excerpted and reposted from
The Raw Story
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/02/14/michigan-voters-recall-petition-emergency-managers-detroit/

By Stephen C. Webster
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
 and The Nation
http://www.thenation.com/article/166297/scandal-michigans-emergency-managers
By Chris Savage
February 15, 2012

Groups collecting petition signatures to force a vote on state appointed “emergency managers” that have been running several cities and school districts say they have done it: out of 161,300 needed, they’ve collected more than 200,000, according to The Associated Press.

Activists in the state have taken to calling the emergency managers “local dictators” because of their sweeping powers. The law, signed by Gov. Rick Snyder (R), mandates that municipal entities facing bankruptcy be assigned a state appointed official who controls their budgets, ostensibly in an effort to fix the problems.

… These managers … are empowered to cut public workers, slash services, sell off public infrastructure, cancel union contracts, overrule and even fire elected officials, and write all contracts as they see fit.

The petition drive, organized by Michigan Forward, seeks a citizen referendum to overturn the law.  The group plans to turn in the petitions on February 29. Since PA 4 replaced the law that created emergency financial managers, this could eliminate the positions in Michigan until the referendum is voted on in November.

Other efforts are under way to rid Michigan of PA 4. The first is a lawsuit brought in June 2011 by the Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice and the Center for Constitutional Rights challenging the law under the state Constitution. Despite efforts by the Snyder administration to bypass the legal process and force the Republican-controlled state supreme court to hear the case immediately, the lawsuit is still pending in the lower courts.  In addition, Representative John Conyers is pursuing the issue through the Justice Department, arguing that the law’s impact on minority populations may violate the Voting Rights Act.

So far there are emergency managers in the cities of Flint, Ecorse, Benton Harbor and Pontiac. The state has also appointed officials to oversee the Detroit and Highland Park school districts.

One example of the emergency managers’ power: a Benton Harbor public radio station was recently shut down by an emergency manager, and its equipment was put up for sale on auction website eBay.

The city of Detroit, as well, faces the possibility of getting an emergency manager, but Gov. Snyder said Tuesday that he did not want the state to take over the city. The governor has assigned a group to review Detroit’s finances and make a recommendation as to what the state should do to help, and Detroit Mayor Dave Bing has made avoiding an emergency manager his top priority.

The governor’s review group is expected to render a decision at the end of the month, but voters could potentially nullify that if the “Stand Up 4 Democracy” group has their petition signatures verified by then. Activists hope their ballot initiative will force the law to be placed on hold pending a vote by the citizens in November.

Fighting for American Workers’ Pensions

The PBGC, federal government agency charged with protecting the pensions of America’s workers, has issued a fact sheet debunking some of the myths AMR has generated to support its proposal to terminate its workers’ pensions and dump the obligation on taxpayers. 

American Airlines Pensions: Get the Facts
By the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC),
http://www.pbgc.gov/wr/other/pg/american-airlines-pensions—get-the-facts.html

American Airlines has announced it wants to end the pension plans of its 130,000 workers and retirees. The company will ask the bankruptcy court to transfer its pension obligations to PBGC.

Pensions are promises made to working Americans who count on them for a secure retirement. Those promises should not be broken lightly. PBGC will make sure the AMR pensions end only as a last resort: if doing so is necessary for the airline to restructure itself successfully after considering the possible alternatives.

Unfortunately, some of the claims that have been made about these issues aren’t true. Here are some of the facts:

AMR says the pensions must end as part of its cost-cutting effort in bankruptcy.

In fact: AMR can’t just decide to end its workers’ pensions because it wants to cut costs. The law is very clear: AMR must prove that it needs to terminate the plans in order to stay in business, that there aren’t other ways for American to succeed. To date, AMR has not done that.

AMR says the pensions have to go so it can regain its “rightful place at the top of the industry.”

In fact: Many other companies have successfully reorganized without ending their pensions. In the airlines industry, Northwest went through bankruptcy and emerged with all its pension plans. So did Continental. Delta kept two of its three pension plans, terminating only its pilots’ pensions.

Furthermore, thanks to pension relief already granted, AMR’s pension costs are lower than some of its major competitors. Delta has pension costs almost 2/3 higher than AMR’s pre-bankruptcy cost; in 2010 Delta paid about $13,200 per employee, compared to $8,100 for AMR. Yet Delta posted earnings last year of $854 million, while American lost money.

AMR points to United Airlines and other carriers that shed pensions in bankruptcy, and says it too must do so in order to compete.

In fact: Some airlines had to terminate their plans, and others did not.
Other airlines reorganized at a time when the industry’s situation was dire. Now, except for American, the major carriers are profitable, whether they terminated their plans or not.

AMR says the pensions must end to reduce labor costs.

In fact: Other airlines reduced their labor costs without terminating their pensions. Pension costs have not driven the decline in AMR’s competitive position.

AMR says unless the pensions end, the company will have to come up with more than $800 million a year to pay for them.

In fact: AMR lobbied for and obtained pension relief from Congress that allowed the airline to reduce and defer pension payments. This funding relief has saved AMR more than $2.1 billion over the past six years. That’s more than half of AMR’s total $4 billion in cash on hand. In effect, that’s money AMR borrowed from its workers’ pensions, money that helped keep the company aloft.

For the next six years, thanks to the pension relief it already obtained, AMR’s annual pension cost will be roughly half the $800 million the company says it will be. So the pensions are a lot more affordable than AMR claims.

AMR claims that most employees will not be affected if the pension plans are killed.

In fact: That claim just isn’t true for the 13,000 current or future retirees that AMR admits would have their benefits cut. (Since AMR hasn’t shared any information, the real number could be many more.) PBGC’s initial estimates suggest AMR retirees would lose $1 billion in benefits. In the bankruptcy retirees also stand to lose other benefits, such as health care, that PBGC does not insure.

Voting Rights: The Struggle Continues

For decades in the American South the most fundamental democratic rights, including voting rights, were denied to African Americans.  The state of Alabama was widely known for its egregious and discriminatory laws and practices.  The people of Alabama and their allies across the country stood up and defeated these attacks on democracy.  A decisive turning point in this struggle came in 1965 when demonstrators marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge from Selma to Montgomery to demand an end Alabama’s attacks on democracy.  The marchers were met with brutality, but they persevered and forced Alabama to change its course.  They changed Alabama and this country.

Today nearly 50 years later, Alabama leads a new wave of attacks on democracy.  Like so many states across the country, Alabama is suppressing voting rights, workers’ rights, and immigrant rights.  Again people from Alabama and across the country have taken up the struggle for democracy.  People will come from across the region, and the country to join the people of Alabama to again march from Selma to Montgomery to again demand justice.

Join the march in Alabama, March 4 – 9.  The march will begin on Sunday, March 4 at 1:30 PM in Selma, Alabama at the Brown Chapel AME Church and proceed to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge just as courageous demonstrators did on Bloody Sunday in 1965. The march will continue over the next four days focusing on education, the plight of Black farmers, workers’ rights, voting rights, and immigrant rights.  The focus on workers’ rights will be on March 7.  The march will end on March 9 in Montgomery, Alabama.  For more information, contact TWU Director of Civil and Human Rights Sandra Burleson at sburleson@twu.org, or click here.

April 9-15, 2012 — 100,000 Americans Will Train for Non-Violent Direct Action

Memo to America from the 99%:

“We are at a crossroads as a country. We have a choice to make. Greater wealth for a few or opportunity for many. Tax breaks for the richest or a fair shot for the rest of us. A government that can be bought by the highest bidder, or a democracy that is truly of the people, by the people, and for the people.  The choice is in our hands. This spring, … we will prepare ourselves for sustained non-violent direct action.”
 
Excerpted and reposted from http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/02/15-11

TO: America
RE: The 99% Spring
Things should never have reached this point.

Every day, the American Dream seems a little farther away. More of our grandparents are being thrown from their homes. Our mothers and fathers can’t retire because their pension funds tanked. Our brothers and sisters are burdened by student loan debt. For our children, budget cuts have resulted in crumbling schools, skyrocketing class sizes, and teachers being denied the supports they need to do their best. Our friends and family are being denied collective bargaining rights in their workplaces and are falling further and further behind. Our neighbors are being poisoned by pollution in our air and water.

The numbers are staggering: in recent years, millions of jobs have been destroyed, homes foreclosed, and an unconscionable number of children live in poverty.

And worst of all: this is no accident. It is a result of rampant greed—the deliberate manipulation of our democracy and our economy by a tiny minority in the 1%, by those who amass ever more wealth and power at our expense.

We are at a crossroads as a country. We have a choice to make. Greater wealth for a few or opportunity for many. Tax breaks for the richest or a fair shot for the rest of us. A government that can be bought by the highest bidder, or a democracy that is truly of the people, by the people, and for the people.

The choice is in our hands. This spring, we will act on that choice and rise up in the tradition of our forefathers and foremothers. We will not be complicit with the suffering in our families for another year. We will prepare ourselves for sustained non-violent direct action. Click here to sign up for the 99% Spring!

From April 9-15 we will gather across America, 100,000 strong, in homes, places of worship, campuses and the streets to join together in the work of reclaiming our country. We will organize trainings to: Tell the story of our economy: how we got here, who’s responsible, what a different future could look like, and what we can do about it Learn the history of non-violent direct action, and Get into action on our own campaigns to win change.

This spring we rise! We will reshape our country with our own hands and feet, bodies and hearts. We will take non-violent action in the spirit of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Gandhi to forge a new destiny one block, one neighborhood, one city, one state at a time.

We know great change is possible. We inherit a history of everyday people standing up for their own dignity, freedom, and self-determination, shaping our direction as a country. The seamstress in Alabama who launched a bus boycott. The farmers in New England and Virginia who imagined we could be a free nation. The workers in Flint, Michigan who occupied their plant to win collective bargaining rights. The farmworkers in California who liberated our fields. The women in New York who dreamed they could one day speak with equal voice. The mother who stood up in Love Canal to stop the poisoning of her community. And the students who risked their lives during Freedom Summer to register voters.

In the last year alone we watched the teachers and fire fighters of Wisconsin stand for the rights of workers. And we joined those who Occupied Wall Street, inspiring us to stand with the 99%.

We will rise this spring, because we DO hold these truths to be self evident—that all men and women are created equal, that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Will you rise with us? Can we count on you to join us April 9th to 15th to stand with the 99% for America?

Signers:

Sarita Gupta
Jobs With Justice
Bob King
United Auto Workers
George Goehl
National People’s Action
Ai-jen Poo
National Domestic Workers Alliance
Justin Ruben
MoveOn.org
Joy Cushman & Judith Freeman
New Organizing Institute
Liz Butler
Movement Strategy Center
John Sellers
The Other 98%
Mary Kay Henry
Service Employees International Union
Van Jones and Natalie Foster
Rebuild the Dream
John Wilhelm
UNITE-HERE
Phil Radford
Greenpeace
John Cavanaugh
Institute for Policy Studies
Scott Reed
PICO National Network
Tracy Van Slyke and Ilana Berger
New Bottom Line
Leo Gerard
United Steel Workers
Daniel Cantor
Working Families Party
Larry Cohen
Communications Workers of America
Victor Sanchez Jr
United States Student Association
Becky Tarbotton
Rainforest Action Network
Randi Weingarten
American Federation of Teachers
Brian Kettenring
Leadership Center for the Common Good
Randy Jackson
UNITY
Saket Soni
National Guestworker Alliance
Bill McKibben and May Boeve
350.org
Sharon Lungo and Megan Swoboda
The Ruckus Society
Ian Inaba
Citizen Engagement Lab
Patrick Reinsborough
smartMeme Strategy & Training Project
Rachel LaForest
Right to the City Alliance
Brigid Flaherty
Pushback Network
Tim Carpenter
Progressive Democrats of America
Bob Callahan
Change to Win
Michael Leon Guerrero
Grassroots Global Justice Alliance
Roger Hickey
Campaign for America’s Future
Aaron Ostrom
Fuse Washington
Jeff Ordower
Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment
Karen Scharff
Citizen Action of New York
Marianne Manilov
Engage
Bruce Klipple
United Electrical Workers Union
Pablo Alvarado
National Day Laborers Organizing Network
LeeAnn Hall
Alliance for a Just Society
Leslie Moody
The Partnership for Working Families
Teresa Cheng
United Students Against Sweatshops
Click here to sign up for the 99% Spring!

Florida Agricultural Workers to Fast for Fair Food in March 


In March, workers from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers in Florida — men and women who put food on tables across the country — will go without food to demand that Publix Supermarkets support the fundamental human rights of farmworkers in Florida’s fields. 

The March fast follows close on the heels of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers’ (CIW)  historic agreement with Trader Joe’s.  On February 9, CIW and Trader Joe’s announced they had signed an agreement Committing Trader Joe’s to work with CIW and Florida Tomato Growers to support CIW’s Fair Food Campaign.

On March 5th, outside Publix corporate headquarters in Lakeland, Florida, farmworkers and their allies — faith leaders, students, and community
leaders from across Florida and across the country — will come together in a six-day fast, in the hope of raising awareness of Publix’s role in blocking progress in the fields and expanding the rights of the farmworkers who harvest the nation’s food.

On March 10th, Day Six of the fast, Fair Food allies will converge on Lakeland for a protest at a Publix location followed by a 3.5-mile procession leading to Publix headquarters, where they will join the fasters in a ceremony to break the fast.

The CIW is a community-based organization of mainly Latino, Mayan Indian and Haitian immigrants working in low-wage jobs throughout the state of Florida.

Throughout history, the act of fasting has been a show of faith, a form of political protest, a weapon of the powerless.  Social movements throughout modern times — from the women’s suffrage movement of the early 1900’s to Mahatma Gandhi and his use of non-violent protest to challenge British colonial rule — have also turned to fasting when other forms of protest have failed to produce change. 

U.S. farmworkers in particular have fasted as a means to underscore the urgent need for more humane labor conditions in the fields.  The most notable of these was the fast of the United Farm Workers’ Cesar Chavez in 1968, which drew global attention to the plight of California farmworkers.

The CIW’s own organizing history is founded, in part, on a seminal hunger strike by six of its members, a month-long fast that stretched from December 1997 to January 1998.

CIW welcomes allies to join with farmworkers in fasting or as support for the entire 6 days of March 5-10, or arrive on Thursday or Friday (March 8th or 9th) to fast or be present for a day or two.

They ask supporters who are only able to attend for one day, to join in the protest, procession, and ceremony to break the fast on Saturday, March 10th at 12pm.

For more information or to participate, contact Jake Ratner of Just Harvest USA, jake@justharvestusa.org.

Support American Jobs

In two new TWU videos, American Airlines workers and community members in Dallas/Fort Worth and Tulsa speak out about the devastating impact of job cuts and benefit reductions proposed by AMR in bankruptcy proceedings. Pledge your support for those American jobs right now—click here.

Outsourcing American Jobs: Unsafe at Any Speed

In a discussion on CNN last week of safety problems posed by AMR’s bankruptcy proposal to outsource aircraft maintenance, TWU International President James C. Little completely turned around an “expert” who started out saying there is nothing to worry about, and ended up agreeing outsourcing is a big problem. 

President Little told CNN,

 “The airline industry’s dirty little secret is that more and more planes are being flown to third-party offshore locations for major overhauls and repairs.  The FAA only inspects these facilities in China, El Salvador, Mexico and elsewhere, at most, once a year—and by treaty must give 30 days notice.  A loophole in our laws allows our commercial airliners to be worked on in these poorly secured, largely unregulated facilities, by mostly unlicensed mechanics who lack background checks, who have never had a drug test, and who often cannot read the repair manuals.”

After hearing that, CNN’s “expert” back-pedaled fast, saying, “No, he’s not wrong.  And do I like it? No. Not even a little bit. I didn’t like it when some of the other airlines started to do it.”

This should not have been news to anyone who has been paying attention.  In last year’s final report of the Future of Aviation Advisory Committee (FAAC) organized by the U.S. Department of Transportation, TWU, joined by representatives of the Consumers Union and other aviation unions, exposed this “dirty little secret” to public view:

…[A] significant number of non-certificated facilities are legally performing work on U.S. aircraft in outsourced repair facilities in the U.S. and abroad.  These non-certificated facilities are “black boxes” for aircraft maintenance.  Moreover, foreign repair facilities are held to a different set of standards … [C]ritical exceptions are made in personnel and security standards including background checks, duty-time limitations, and alcohol and drug testing.  In recent years, outsourcing of aircraft maintenance has exploded while regulatory standards and oversight have stagnated. Academic research and case studies suggest a relationship between these changes and safety.  [p. 68. Emphasis added.]

In the same report, TWU and the other aviation unions stated

Air carriers have recently used outsourcing as a systematic way to eliminate jobs and lower costs… The cost savings of outsourcing are generally derived from lower-paying jobs with inferior benefits, resulting in a net degradation of pay and working conditions… Choosing outsourcing as the first option, when it negatively affects lives and livelihoods, sends a message that air carrier employees are merely factors of production, and not valued as important industry stakeholders. [p. 63]

The aviation unions also pointed out in the FAAC report that

Companies have exploited § 1113 [of the bankruptcy code] as a business model of first resort to gain long-term economic concessions by gutting the wages and working conditions of air carrier and other employees.  The current bankruptcy process enables employers to impose contract changes through the court and outside the normal collective bargaining process.  Recent bankruptcy court decisions have greatly loosened the standards for employers to force economic concessions from workers. As a result, employers have been able to breach their employees’ contracts with impunity, and workers have lost critical leverage in the process, with grossly unfair results. [p. 66]

TWU and its consumer and aviation allies recommended common sense reforms that would have addressed all of these problems. Had Congress acted promptly on these recommendations, and the industry not stonewalled them, AMR might not be in bankruptcy today, and the flying public and aviation workforce would be a lot safer and more secure.

Read the full FAAC report here.

Obama Budget Would Protect Working Families, End Tax Cuts for the Rich

The budget President Obama proposed this week offers a clear and welcome contrast to the slashing austerity — and protect-the-wealthy priorities — favored by Republican Congressional leaders and the party’s presidential candidates. Instead of trying to stabilize the budget on the backs of working families and the poor, it would raise taxes on the wealthy and on big banks and eliminate many corporate tax loopholes.

A Responsible Budget
By the New York Times
February 14, 2011
Excerpted and reposted from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/14/opinion/a-responsible-2013-budget.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

President Obama’s 2013 budget was greeted on Monday with Republican catcalls that it is simply a campaign document, but election-year budgets are supposed to explain priorities to voters. This one offers a clear and welcome contrast to the slashing austerity — and protect-the-wealthy priorities — favored by Republican Congressional leaders and the party’s presidential candidates.

The president’s budget calls for long-term deficit reduction, but its immediate priority is to encourage the fledgling economic recovery. Instead of trying to stabilize the budget on the backs of the poor, it would raise taxes on the wealthy and on big banks and eliminate many corporate tax loopholes.

To put Americans back to work, it would invest $350 billion in constructing roads, rail lines and schools, and encourage manufacturing through tax incentives and research spending. It would maintain the Pell grant program for low-income college students and add new spending for teacher improvement and education reform.

Republicans, on the other hand, would cut taxes for the rich and cut almost all of that spending, heedless of the pain that it would inflict on the economy and the millions of Americans still reeling from the downturn’s effects. In poll after poll, the public has made clear that it prefers the president’s approach of rebuilding the economy now and tackling the deficit when the fundamentals are stronger. While Republicans have counted on voters blaming Mr. Obama for the hard times, some are beginning to worry that they will be blamed for their obstructionism…

If Congress were not dysfunctional — if it cared more about economic stabilization than scoring political points — it would sign on to a budget like this. As it is, the proposal will go nowhere, largely because of the Republican refusal to raise taxes on the wealthy and to spend money on vital programs. Senate Democrats, who don’t want to make hard political choices, also share the blame. They have already said that they do not intend to pass the president’s or their own budget, deferring their responsibility for a third year. At a time when honest economic planning needs all the support it can get, that’s a serious mistake.

Anti-union mass dismissals at LAN Ecuador

The ITF, the global union with which TWU is affiliated, is urging affiliates to act in solidarity with dismissed aviation workers and their families. More than 80 workers, including 49 union members and two union leaders, have been dismissed by LAN Ecuador.

The ITF is asking affiliates around the world to stand in solidarity with Ecuadoran workers against an apparent anti-union attack on the fledgling union representing the workers – Sindicato de Trabajadores de Aerolane, SITA.

Read more and send messages of protest and solidarity here » (http://www.itfglobal.org/solidarity/LAN.cfm)