On Friday morning, May 11th, 5th Congressional District candidates Eileen Donoghue, Jamie Eldridge, Barry Finegold and Niki Tsongas will formally kickoff a campaign boycott of corporate giant Clear Channel Outdoor according to Painters & Allied Trades District Council #35.
The boycott, which will be announced at the Merrimack Valley Central Labor Council Legislative Breakfast that morning, is in support of 25 workers who were forced on strike on March 19th against Clear Channel.
(From the press release issued this evening):
“Senators Kennedy and Kerry, along with the entire Massachusetts Congressional Delegation including retiring Congressman Meehan, recently sent Clear Channel a letter urging the Texas-based company to bring the strikers back to work under the old contract and return to the bargaining table,” explains District Council #35 Communications Director John Laughlin. “This boycott by the leading candidates for Congressman Meehan’s seat continues a tradition of active support for workers by our U.S. Representatives – it’s a great statement of solidarity”.
The strikers, members of Sign & Pictorial Local #391 and IBEW Local #103, work on hanging and posting over 2400 billboards in Eastern Massachusetts. Most have at least 10 years, and many more than 25 years, of working for Ackerley Communication, AK Media and now Clear Channel, which bought the company five years ago. After 18 months of negotiations, Clear Channel abandon bargaining and unilaterally implemented a $60-a day paycut, a 7-day work week, took away pensions and health care from the workers and eliminated the grievance and union security protections. Clear Channel’s actions forced the workers onto the street and the Union to file Unfair Labor Practice charges with the federal government.
Clear Channel had paid strikebreakers already at the plant on March 19th and has been flying strikebreakers into Massachusetts from Florida, Georgia and Texas on a weekly basis to take the jobs of Massachusetts workers.
Basicly Clear Channel is Wal-Mart without the smiley face!
At the Merrimack Valley Central Labor Council Breakfast on May 11th, State Representative James Miceli became the fifth candidate for Congress in the 5th District to join the Clear Channel boycott.
His chairmanship of Personnel & Administration is secure, and he is well respected in the House. I really don’t get why he’s doing this.