Texas-based Clear Channel Outdoor chose the week of Memorial Day to tell striking billboard workers, including a significant number of U.S. Military veterans employed by the company, that they no longer had jobs. Members of Sign Local #391 have been on strike in Eastern Massachusetts since March 19th.
The striking workers including U.S. Army and U.S. Marine veterans met with U.S. Senator John Kerry this morning to ask for his support and assistance in settling the strike.
“The upper management of Clear Channel is nothing more than cowardly, hiding in corporate offices in Texas, while stealing jobs from workers who have served in the country’s military branches,” said Painters District Council #35 Communications Director John Laughlin. “Clear Channel executives didn’t have the courage to face these workers at the bargaining table and now they’d leave veterans and their families in the street on Memorial Day.”
The strikers, members of Sign & Pictorial Local #391, 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 abandoned bargaining and unilaterally implemented a $60-a day paycut and 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 forced the Union to file Unfair Labor Practice charges with the federal government.
“Clear Channel had paid strikebreakers ready at the plant on March 19th, and has been flying more into Massachusetts from Florida, Georgia and Texas on a weekly basis to take the jobs of Massachusetts workers,” said Laughlin.
that veterans have more of a right to jobs than non-vets? i am totally sympathetic to unionization, but to try to pull heartstrings by stating the extraneous fact that some of the strokers are vets i find kinda obnoxious and certainly needless. i wish the former employees the best of luck in their efforts to get reemployed in a union shop, but i will not wish more luck for some workers than for others. unions are about fairness, not special recognition based on something not related to job performance.
…regarding the “clutching at the heartstrings” aspect of the post, and further add that unless the strike was originally based on a claim of Unfair Labor Practices, instead of it being an economic strike, it is difficult to see how a ULP claim could be substantiated now. It has been a while since my labor law course, but, from memory, it is the case that a ULP claim can be based on an employer’s unwillingness to bargain with the union representative. But from the post, it appears that the employer did negotiate with the union for a year and a half, to no avail. In view of that, I am rather dubious that a ULP claim would be upheld.
<
p>
NB: in an economic strike, an employer is permitted to, at some point, replace strikers. In a ULP strike, if the ULP claim is upheld, the employer has to re-hire the replaced strikers.
First, the company chose Memorial Day week to tell 25 Massachusetts families that they are out of jobs – and the fact remains that of those 25, 5 are military veterans. Local and state governments give hiring prefernces to vets alas, Clear Channel apparently has no problem firing vets who stand up to their bullying. Do I think men and women who serve their country deserve preference in hiring – absolutely. In fact, the national AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades has a program called Helmets to Hardhats that gives returning vets opportunities at union construction jobs (Painters DC #35 is part of the Trades). The H2H program receives federal funding (about $5 million thanks to Congressman John Murtha).
<
p>
As for Labor Law -a ULP charge has been filed and the NLRB has not yet made a decision on a local level. Whoever wins that charge will appeal it to Washington DC anyway. (However, since we are doing a minor seminar on Labor Law – look up the term “surface bargaining” and apply it to 18-months and then implementaiuon of conditions). But prior to the decision – Clear Channel is dumping 25 families (one worker with 34 years on the job) into the street. And yes, they did it this week -so heartstrings included, the vets on that job deserve better. And their co-workers agree (strangely, so did Senator Kerry)
<
p>
Finally lets not forget this is Clear Channel – the same company who is so patriotic they banned the Dixie Chicks from their radio stations after they bashed Bush’s war and banned anti-war billboard messages.
<
p>
Apparently, like Bush, their patriotism begins with the war and ends with the warriors’ welfare.
<
p>
So no apoligies for making this issue on Memorial Day weekend. As usual it falls to those of us who oppose this war to stand up for those who are fighting it. The hawks are too busy making money off it to care.
One, you suggest that the firing by Clear Channel (CC) of 25 unionized workers, 20% of whom were veterans, after 18 months of negotiations, was inappropriate in the week before Memorial Day (not the week including Memorial Day), because 20% were veterans. I’m sorry, but that doesn’t fly with me. You could not have made the same “clutching at heartstrings” argument if they had been fired in the previous week, or in the week after Memorial Day. So why bring up that argument other than to “clutch at heartstrings”?
<
p>
Two, you seem to believe that a particular entity, in this case CC, owes veterans (who make up only 20% of the striking workforce) special consideration. It seems to me that, if any entity is to give a veteran special consideration, it is the federal government, not just CC.
<
p>
Three, it is really very nice that the AFL-CIO has the H2H program to give veterans opportunities in the building trades, and I hope it does wonders. But presumably the people in that program are not striking. I have no idea what your reference to that program is supposed to mean in this context. The people who CC fired were striking. It sounds as though the H2H program is an analog to an “employment matching” service. It obviously would benefit the AFL-CIO, since presumably those taking advantage of the program would become union members, but that’s beside the point.
<
p>
Four, regarding the ULP issue, I am seriously dubious. If CC were bargaining in bad faith (your “surface bargaining” issue), that should have been evident fairly early on, not just after the striking workers were fired 18 months after the strike began. Why did the union wait 18 months to file a ULP charge, and only after the striking workers had been terminated, if it was evident that the company was bargaining in bad faith earlier? The company (CC) has a right to continue its business during an economic strike, and it took measures to do so.
<
p>
On the other hand, anyone can file a charge with any relevant government entity. That doesn’t mean that he, she or it will win, of course.
<
p>
Five, I’m not exactly sure what relevance CC and the Dixie Chicks has to do with this discussion. Aside from that, I have read conflicting reports on the issue. Some say that CC banned the Dixie Chicks. Others say that some program directors at a few radio stations that were owned by CC refused to broadcast their music, but that the bann was not corporate-wide.
<
p>
Six, regarding one worker with 34 years on the job, that is the risk that one takes when one goes on an economic strike that seems to go on interminably.
<
p>
And finally…
<
p>
Seven, As usual it falls to those of us who oppose this war to stand up for those who are fighting it. if this has to do with Iraq, this has nothing to do with the topic under discussion. So why bring it up?
Nothing in Striker57’s post said that the ULP charge was filed after or as a result of the firings. That’s been underway for a long time.
After 18 months of negotiations, Clear Channel abandoned bargaining and unilaterally implemented a $60-a day paycut and 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 forced the Union to file Unfair Labor Practice charges with the federal government.
<
p>
…the last two sentences of Striker57’s second-to-last paragraph. It is somewhat ambiguous, but it clearly states that the ULP charge was filed after 18 months of negotiation. I interpreted “Clear Channel’s actions forced the workers onto the street” as indicating that the strikers were fired (“forced the workers onto the street”) just after the end of the 18 month period. If that is not the case, just when along the time line were the strikers fired?
You DO know that a strike picket line generally occurs “on the street” yes?
<
p>
The strike began over 2 months ago, when workers were forced to strike by Clear Channel’s unfair labor practices. Clear Channel followed up by firing the strikers.
<
p>
If you were really so interested in this issue and the time line, there are plenty of press releases, BMG posts and details on the union website. Before schooling Striker57 on labor law, maybe you should school yourself on the issue.
After reading the pro-Clear Channel posting, all I can think of is that ESPN commercial with the guy talking sports out his ass.
<
p>
Try to get facts correct at least. The striking workers were fired after 10 weeks not 18 months.
…writing a little more clearly next time, and lay out the timeline in a little more detail. See my comment directly above.