News New Mexico: Labor Unions

Showing posts with label Labor Unions. Show all posts

NM Police Involved in Shootings Given Union Checks

From trivalleycentral.com -Albuquerque police officers involved in a rash of fatal shootings over the past two years were paid up to $500 under a union program that some have likened to a bounty system in a department with a culture that critics have long contended promotes brutality. Mayor Richard Berry called Friday for an immediate halt to the practice, which was first reported in the Albuquerque Journal during a week in which Albuquerque police shot and killed two men. Since 2010, Albuquerque police have shot 23 people, 18 fatally. “The administration has nothing to do with how the union conducts their business,” Berry said in a statement, “but I was shocked yesterday when made aware of this practice. I cannot stand aside and condone this practice — it needs to end now.” Although the union said the payments were intended to help the officers decompress from a stressful situation, one victim’s father and a criminologist said it sounded more like a reward program. More News New Mexico

Obama's NLRB Backs Down on Boeing Complaint

The Hill - The National Labor Relations Board has dropped its controversial case against airline manufacturer Boeing, which had become a lightning rod for conservatives. The labor board argued for much of the past year that Boeing decided to locate a new plant to build its new 787 Dreamliner jets in South Carolina, a right-to-work state, in retaliation for strikes by unionized workers at its existing facilities in Washington state. But the panel appeared to bow to political pressure Friday, saying that a deal the company reached this month with the International Association of Machinists to build a different type of airline, the 737 Max, in Washington satisfied its concerns. Read full story here: News New Mexico

When Public Unions Successfully Bargain for Special Benefits Taxpayers Foot the Bill

USA Today - Special retirement benefits once reserved for police, firefighters and others with dangerous jobs are now being given to tens of thousands of state workers employed as park rangers, foresters, dispatchers, coroners, even highway laborers, museum guards and lifeguards. The trend will add heavily to the $70 billion that state taxpayers owe state retirement funds each year and is costing states such as Florida and Maryland $15 million to $30 million annually, a USA TODAY analysis shows.

Thirty-one states have passed laws since 2000 that expand the range of workers who can retire when they turn 50 or 55 or after working 20 or 25 years, then collect special pensions that will pay some an extra $1 million or more in retirement. The pensions are enhanced because they are usually based on a higher percentage of a worker's salary than pensions for ordinary state workers. In 10 other states where lawmakers have expanded early retirement eligibility since 2000, the number of workers in those plans increased by twice as much as the increase in workers in regular retirement plans. The states are Arizona, California, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, South Carolina, Vermont and West Virginia. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Bizarre Coincidence: Right to Work States Far Superior for the Workers

From directorblue.blogspot.com - Why, this must be some sort of statistical -- how you say in English? -- anomaly. Turns out that states which force employees to join unions against their will are inferior to right-to-work states using about any economic measure you can think of. Notice the eight-day difference between right-to-work and forced unionization states. For those of you who live in the latter, you spend eight days every year working for the unions. More News New Mexico

Obama's Union Backers Also "Occupy" Backers

AFL-CIO Pres. Richard Trumka

Washington Times - Some of the country’s biggest and most powerful unions are providing the infrastructure and amenities to keep the Occupy D.C. encampment fortified going into the winter. The camp’s portable toilets are being provided by the Service Employees International Union, the 2.1-million-member union that helped elected President Obama and recently backed his re-election bid. The estimated 100 demonstrators staying each night in McPherson Square, just blocks from the White House, can take a hot shower at the AFL-CIO headquarters on 16th Street Northwest. “We happen to have a few showers associated with our small gym. From [10 a.m. to noon] we make those showers available,” said Jeff Hauser, spokesman for the AFL-CIO, the international labor union with more than 12 million members. “It happened kind of naturally. We’ve talked with them about the needs they’ve expressed. This really helps them, and it’s not a heavy lift on our part.” A demonstrator said the encampment has designated a “shower coordinator” who takes Occupy D.C.-ers to the union’s gym showers. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Steve Jobs Warned Obama About: Education Unions and Costly Regulations

Politico - Steve Jobs told President Barack Obama he was “headed for a one-term presidency,” citing the U.S.’s competitive disadvantages with China and a “crippled” education system, a new biography of the former Apple CEO indicates. “You’re headed for a one-term presidency,” Jobs told Obama in a meeting last year where he asserted that the White House needed to be more friendly toward business, according to the Huffington Post, which obtained a copy of Walter Isaacson’s forthcoming book, “Steve Jobs.”

Jobs also told Obama that “regulations and unnecessary costs” put the United States at a competitive disadvantage with China, where companies can build factories more cheaply. The recently deceased Jobs also told Obama that the education system was “crippled by union work rules,” according to Isaacson. Jobs proposed principals be able to hire and fire teachers based on merit, and to extend the length of both the school day and academic year. Read full story here: News New Mexico

NM Falls in CNBC Business Ranking

Pulaski note: Interestingly enough the top ranked states are "right to work" states. How long before the Obama administrations gets this concept? From cbnc.com -New Mexico ranks 43rd in CNBC's annual Special Report: America's Top States For Business. More News New Mexico

Is Obama's NLRB Killing Jobs in South Carolina?

Charleston Regional Business Journal - The U.S. House oversight committee and National Labor Relations Board General Counsel Lafe Solomon haggled over Solomon’s participation in Friday’s committee hearing in North Charleston. The hearing, entitled “Unionization Through Regulation: The NLRB’s Holding Pattern on Free Enterprise,” includes Solomon in its list of witnesses. Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., wrote Solomon on May 26 to request his testimony at the committee hearing in North Charleston. The hearing will explore the NLRB’s decision to file a complaint against Boeing for its expansion to North Charleston, where the aerospace company will assemble and deliver 787s. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Union Head: N.J. is Nazi Germany Led by "Adolf Christie"

Chris Christie

Daily Caller - Welcome to the new civility. At a Thursday rally in New Jersey protesting Republican Gov. Chris Christie’s pension deal that would cut pensions and benefits to public workers, a union leader charged Christie with acting like a Nazi. And not any ordinary Nazi, but Adolf Hitler himself. “Good afternoon brothers and sisters. Welcome to Nazi Germany,” Communications Workers of America District 1 Vice President Christopher Shelton is seen raving in a video posted on YouTube. “We have Adolf Christie and his two generals trying to make New Jersey Nazi Germany.” The two Nazi “generals” apparently refer to two Democratic state legislators instrumental in reaching the pension deal with Christie.

After ranting more about “Adolf Christie,” the YouTube video shows Shelton comparing the pension battle in New Jersey to World War II. “Brothers and sisters, this is not going to be an easy fight,” he shrieked. “It took World War II to get rid of the last Adolf Hitler. It is going to take World War III to get rid of Adolf Christie. Are you ready for World War III?” Rally attendees are seen wildly cheering Shelton’s speech in the video. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Union Leaders Laid Off: Claim They Were Targeted By Governor

From therepublic -The head of one of New Mexico's largest state workers unions got a pink slip last weekrepublic.com, prompting allegations labor is being targeted in state layoffs. Michelle Lewis, president of the Communications Workers of America Local 7076, was among 44 state workers who was told Friday she will lose her job because of budget cuts. "I do believe it was retaliation," said Christine Trujillo, president of the New Mexico Federal of Labor, AFL-CIO. All but 11 of the layoffs announced Friday came from the Public Education Department, whose budget was slashed by more than 20 percent this year. Lewis is an education technology coordinator in the department. She said she thought that the decision to cut her position "was intentional, but I can't validate that." More News New Mexico

Progressives Lose Judge Race in Wisconsin

Badger Herald - Fifty-six days after the official Supreme Court election came to a close, Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenburg conceded the seat to incumbent Justice David Prosser Tuesday. During a press conference Tuesday, Kloppenburg said she called Prosser earlier in the day to inform him she would not pursue legal action on the recount results and to give her congratulations on his victory. “It would serve no purpose to bring a suit with insufficient legal basis,” Kloppenburg said during the conference. “That is not the kind of lawyer I am.” According to the Government Accountability Board, Prosser was certified as the winning candidate last week by a margin of 7,004 votes. Read full story here: News New Mexico

NM E.R.B. Overpaid Hundreds Of People

From kfoxtv.com - The New Mexico Education Retirement Board manages the retirement assets of New Mexico's educators. When someone stops teaching unexpectedly, he or she can have their pension contributions refunded. It happened over 700 times last July and August, but the ERB admits it made a big mistake during those two months. "The people who process our refunds, they thought the interest that was calculated was too high," said ERB Executive Director Jan Goodwin. Goodwin said the miscalculation was so high, the ERB overpaid interest for all those refunds by $1.7 million. "It was a mistake and we regret the error, and we're going to work as hard as we can to get this behind the recipients of the checks and us," said Goodwin. However, the only way to put the mistake in the past is by calling the hundreds of former teachers affected to apologize and demand their money back. More News New Mexico

Barone: Reward Pals, Punish Foes

Kathleen Sebelius

Washington Examiner - by Michael Barone - Question: What do the following have in common? Eckert Cold Storage Co., Kerly Homes of Yuma, Classic Party Rentals, West Coast Turf Inc., Ellenbecker Investment Group Inc., Only in San Francisco, Hotel Nikko, International Pacific Halibut Commission, City of Puyallup, Local 485 Health and Welfare Fund, Chicago Plastering Institute Health & Welfare Fund, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee, Teamsters Local 522 Fund Welfare Fund Roofers Division, StayWell Saipan Basic Plan, CIGNA, Caribbean Workers' Voluntary Employees' Beneficiary Health and Welfare Plan. Answer: They are all among the 1,372 businesses, state and local governments, labor unions and insurers, covering 3,095,593 individuals or families, that have been granted a waiver from Obamacare by Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius. All of which raises another question: If Obamacare is so great, why do so many people want to get out from under it? More specifically, why are more than half of those 3,095,593 in plans run by labor unions, which were among Obamacare's biggest political supporters? Union members are only 12 percent of all employees but have gotten 50.3 percent of Obamacare waivers. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Bingaman and Udall: You Want Free Trade - Give Us Alot More Government

Tom Udall

Jeff Bingaman

KOB - TV - ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - New Mexico's two U.S. senators are throwing their support behind the White House as it pushes to extend American worker retraining as part of congressional negotiations over free trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama. President Barack Obama has said the trade deals are an integral part of his economic agenda, but administration officials have indicated they would be willing to delay the deals if the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program is not extended. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Union Hires Non-Union Pickets

From New Mexico Watchdog -The workers don’t seem to mind the low wages or a contentious employer that puts them on the street to air someone else’s grievance. They seem to like their $10 an hour jobs – for the most part. Although he understood that he doesn’t have to talk to reporters, a man paid to picket Lovelace Womens Hospital on Montgomery Blvd. in Albuquerque didn’t realize that his job might include appearing in the news. He didn’t want to be photographed holding a banner that said “Shame on Lovelace Health Systems.” After first declining to talk on camera, the man later motioned a videographer back to his end of the sign. On camera, he said he had not been trained to understand rules that govern news photography when he accepted the job as a picket in the nationwide Shame-On campaign. More News New Mexico

Attempting to Legalize Labor-Extortion

Townhall - by Erika Johnsen - "This is just plain egregious." From Christopher Corson, General Counsel for the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, on HuffPo Business: “For many years, Boeing employees in the State of Washington have worked through their union, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, to improve their work lives at the company -- all while helping Boeing prosper by building the best commercial airliners in the world.

Equally undisputed is that such activity was protected by law. So when Boeing itself announced that legally protected activities of its workers were the principal reason for moving a substantial portion of the company's 787 Dreamliner assembly to South Carolina, the company committed unlawful retaliation. The case is that simple.” The case is indeed a simple one, so it is dumbfounding that Mr. Corson and other Big Labor freebooters could turn it into such a crooked, preposterous, relentlessly profiteering ploy. Read full column here: News New Mexico

Obama Officials: Plan Dump of General Motors Stake

AFP - NEW YORK — A report that the US government plans to sell off much of its remaining stake in General Motors this year despite the firm's lackluster share price caused investors to flee the stock Tuesday. After the Wall Street Journal reported a government sale could come within the next six months, GM's shares fell by nearly 1.3 percent to end at $29.59. The government sale would "almost certainly" mean that US taxpayers would take a loss from a politically controversial $50 billion rescue of the auto giant in 2009, according to the paper. The government would need to sell its roughly 500 million shares for $53 dollars each in order to break even, but GM's stock is currently hovering at a price of just under $30 per share. At the current price, the government would lose more than $11 billion, but the Obama administration is willing to accept the loss in order to cut its last ties to the auto manufacturer, the newspaper said, citing unnamed sources. Read full story here: News New Mexico

Stewart: State's Pension Plans Need Fixing NOW

Mimi Stewart

NMPolitics - For New Mexico’s more than 45,000 public and educational employees, ensuring the sustainability and solvency of their retirement programs is of monumental concern. Our workers deserve a fair shake. They work hard, serve the public and our communities, and play by the rules. They make significant contributions to fund these retirement programs, one of which, the PERA plan, ranks as one of the best in the nation. The solvency of these retirement funds is a concern to taxpayers as well. To find answers, the Legislature established the Retirement Systems Solvency Task Force in 2009. With 24 members representing organized labor, state agencies, private sector and lawmakers, the task force spent two years studying the difficulties facing our pension funds. PERA and ERB, with combined assets of more than $20 billion, are today more than $7 billion short to meet promised benefits. That shortfall is projected to more than double in five years and hit $20 billion by 2019. Read full column here: News New Mexico

Supreme Court Rules Against Gov. Martinez

From stamfordadvocate.com -The New Mexico Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled against Gov. Susana Martinez in a dispute with labor unions over the Public Employee Labor Relations Board. The court said the governor does not have authority to remove members from board and ordered the immediate reinstatement of two members who were removed by the governor in March. More News New Mexico

Strangley Mixed Impact of Teachers Union in NM

From Burlington Free Press- In an article in the Yale Law Journal, Benjamin Lindy finds that collective bargaining had the effect of raising SAT scores and lowering graduation rates. The “results suggest,” he writes, “that mandatory collective bargaining shifts the focus of schools away from lower-performing students toward higher-performing ones.” Why might that be? His best guess is that higher-quality teachers used their transfer rights, under their contracts, to move into schools with higher-quality students, leaving the less-experienced, less successful teachers preponderantly in the schools with low-achieving students. Then in the years without collective bargaining, when transfer rights went out the window, better teachers were more likely to be assigned to the high-poverty, low-achieving schools. In other words, by Lindy’s reckoning, collective bargaining favored the high achievers and made matters worse for the low achievers. More News New Mexico

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