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In Right-to-Work States, Members Do the Hard Work of Organizing

Local union leaders and activists in District 6 — Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas and Kansas — have signed up nearly 4,000 new members since the district launched an aggressive, one-on-one organizing initiative in 2010 with a special focus on internal organizing.

Local union activists are meeting with and talking to workers one-on-one in an effort that District 6 Vice President Andy Milburn says is critical to CWA’s continuing to grow in the industry. “Our union’s ability to reach out and organize unrepresented telecom workers and to bargain good contracts depends on how strong we are as locals,” he said. “We can’t do either effectively if we don’t have a strong membership base.”

Many of the non-members at companies like AT&T Mobility are young, so organizers across the district are using flip cameras, social networking websites, and many different types of communication to reach out. CWAers are circulating videos of members describing in their own words why belonging to CWA is important.

“Non-members need to be engaged and educated about CWA,” says Local 6229 President Phillip Ramirez. “And we need to stay in touch.” The local signed up 26 new members at seven AT&T Mobility stores across the Rio Grande Valley by reconnecting with the workers, some of whom were new or had not met with a steward or activist since joining CWA.

Some workers were skeptical at first, but local organizers worked hard to build a relationship with them, answering their questions and providing information. After several visits and conversations about the benefits of membership, workers signed up. CWA membership at the stores is now over 85 percent.

“Passing out literature is useful to educate non-members, but what really matters is making human contact and talking with people face to face,” Ramirez said.

In Florida, District 3 locals also are reaching out to non-members at AT&T Mobility. In Jacksonville, CWA membership at the area’s 14 AT&T Mobility retail stores is now over 70 percent, up from 30 percent, thanks to Local 3106 and organizers Floyd Carroll and Deb Ricketson.

Carroll and Ricketson spent months visiting workers at the stores and meeting with them after working hours. “We have to build our union and increase union density at our represented employers,” says Carroll. “If we don’t grow, our power at the bargaining table will diminish.”

In North Carolina, Local 3683’s internal organizing efforts at Windstream over the last year enabled the union to stop management from weakening the bargaining unit by targeting union members for buyouts.

“Signing up non-members was the only way we could maintain our strength, so that’s what we did,” said local president Don Tyner. “Our members are spread out widely, so we moved our union meeting each month to a different location to reach as many people as possible.”

Tyner would drive two hours or more to meet with workers and talked about the consequences of having fewer union members at Windstream. “You have to keep workers informed of what’s happening at their company and in their industry. It’s a matter of their livelihood,” he said.

Close to 95 percent of the local’s Windstream bargaining unit is organized as result of the local’s internal organizing, and CWAers were able to easily beat a management-orchestrated decertification election to vote out the union last year.