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CWA Membership at AT&T Broadband Tops 3,200
Districts 7, 9 and 13 Claim Latest Organizing Victories
Organizing at AT&T Broadband has snowballed in recent weeks, with workers winning neutrality and consent elections in Pittsburgh, Pa., St. Paul, Minn., Spokane, Wash., Portland, Ore., and Modesto, Calif.
The campaigns add nearly 500 new members to CWA, for a total of more than 3,200 workers organized at Broadband over the last 18 months.
The wins bring the concentration of membership in the Pennsylvania and California markets to more than 1,000 in each, CWA Executive Vice President Larry Cohen said.
A previously organized unit in Oakland, Calif., already has a contract and San Francisco Bay area Broadband workers are putting the finishing touches on theirs. Pittsburgh units were in bargaining as the CWA News went to press, and newly organized units were preparing to bargain.
Big Gain in Pittsburgh
For several months, CWA Local 13550 President Karen Gatto spent part of every Monday and Wednesday at AT&T Broadband’s Corliss call center in Pittsburgh talking to customer service representatives about union benefits, and spent Saturdays at organizing meetings. It was her first campaign, and she was almost as thrilled as the workers with the result: a 131-105 vote for CWA. The unit has 286 members.
“I was glad to be there, every day of it,” Gatto said. “They’re a good bunch of people, they need a union, and we will represent them very well.”
Marge Krueger, administrative assistant to District 13 Vice President Vince Maisano, said the victory took a team effort, with local organizers, staff and already-organized Broadband workers contributing.
“I believe this is the first sizeable call center that has been organized in the cable industry,” Krueger said.
About 15 Broadband technicians from different CWA units in Western Pennsylvania — the largest with 800 workers right across the parking lot — visited with the Corliss service reps and put them at ease about joining a union.
The campaign was driven by intense job pressure the service reps face daily and their need for a voice at work pending the possible AT&T-Comcast merger, Krueger said.
The campaign began when CWA Representative Ameenah Salaam connected last fall with Sharon Elliott, a service rep who attends her church. Elliott told her, “We need a union. We’ll work with you, and you can tell us how to do it.”
Service reps LaTanya Harris and Lawanna Smith joined Salaam for a meeting at the district office and, along with Elliott, became the core of a hard-working internal organizing committee.
Spreading Across the West
Broadband workers in Spokane moved so quickly to organize that management charged CWA with stealth in violation of the neutrality and consent agreement.
“There was not one house visit made,” said Local 7818 organizer and Executive Vice President Mary Boehnke. “In three days we had 47 of 54 cards signed.”
She said Gibb Brantley, a Broadband technician and chair of the internal organizing committee was “working alone until December, when management pretty much handed him and us the election.”
Workers faced heavy-handed policies and management was inconsistent in its day-to-day policies relating to scheduling, promotions and raises, Boehnke said.
With Boehnke’s help, Brantley recruited an internal committee and talked up the benefits of having a grievance procedure,
“A lot of these guys worked for Cox and TCI prior to AT&T,” Boehnke said. “It didn’t take too much convincing.”
They notified management of their intentions Jan. 11, filed for an election Jan. 14 and won it 47-6 on Jan. 30.
The ballots were impounded while a third party neutral investigated management’s charge and found no wrongdoing on the part of CWA. The ballots were finally counted April 18, District 7 Organizing Coordinator Kevin Mulligan said.
Mulligan announced another win April 25, this one in Portland, Ore., where Broadband workers at two warehouses voted 11-6 to join CWA.
Local 7901 Organizer Jeanne Carpenter credited Bud Roberts, a worker at one of the warehouses, with rounding up six of seven available votes for CWA.
“The workers were seeking a career ladder, a voice in working conditions. They were ignored,” Carpenter said.
In St. Paul, Minn., Broadband warehouse workers voted 12-9 in May for CWA. Mulligan said Local 7201 organizers Kathy Reck and Dave Rewey were instrumental in the campaign.
“We hope this will lead to more organizing in the St. Paul area, where there are hundreds of technicians,” he said.
Sunny Outlook in California
Broadband installers and outside technicians in Modesto, Calif., brought their unit of 46 workers into Local 9418, voting 25-14 in May, with five challenged ballots.
District 9 Organizing Coordinator John Dugan, who worked on the campaign along with Organizing Coordinator Libby Sayre, credited the win to Local 9418 organizers Joel Sendejo and Manuel Armendariz, as well as Broadband technicians already organized in Fresno and Sacramento.
Sendejo, vice president of Local 9418, and Armendariz, an executive board member, worked daily with the technicians, many who are Hispanic, Dugan said. Both men have worked for Pacific Bell and knew many relatives of the Modesto Broadband technicians who could tell them how much better life is working union.
In addition, Broadband technicians Art Lindsay and Greg Cherry, now members of Local 9421 in Sacramento, and Milton Clemente of Local 9408 in Fresno spent hours on the road, shuttling to and from Modesto to let the workers know that by joining CWA they would be joining a much larger and stronger force of organized Broadband workers.
Organizing at AT&T Broadband has snowballed in recent weeks, with workers winning neutrality and consent elections in Pittsburgh, Pa., St. Paul, Minn., Spokane, Wash., Portland, Ore., and Modesto, Calif.
The campaigns add nearly 500 new members to CWA, for a total of more than 3,200 workers organized at Broadband over the last 18 months.
The wins bring the concentration of membership in the Pennsylvania and California markets to more than 1,000 in each, CWA Executive Vice President Larry Cohen said.
A previously organized unit in Oakland, Calif., already has a contract and San Francisco Bay area Broadband workers are putting the finishing touches on theirs. Pittsburgh units were in bargaining as the CWA News went to press, and newly organized units were preparing to bargain.
Big Gain in Pittsburgh
For several months, CWA Local 13550 President Karen Gatto spent part of every Monday and Wednesday at AT&T Broadband’s Corliss call center in Pittsburgh talking to customer service representatives about union benefits, and spent Saturdays at organizing meetings. It was her first campaign, and she was almost as thrilled as the workers with the result: a 131-105 vote for CWA. The unit has 286 members.
“I was glad to be there, every day of it,” Gatto said. “They’re a good bunch of people, they need a union, and we will represent them very well.”
Marge Krueger, administrative assistant to District 13 Vice President Vince Maisano, said the victory took a team effort, with local organizers, staff and already-organized Broadband workers contributing.
“I believe this is the first sizeable call center that has been organized in the cable industry,” Krueger said.
About 15 Broadband technicians from different CWA units in Western Pennsylvania — the largest with 800 workers right across the parking lot — visited with the Corliss service reps and put them at ease about joining a union.
The campaign was driven by intense job pressure the service reps face daily and their need for a voice at work pending the possible AT&T-Comcast merger, Krueger said.
The campaign began when CWA Representative Ameenah Salaam connected last fall with Sharon Elliott, a service rep who attends her church. Elliott told her, “We need a union. We’ll work with you, and you can tell us how to do it.”
Service reps LaTanya Harris and Lawanna Smith joined Salaam for a meeting at the district office and, along with Elliott, became the core of a hard-working internal organizing committee.
Spreading Across the West
Broadband workers in Spokane moved so quickly to organize that management charged CWA with stealth in violation of the neutrality and consent agreement.
“There was not one house visit made,” said Local 7818 organizer and Executive Vice President Mary Boehnke. “In three days we had 47 of 54 cards signed.”
She said Gibb Brantley, a Broadband technician and chair of the internal organizing committee was “working alone until December, when management pretty much handed him and us the election.”
Workers faced heavy-handed policies and management was inconsistent in its day-to-day policies relating to scheduling, promotions and raises, Boehnke said.
With Boehnke’s help, Brantley recruited an internal committee and talked up the benefits of having a grievance procedure,
“A lot of these guys worked for Cox and TCI prior to AT&T,” Boehnke said. “It didn’t take too much convincing.”
They notified management of their intentions Jan. 11, filed for an election Jan. 14 and won it 47-6 on Jan. 30.
The ballots were impounded while a third party neutral investigated management’s charge and found no wrongdoing on the part of CWA. The ballots were finally counted April 18, District 7 Organizing Coordinator Kevin Mulligan said.
Mulligan announced another win April 25, this one in Portland, Ore., where Broadband workers at two warehouses voted 11-6 to join CWA.
Local 7901 Organizer Jeanne Carpenter credited Bud Roberts, a worker at one of the warehouses, with rounding up six of seven available votes for CWA.
“The workers were seeking a career ladder, a voice in working conditions. They were ignored,” Carpenter said.
In St. Paul, Minn., Broadband warehouse workers voted 12-9 in May for CWA. Mulligan said Local 7201 organizers Kathy Reck and Dave Rewey were instrumental in the campaign.
“We hope this will lead to more organizing in the St. Paul area, where there are hundreds of technicians,” he said.
Sunny Outlook in California
Broadband installers and outside technicians in Modesto, Calif., brought their unit of 46 workers into Local 9418, voting 25-14 in May, with five challenged ballots.
District 9 Organizing Coordinator John Dugan, who worked on the campaign along with Organizing Coordinator Libby Sayre, credited the win to Local 9418 organizers Joel Sendejo and Manuel Armendariz, as well as Broadband technicians already organized in Fresno and Sacramento.
Sendejo, vice president of Local 9418, and Armendariz, an executive board member, worked daily with the technicians, many who are Hispanic, Dugan said. Both men have worked for Pacific Bell and knew many relatives of the Modesto Broadband technicians who could tell them how much better life is working union.
In addition, Broadband technicians Art Lindsay and Greg Cherry, now members of Local 9421 in Sacramento, and Milton Clemente of Local 9408 in Fresno spent hours on the road, shuttling to and from Modesto to let the workers know that by joining CWA they would be joining a much larger and stronger force of organized Broadband workers.