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Governorships the Top Target in States
With almost every state in the nation operating in the red due to President Bush’s $100 billion tax cut for corporations and a shrinking tax base caused by high unemployment, state and local elections this year take on a special importance.
Thirty-six governorships — 11 currently held by Democrats, 23 by Republicans and two by Independents — are in play, as well as thousands of state legislature seats, county, municipal and local offices.
Despite talk of economic recovery, nearly 2 million people have lost jobs since March 2001. And with unemployment hovering around 6 percent — the highest in eight years — states are facing increasing demands to provide health care and other services to newly unemployed workers.
Forty-three states face budget shortfalls as large as $7.5 billion and in many public employees face the possibility of furloughs or layoffs.
How will the state officials you elect handle the crisis? By firing workers and cutting vital public services? Or like Gov. Jim McGreevey (D-N.J.), elected last November with the support of CWA members?
New Jersey faced a $6 billion shortfall after eight years of financial mismanagement by former Gov. Christie Whitman (R). Where layoffs had been Whitman’s common solution to the state’s financial ills, McGreevey offered early retirements, enabling nearly 6,000 workers to leave state employment with dignity and a secure future.
Friends of working families in New Jersey’s state legislature also passed a $1.8 billion corporate tax bill, putting New Jersey back on the road to economic recovery. Not a dime of the much-needed revenue came from CWA members’ pockets.
Prior to this election, anti-worker officials in at least a dozen
states attempted to enact legislation or pass ballot initiatives to silence the voice of working families in politics. CWA members mobilized to defeat such paycheck deception measures in California and Oregon in 1998 and again in Oregon in 2000.
Paycheck deception, or “paycheck protection” as its proponents misleadingly call it, would place massive reporting and administrative burdens on unions before they could use dues money for any type of political expenditure — from educating members about issues and candidates to lobbying for legislation to benefit working families.
Political observers say President Bush vowed to pursue paycheck deception nationally in retaliation for union members’ mobilization in 2000 to elect Al Gore.
Having friends in the governor’s mansion and in state legislatures is also union members’ strongest defense against “right-to-work” (for less) legislation, which allows non-members to escape paying their fair share for union representation. While most of the 21 states with existing right-to-work laws are in the South and West, states as far north as Connecticut and even Hawaii have attempted to pass such legislation.
Jobs, retirement and union security. State services for working families. When you vote Nov. 5, think about what you have — it’s worth protecting.
This portion of this website is paid for by the CWA Committee on Political Education - Political ontributions Committee, with voluntary contributions from union members and their families, and is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
Thirty-six governorships — 11 currently held by Democrats, 23 by Republicans and two by Independents — are in play, as well as thousands of state legislature seats, county, municipal and local offices.
Despite talk of economic recovery, nearly 2 million people have lost jobs since March 2001. And with unemployment hovering around 6 percent — the highest in eight years — states are facing increasing demands to provide health care and other services to newly unemployed workers.
Forty-three states face budget shortfalls as large as $7.5 billion and in many public employees face the possibility of furloughs or layoffs.
How will the state officials you elect handle the crisis? By firing workers and cutting vital public services? Or like Gov. Jim McGreevey (D-N.J.), elected last November with the support of CWA members?
New Jersey faced a $6 billion shortfall after eight years of financial mismanagement by former Gov. Christie Whitman (R). Where layoffs had been Whitman’s common solution to the state’s financial ills, McGreevey offered early retirements, enabling nearly 6,000 workers to leave state employment with dignity and a secure future.
Friends of working families in New Jersey’s state legislature also passed a $1.8 billion corporate tax bill, putting New Jersey back on the road to economic recovery. Not a dime of the much-needed revenue came from CWA members’ pockets.
Prior to this election, anti-worker officials in at least a dozen
states attempted to enact legislation or pass ballot initiatives to silence the voice of working families in politics. CWA members mobilized to defeat such paycheck deception measures in California and Oregon in 1998 and again in Oregon in 2000.
Paycheck deception, or “paycheck protection” as its proponents misleadingly call it, would place massive reporting and administrative burdens on unions before they could use dues money for any type of political expenditure — from educating members about issues and candidates to lobbying for legislation to benefit working families.
Political observers say President Bush vowed to pursue paycheck deception nationally in retaliation for union members’ mobilization in 2000 to elect Al Gore.
Having friends in the governor’s mansion and in state legislatures is also union members’ strongest defense against “right-to-work” (for less) legislation, which allows non-members to escape paying their fair share for union representation. While most of the 21 states with existing right-to-work laws are in the South and West, states as far north as Connecticut and even Hawaii have attempted to pass such legislation.
Jobs, retirement and union security. State services for working families. When you vote Nov. 5, think about what you have — it’s worth protecting.
This portion of this website is paid for by the CWA Committee on Political Education - Political ontributions Committee, with voluntary contributions from union members and their families, and is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.