Meeting Highlights Shared Mission, Values of CWA and its Retirees By James Starr

For the first time, but certainly not the last, the executive boards of CWA and the CWA Retired Members' Council sat down together in April to discuss our shared mission and how we can help each other achieve it.

The historic meeting, during CWA's legislative conference, made it clear that CWA cares deeply about the issues that confront retirees, and that we are just as concerned about the issues most vital to active union members.

Specifically, we talked about CWA's four main missions: passing the Employee Free Choice Act, affordable health care for all, a secure retirement and fighting for fair trade and good jobs.

The overall strength of the active labor movement is crucial to all of us, and to all the issues on our agenda. When the Employee Free Choice Act becomes law, we will see our collective power multiply. The RMC is committed to CWA's goal of getting the Act passed and signed by a new, Democratic president in early 2009.

We hope every member of the RMC will sign one of the Employee Free Choice Act postcards that CWA and others in the labor movement are collecting along with photographs of the people who sign. The goal is to display a million postcards and photos — CWA has pledged to gather at least 80,000 of them — in the Capitol after the November election. Our union-busting opponents have deep pockets, but we've got people power and we're going to prove it to Congress.

We will also get stronger as a movement as we keep and create more good, union jobs in the United States. Standing firm for fair trade pacts and battling companies that want to contract out jobs or send them overseas doesn't just help the targeted workers. It helps us build a labor and a political movement that benefits all of us.

As we get bigger and stronger we can and will win the fight for health care reform. CWA has launched an ambitious Strategic Industry Fund project that demands that affordable health care for all is on the immediate agenda of the new Congress in January. Retired members are needed right now to reach out to other retirees, CWA members, friends, neighbors — anyone willing to listen. The goal is a critical mass of Americans who will push Congress to enact sweeping reform by 2010 and put the changes in place by 2012.

Our bigger, stronger labor movement will also stop talk of privatizing Social Security. And we will have a louder voice than ever at corporate shareholder meetings and in Washington as we demand more accountability and less greed, protecting workers' livelihoods and their retirement security.

The Retired Members' Council is growing in chapters and in members. The CWA Executive Board was excited to hear how far we've come and how determined we are to keep growing. We now have nearly 38,000 lifetime members, including 6,000 retirees who have joined in the last year. And we have 12 new chapters nationwide.

We'll soon have a new member we all know — at least by name or reputation, if you haven't been fortunate enough to meet her in person. CWA Secretary-Treasurer Barbara Easterling, who founded the RMC, is retiring from her position after a labor union career that has spanned 50 years.

After Barbara steps down officially at the CWA Convention in June, we will eagerly welcome her talents and energy as an RMC member — and, we fully expect, as an RMC activist.

The RMC board will meet with the full CWA Executive Board again at the convention, and our plan is to meet regularly at both the convention and legislative conference. As we said in a joint statement after our April 6 meeting, "We look forward to working together with stronger ties for years to come."