The 9th Annual Meeting will be held on Thursday, September 23rd. We will meet at IBT Local 445, 15 Stone Castle Road, Rock Tavern. Please click on the "Annual Delegates Meeting" tab on the left hand side of this page to access updated credential forms, directions to IBT Local 445, and other important information.

Please RSVP to (845)567-7760 as soon as possible.

The New York Congressional Delegation has released a letter to the Chief Executive Officer of Dr Pepper Snapple Group expressing concern over the ongoing strike in Williamson, New York and urged the beverage giant to return to negotiations with RWDSU Local 220. The letter, addressed to Dr Pepper Snapple CEO and President Larry D. Young, notes Dr Pepper has "$555 million in profits" and the company has "ample room to promptly negotiate a fair deal with the workers."

The letter in its entirety can be found here.

Hello Members,

Our Political Action page has been updated with the 2010 NYS AFL-CIO endorsements as well as the 2010 HVALF Endorsements.  Also available to you are the questionnaires for the 2010 Congressional, State Senate, State Assembly, and County questionnaires as well as the Judicial resumes.

Please be advised that the Tuesday, August 24th meeting of the Hudson Catskill Central Labor Council will meet at IBT Local 445, 15 Stone Castle Road, Rock Tavern. The meeting will begin at 6:30pm, the regularly scheduled time.

We apologize for the inconvenience and hope to see you there.

Just as a reminder, the Upper Hudson CLC will meet TONIGHT, Monday August 23rd at 6:30pm, 201 Stockade Drive, Kingston, NY. The Dutchess County CLC has been cancelled for the month of August. The Rockland County CLC will meet on Thursday, September 2nd at 4:00pm, 8 Taylor Lane, New City, NY.

SEIU 200 United members at the Bank of America facility in Kingston need your help. Although the staff was originally over 300, there are now only 6 SEIU 200 United members who are contracted by Harvard Maintenance to take care of the facility. They are in danger of permanently losing their vacation and benefits because Harvard Maintenance refuses to honor their contract.

Please click HERE to quickly sign your name and tell Harvard Maintenance that you are standing strong for your fellow union members.

Join 1199 SEIU and the Greater New York Hospital Association (GNYHA) in their partner Healthcare Education Project as they address how to eradicate disparities in healthcare and how it affects entire communities.

The Disparities Fair will offer solutions to to get our kids and communities on the right track. By joining us, you will learn about and sample healthy foods, receive free tools and information for improving your own life, receive a complete health scan, and be eligible to win door prizes.  

Join us on Saturday, September 25, 2010 from 11am to 3pm at Nubian Directions, 248 Main St., Poughkeepsie.

Please be advised that the August 25th meeting of the Dutchess County CLC has been cancelled. We will meet again on Wednesday, September 22nd at 5:30pm at 21 Davis Ave, Poughkeepsie.

on July Jobs Report

 

"Nearly a year into the recovery, we are still mired in the most serious employment crisis since the Great Depression.

 

 

Todays disappointing employment report shows the economy shed 131,000 workers, mostly because of the winding down of the U.S. census.

 

 

Of more concern is that private sector employment increased by only 71,000 new jobs.  The unemployment rate was unchanged, but only because another 181,000 workers left the labor force.

 

 

With the recovery showing signs of losing steam, our government  the Obama administration, Congress and the Federal Reserve  must act with the same urgency and political will that was used to save the global banking system to put our workers back to work and assure that the jobs of the future are good jobs. 

 

 

President Obama has been calling for further fiscal support for the recovery.  And Congress did finally pass a much needed extension of unemployment benefits through November.  Just this week, the Senate acted to save hundreds of thousands of essential public servants teachers, firefighters and public safety officers  from joining the ranks of the jobless.

 

 

But the economic recovery is still far too weak to power the job growth we need to offset the almost 8 million jobs lost since the recession began.  Meanwhile, 14.6 million workers are formally unemployed, and nearly half of them have been unemployed for more than 26 weeks. Yet every effort to dig us out of our 10.5 million jobs hole has faced enormous opposition from Republicans who choose to vote against good jobs and working people for cheap political points. This is inexcusable.

 

 

There will not be a sustainable recovery until we see strong employment growth.  And we will not soon see strong employment growth without sustained government support to put workers back to work. Come November, voters will be looking for those with the commitment to create good jobs at the level our economy demands."

Statement by AFL-CIO President Richard L. Trumka on

House Vote on 9/11 Health and Compensation Act

"The AFL-CIO is deeply disappointed by the failure of the House of Representatives to pass the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act (H.R. 847).

 

 While the bill received a strong majority vote with 243 Democrats and 12 Republicans supporting, it did not reach the two-thirds level required for a vote on suspension.  We thank Representatives Carolyn Maloney, Jerry Nadler and Peter King for their leadership and all of those who supported the bill.

 

Helping the thousands of 9/11 responders and others who are now sick as a result of their exposures at the World Trade Center should not be a partisan issue.  But sadly, the majority of House Republicans voted against this bill, even though its costs were fully paid for as required under the PAYGO rules by closing a tax loophole for foreign firms that operate in the United States.  It appears that some Republicans and business groups, including the Chamber of Commerce, are more concerned with protecting the interests of the foreign based companies who try to avoid paying taxes than helping those who answered the nations call on 9/11.

 

This vote is a disappointment, but should not be a set back.  An overwhelming majority of the House of Representatives supports this bill.  We call upon the Democratic leadership in Congress to move and pass this bill under the regular rules, this week or immediately upon the return of the House in September. The ninth anniversary of September 11 is just weeks away.  The 9/11 heroes have waited long enough."

America ’s union movement and our allies took on Wall Street and we won.

Last week Congress passed the most sweeping financial regulatory reform since the Great Depression. We won because union members took their anger to the streets. State federations, area and labor councils, unions and our allies mobilized more than 100 protests at the major banks this spring. Thousands of workers rallied at shareholder meetings in San Francisco, Kansas City, Chicago and Charlotte. We raised our voices and demanded real reform with more than a half-million phone calls, letters, town hall meetings, texts, e-mails and faxes to Congress. We took our message to every major media market and outlet, to the nation’s editorial pages and to the blogosphere. And we took to Wall Street’s own backyard, as 15,000 of us rallied in New York to fix our broken financial rules and regulations.

Here’s what we won for America’s workers:

• Reining in the Wall Street casino: Banks will be barred from gambling for their own account with our money and will have to separate some derivatives trading operations into affiliates.

• Landmark consumer protection: Consumers will have an independent advocate to prevent tricks and traps related to mortgages and payday loans and will have checking language we can all understand. People abused by predatory lenders will get help and banks will be limited from charging businesses hefty fees for debit card purchases.

• Shining light on shadow markets: The $600 trillion derivatives market now will operate in the open, so regulators can catch problems—like the credit default swaps that brought down the economy—before they happen. Most deals will have to be backed by a separate clearinghouse and traded on public exchanges. Participants will have to prove they actually have the money to cover their bets. Hedge funds and private equity funds will have regulators
watching over them.

• Preventing taxpayer bailouts: The government will have the authority to step in and safely shut down any failing
financial firms, not just banks, instead of propping them up with taxpayer money. One regulator will be in charge of watching for emerging threats to the whole financial system—and will have the tools and authority to ensure those threats are visible.

• Mortgage reforms: Lenders will be prohibited from making loans that borrowers cannot repay and banned from
receiving kickbacks for steering people into high-rate loans when they qualify for lower rates. Consumers are protected from abusive loan fees and penalties for prepaying.

• Strong investor protections: Shareholders will have new tools to hold corporate boards and management accountable, including a voice on executive compensation and enhanced ability to nominate and elect corporate directors. Brokers will have to act in the best interests of their customers.

• Holding credit rating agencies accountable: Credit rating agencies no longer will have a vested financial interest
in giving high ratings to risky investments. Investors will be able to sue credit rating agencies that slap high ratings on risky investments.

• Opening the Fed’s books: The Fed’s emergency lending programs from the financial crisis will be audited to see where the money went. The Fed also will have to disclose loans it makes to banks through its discount window.

Call your senators and representatives who supported this landmark legislation and say “Thank you!”