The Executive Employee Relations Committee is set to approve the Joint Safety Institute. We have been fighting for this because we believe it will be a major improvement in the work culture of the DWP, improving our safety practices and, most important, providing a permanent, jointly-managed, institutional framework for maintaining a safe workplace and addressing potential safety problems.
There are two characteristics of the Institute that make it vital to our well-being: autonomy and worker participation. Although funded by the Department, the Institute will have its own staff and governing board, which will consist of equal numbers appointed by management and Local 18. This will ensure continued meaningful input from the front-line worker and an institutional commitment to worker safety that is not subject to the whims and shortcomings of management.
The DWP has twice the national average of workplace injuries. We need this institutional reform now.
We are also pushing for the establishment of a Joint Training Institute, and the same urgency applies. By the year 2005, 70% of the DWP workforce will be 48 years old or older. We will experience an overwhelming shortage of trained personnel. We need to take steps now to put training on a secure footing, and use the joint labor/management process that has been so productive to establish and maintain the best possible training program.
We already have a Health Care Trust that administers health care programs for our members, and it continues to improve our options.
Looking at the big picture—the joint labor/management committees, mutual gains bargaining, and now the establishment of the joint institutes—you can see that we have been forging a new relationship with management that is dramatically improving the working culture, day to day operation and long-term viability of the country’s largest public utility.
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We may be at a crossroad in history similar to the period a century ago
when the labor movement arose out of the oppression of unbridled industrialism
and the government was forced to realize that in order to protect the public
welfare, the power of the great corporate trusts had to be contained. Today,
with the rise of the global economy, powerful economic interests will override
human rights, worker rights and environmental concerns if the government
does not actively protect those interests. That’s why it is so important
that working people participate in the electoral process and, as Samuel
Gompers said, “reward our friends, punish our enemies.” Democrats will have the opportunity this November to retain the presidency and take back the House. I urge you all to be sure that your voter registration is current, and to use your vote in November to reward labor’s friends. As I reported in my last column, there are also strong pro-labor candidates running for state office. They deserve your support. Get to know your candidates, and think about getting involved in a campaign.
And speaking of campaigns, we will be voting next year for a new mayor and six city council members. That will be another opportunity—and a very important one—to reward our friends at the ballot box.
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As we go to press, the Janitors Strike is in its second week. Perhaps by the time you read this it will have been settled. If not, I hope all members are respecting the SEIU picket lines. Don’t enter a struck building, even if you are there on a service call. Tell them you will come back when they sign a fair contract with their workers.
Now more than ever, when the principle that a working person is entitled to decent living is under attack from the cold logic of the global marketplace, we must remember that “an injury to one is an injury to all.”
We strongly support the janitors in their struggle for a living wage.
In Unity,
BRIAN D’ARCY, Business Manager