RI labor faces a turning point (continued)

THE HEALTH-CARE unions — which aggressively seek new members and represent workers whose jobs can’t be exported — are among the few hopeful centers of activity in the current labor movement, according to historian Buhle. "The problem is that labor nationally has totally failed to organize the commercial sector," he says, "and consequently, when the factories closed down, the union movement withered away."

One of the unions cited by Buhle is the Hotel Employees, Restaurant Employees. In addition to representing new immigrant workers, HERE is in the process of merging nationally with the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees. Warren P. Heyman, secretary-treasurer of HERE, Local 217, says the union has pushed such ideas as "neutrality" arrangements with employers, which agree not to campaign against union-organizing drives.

The union has local agreements with Harrah’s and would-be developers for a hotel in the former Masonic Temple, as well as with developers of second proposed downtown hotel. Further, HERE and other unions are "mass organizing" with companies that do business in many states, Heyman says, rather than unionizing individual workplaces one at a time.

Another union on the forefront of aggressively recruiting new members is District 1199.

With about 3500 nurses and other health-care workers, the union attempted to unionize Kent County Memorial Hospital in Warwick — and received a stunning rebuke in May, when workers rejected the union, 327 to 168. Stan Israel, District 1199’s vice president, says the union was caught off guard, because after a bitter 1999 strike and lockout at Women & Infants Hospital in Providence, the union has had positive relations with Care New England, the nonprofit company that runs both hospitals. Israel says the union was not prepared for what he calls "a quite vicious" campaign against the organizing drive by the hospital, but said the union isn’t giving up.

"We think we will be coming back. We are not going anywhere," he says. "Our long term goal is to organize Kent. We lost the battle in a long war."

Meanwhile, District 1199 is also in the middle of the furious battle over whether home day-care providers will join the union as state workers.

The effort is noteworthy, in part, since it involves an attempt to represent a new groups of workers. In this case, many home care providers are women, recent immigrants, and Spanish-speaking. Further, the union began with a novel approach, arguing that the providers — who have been considered independent businesswomen — are de facto state employees, because they are highly regulated by the state, and in many cases, paid by the state and eligible for the RIte Care state health insurance plan.

In a change of tactics after a court order blocked the union drive, the union recently proposed a new arrangement: instead of being declared regular state workers, with standard pension and health benefits, the providers be allowed to join District 1199. The union would then bargain with the state over working conditions, including pay and fringe benefits.

Israel and other union members believe this fight represents the cutting edge of the modern labor movement. The local has been using a variety of tactics, including partnering with community groups and employing 1960s-style community-organizing tactics.

In joining with the One Rhode Island Coalition, which seeks a united front on a variety of social legislation, District 1199 says it worked hard to reverse millions in subsidy cuts proposed by Carcieri for day-care parents. The union says it arranged 27 meetings with state legislators and day-care providers, organized the mailing of 7500 postcards, 800 letters, and 900 e-mails to state officials. Further, the union staged rallies, a march, and leafleted the governor’s neighborhood in East Greenwich. "This is the kind of a campaign that rejuvenates you, that makes you realize what you are doing in the labor movement," Israel says. The day-care workers, he says, "are people who never had an opportunity to be organized, and who now have a sense of empowerment."

One of the lasting images for him, Israel says, was of children handing leaflets to the governor, giving them and their parents a sense "they can be part of the process."

That sense of breaking new ground is shared by one of the most traditional groups in the labor movement — construction workers — after the two leading unions, the Laborers and the Carpenters unions, signed agreements with Gilbane, ensuring the big contracting company will pay union rates on its jobs. Such agreements were typical decades ago, but Gilbane and other unions backed away, opening the way to use of contractors who preferred to hire union workers and those that didn’t. But this changes during a long campaign to reverse the trend, as more contractors signed with unions, culminating in the agreement with Gilbane.

Ronald M. Coia, president of the Rhode Island Building and Construction Trades Council, and a top official of the Laborers union, says this came about because of "persistence," advocacy, and the availability of a large pool of skilled, versatile workers, thanks to apprenticeship and training programs.

There is no question that union labor costs more, or as the unions would argue, provide superior benefits for workers. Coia says a union laborer costs more than $36 an hour — $22.50 in wages and $14.35 in fringe benefits. He says non-union wages are $12 to $13 (although industry sources says some non-union firms come close to matching union rates).

The unions argue the differential pays for itself in efficiency and safety. In 2002, Coia helped organize a group of contractors and building trades unions, the Rhode Island 21st Century Labor-Management Partnership, which tries to sell the concept that union projects are cost-effective. The partnership’s Web site touts recent landmarks built with union labor: the Providence Place Mall, the T.F. Green State Airport terminal, the Rhode Island Convention Center, the Amgen biotech plant in West Greenwich, buildings at Brown University.

Gilbane’s agreement with the Carpenters and Labors caps the effort and ensures that many new projects, such as the GTECH building in downtown Providence, will be union built. "Gilbane definitely has a lot of work planned in the city of Providence," Coia says. "If I were in their shoes, I probably would have said: ‘I’m not going to be able to get the work done without labor’s input.’ "

Wes Cotter, a spokesman for Gilbane, which oversees $2 billion in annual construction throughout the country, says the company signed the agreement because, "We see the benefits. If they [unions] are able to help us achieve our goals, which are building on schedule and under budget, we all do great."

AT THIS POINT, two conflicting trends are at work in the Rhode Island labor movement.

Unions have to fight hard against sliding numbers, to say nothing of regaining their former rank. At the same time, unions remain a force to be reckoned with.

Buhle and Molloy says one challenge is whether labor can regain its position as a force for social change. "The memory that labor could be a great social force for reform has slipped down several notches," says Buhle. "And nothing has replaced it in terms of representing the working poor."

What is happening now on a number of fronts could be critical to labor’s future in Rhode Island.

Will Carcieri or the unions prevail, for example, in the tug-of-war over state employees’ health insurance? Will union efforts ensure that Democrats maintain their hold on the General Assembly? Will labor be successful in representing new groups of workers, such as the home day-care providers? Will more construction projects go union?

Labor’s supporters say they are keyed up, and the optimists contend that the losses and challenges are injecting new life into the effort.

"The activity level and intensity level has never been higher in the last several years," says AFL-CIO official Nee. "It’s like, okay, when we were at our peak numbers, we were not at our peak level of activity. Now, we are doing more, we actually are more effective than we were before."

Whether this activity will move labor forward should be clear by year’s end, and because the numbers are so important to what unions do, the scorecard should be easy to read.

Brian C. Jones can be reached at brijudy@ids.net.