Buy Union Made This Labor Day!
See a full list if Union-made products here!
VSEA’s Week In Action Newsletter: August 23, 2019
Top Stories This Week:
- VSEA Strongly Disputes Local Television Station’s Report On Corrections Staffing Levels
- Possible Dues Increase Proposal Warned This Week
- Executive Branch Bargaining Teams Sit Down With State For Coordinated Bargaining
- Central Vermont Chapter Passes Climate Change Resolution
- To Narrow Spending Gap, State Asks Depts. & Agencies To Find 20% Savings, But There Is Another Way
Read the entire newsletter here!
Subscribe to Week In Action here!
Stop & Shop Strike Leader Is Keynote Speaker At VSEA’s Annual Meeting
Members attending VSEA’s 75th Annual Meeting on September 14 will be hearing from United Food & Commercial Workers’ Local Union 1445 President Jeff Bollen, this year’s keynote speaker.
Here’s a piece about Brother Bollen from the Annual Meeting WARN, which emailed this week to VSEA members:
“We told the workers in advance when we were training them, ‘Don’t worry about how much food gets into the store; don’t worry about how many scabs they bring in from the outside. All you have to do is win over that customer that you wait on every week, and you will win.’ And that’s exactly what happened.”
With Vermont’s Income Gap Continuing To Grow, Maybe It’s Time To Revisit Making State’s Wealthiest Pay A Little More?
With State Looking For 20% Budget Reduction & Vermont’s Income Gap Continuing To Grow, Maybe It’s Time To Revisit Making State’s Wealthiest Pay A Little More?
Given the Scott Administration’s charge to department and agency heads to come up with a 20% reduction in spending by August 30 to "help close the gap between the projected growth in spending and available revenues," it might be time to revisit narrowing Vermont’s income gap by asking the state’s wealthiest to pay a little more.
Remember, according to a January 2018 Public Assets Institute report, from 2006 to 2016, average nominal income for the top 5 percent of Vermont earners rose 42 percent. Over the same period, the bottom fifth of earners saw an average increase of 6 percent.
Hey WCAX! Just Five Months Ago, Chittenden DOC Members Were Educating Legislature’s Women’s Caucus About Staffing
It was just five months ago that VSEA Corrections members from the Chittenden facility were at the State House to educate lawmakers and press in the room about their current work situation.
Here’s what appeared in VSEA’s weekly email newsletter from March 1, 2019:
After touring the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility last week, members of the Legislature’s Women’s Caucus asked to meet today with VSEA DOC members who work at the facility to discuss staffing and other employee concerns, as well as get some perspective on how it is to work with female inmates who are detoxing and the challenges associated. The workers lobbied for additional funding to help resolve the facility’s chronic staffing issues.
Note: Staffing is identified as a primary cause for concern at every Vermont corrections facility.