United Healthcare Workers forms new union as SEIU moves against local

Lisbeth Latham
Months of simmering tension within the Service Employees International Union finally broke this week as the SIEU's leadership moved, on January 27, to place its third largest local the 150000 member United Healthcare Workers - West under trusteeship. The UHW-W board responded on January 28 with an announcement that they were resigning from the SEIU and would be moving to establish the National Union of Healthcare Workers.


The SEIU had given UHW-W two ultimatums on January 23, demanding that the Local accept transfer of 65,000 nursing home and homecare workers out of UHW against their will, or face an immediate takeover and the expulsion of more than 70 healthcare workers who were elected to lead the local union.

The UHW-W executive board replied to the SEIU stating "given the enormity of this decision and its vast implications for UHW members," the executive board wrote, "such a decision should be enacted by a fair membership vote on a local-by-local basis, not by executive fiat." Their letter called for a democratic voting process that is "consistent with the SEIU Constitution and follows the model of the merger between Local 250 and Local 399 that led to the creation of UHW in 2005, and the various mergers, including most recently of 1199NJ, and other local unions into 1199UHE." The SEIU had held a non-binding advisory vote in November and December, however only 8% of affected members voted and the UHW-W had run a boycott campaign against aspects of the ballot it argued were undemocratic.


Following the UHW-W refusal to meet the SEIU's demands, SEIU International President Andy Stern moved to place UHW-W in trusteeship. Under the trusteeship the Local's assets were frozen, dissolved the UHW-W executive board and removed from the payroll all full-time staff. The SEIU sent employers a memo saying that the SEIU was now in charge, that UHW staff no longer had any authority and that employers should report any contact by UHW staff.

UHW-W president Sal Rosselli told the January 29 LA Times that following the trusteeship employers had broken off negotiations and informed some of the union's stewards that they would no longer recognise their authority. SEIU executive vice-president Dave Regan, one of the co-trustees appointed by SEIU, said shop stewards and other rank-and-file representatives have not been stripped of their positions and are trying to ensure that all bargaining goes forward without delay.

The SEIU's move to place UHW-W under trusteeship follows the recommendations of trusteeship hearings held over November and December. These hearings were initiated to instigate financial irregularities with-in the UHW-W. Ray Marshal, Labor Secretary during the Carter administration, who was hired by the SEIU to conduct the hearings, found that the UHW-W had established a not for profit entity with the intention of funding confrontation with the SEIU's leadership. Marshal found that this was insufficient to warrant trusteeship, but recommended that the union be place in trusteeship if it continued to oppose the SEIU's previous decision to shift 65000 members from the UHW-W to a single local representing workers in long-term-care.

UHW-W leaders said it is unprecedented to have a trusteeship request denied, and argued that Marshall linked two unrelated disputes by tying his recommendations to the fate of UHW-W's long-term care members.

Rosselli told Labor Notes "We suspect that the hearing report from Secretary Marshall got amended by SEIU lawyers to get their desired outcome," UHW-W's former head Sal Rosselli said. "Frankly we don't have a lot of respect for it being some independent report or process."

Prior to the publication of Marshal's recommendations, the SEIU had already moved to establish a offices in Oakland and Los Angels from which to impose the trusteeship with staff from across the country being flown into California to help take over the UHW-W.

According to Labor Notes, although many staffers were initially told that UHW-related assignments would be voluntary, the International informed organisers that failure to travel to California will be "considered a resignation."

New Union Launched - National Union of Health Workers
Following the announcement of the trusteeship, thousands of UHW-W members rallied at UHW-W offices across California to express their anger at the trusteeship. Hundreds of members occupied UHW-W offices on January 27 and 28.

On January 28, the UHW-W executive board announced that they had formed the National Union of Healthcare Workers and would begin to collect union cards as a first step towards winning recognition in their workplaces.

Announcing the creating of the union, Rosselli said "As a healthcare workers union, NUHW is committed to continuing the tradition of a member-led, democratically controlled union. There are lot of things that we still have to figure out, but we know NUHW will be all about accountability to the members, democratic-decision-making, organizing the unorganized and winning improvements for healthcare workers and the patients and residents we serve."

The UHW-W had little choice but to establish a new union, the original push to conduct a disaffiliation ballot had little chance of success even prior to the trusteeship. The SEIU constitution makes it almost impossible to win such a ballot, not only are union staff not allowed to support such a campaign, if just seven members support a local remaining affiliated to the SEIU then disaffiliation is not possible.

Constructing a new union will also be exceeding difficult. It is not sufficient for members of the UHW-W to decide they wish to be members of the NUHW for the new union to get bargaining rights. The workers would first need to be in a workplace which is in an "open period" prior to contract expiration and then file for an election and then attempt to defeat the might of the SEIU. However the UHW-W renegotiated 100 contracts in 2008 so the process will take many years.

Despite these difficulties UHW-W members who want a democratic union have little choice but to form a new union. "For decades, healthcare workers in California have wanted to be part of a democratic, progressive movement that would raise standards for caregivers and the patients and residents we serve. Events over the last several days have proven that's not possible in SEIU," said Angela Glasper, a 20-year optical services clerk from Kaiser Permanente. "Healthcare workers deserve to be part of a union that healthcare workers control democratically, not one that is led by a handful of outsiders from Washington D.C.".

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United Healthcare Workers-West to consider disaffiliation as the SEIU moves to carve Local up

Lisbeth Latham

On January 9, the International Executive Board of the Service Employees International Union voted to begin a process of breaking up its third-largest local, the 150,000-member United Healthcare Workers-West. The move follows months of hostility between the leaderships of the SEIU and UHW over the direction of the union, particularly how to build the union and achieve the best outcomes for workers. Part of the hostility has surrounded ongoing threats that the UHW-W would be put into trusteeship by the SEIU. The UHW-W has responded to the International Executive Board’s decision by requesting that the IEB initiate a ballot on disaffiliating from the SEIU.


The IEB decision means that 65,000 UHW-W members in long-term care will be moved into a new union local which will also include members from two other Californian SEIU Locals 6365 and 521.

The UHW-W has opposed the removal of 42 per cent of its membership on three levels. The SEIU has pushed to form state-wide mega-locals with memberships clearly defined along industrial lines, giving the union increased clout with both employers and politicians. The UHW-W, which organises across the healthcare workers, has argued that its structure is consistent with this logic.

SEIU’s President Andy Stern has argued that unions need to build “a ‘working relationship’ that can add value to the business and help improve performance [that] will result in workers sharing fairly in their employers’ success”. The UHW-W has argued that this results in the conditions of existing members being undermined. It also believes its more militant mobilisation of members against employers has not only delivered better outcomes for members in long-term care but has facilitated the organising of new workplaces. Finally the UHW-W’s leadership argues that any decision regarding how members are moved between locals should be made by the members affected rather than by the International’s leadership.

Ballot on the future of the Californian long-term care workers
The IEB’s decision to restructure long-term care has been justified on the outcome of a ballot of Californian SEIU members in November and December 2008. In the poll 21,008 members voted in favour of forming a new California-wide long-term care local. At the time of the ballot the UHW-W raised concerns over the democracy of the ballot, including:
• The ballot was only advisory, so its outcome could be ignored by the SEIU if it wished;
• The ballot was a pooled vote rather than a ballot by local, so all votes were included together, reducing the ability of the wishes of the members of individual locals to be taken into account;
• The vote did not give members a true choice as they were only offered a choice of forming a new long-term care local or a new combined healthcare local; there was no option to maintain the existing local structure;
• The leaderships of the affected locals were not informed at the same time, with the leaderships of both Locals 6365 and 521 being informed of the ballot in advance of the papers being sent to members, while the leadership of UHW-W was only informed of the ballot after the papers were sent to members.

In response the UHW-W called on members to boycott the poll and initiated a petition campaign where SEIU members in long-term care were encouraged to fill out cards protesting the ballot. This campaign was successful: just 24,366 votes were received out of 309,000 eligible voters (an 8 per cent return) and the UHW-W collected cards from 40,000 members including 1,000 members of Local 6365. In addition the UHW-W collected the signatures of 85,000 members on a petition against the ballot.

Disaffiliation
On January 11, the leadership of UHW-W sent the IEB a request that it initiate a ballot of UHW-W members to formally disaffiliate from the SEIU. The request follows the UHW-W’s executive board receiving letters and petitions from members across California requesting that UHW-W disaffiliate from SEIU. According to the UHW-W the requests for disaffiliation have cited three concerns as motivating the requests:
• The forced removal of 65,000 long-term care members from UHW;
• The stifling of union members’ free speech rights;
• Widespread corruption by Stern-appointed union leaders (the president of Local 6365 is one a number of SEIU senior officials to have been stood down in 2008 for the misuse of hundreds of thousands of dollars of members’ money).

Despite requesting that a ballot on disaffiliation be held, the executive board of the UHW-W has indicated that it will not be taking a position in support of disaffiliation. This is due to the changes in the SEIU’s constitution that were made at the SEIU convention in July 2008, which state that “no officer or local union or affiliated body shall support or assist any efforts to dissolve, secede or disaffiliate from the SEIU”.

It is unclear how the SEIU will respond to the UHW-W’s request for a ballot or what the UHW-W will do in the event the SEIU refuses to allow a ballot. The IEB’s decision to re-organise the Californian locals will not be implemented until at least February 9, while a disaffiliation vote takes at least 60 days to be scheduled, making it likely that the conflict between the SEIU’s IEB and the UHW-W will intensify.

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Struggle for union democracy as SEIU dissidents attacked

Lisbeth Latham

On November 17, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) announced that it would be holding an advisory ballot of members in California to determine the future of the United Healthcare Workers–West (UHW-W), which with 150,000 members is the SEIU’s third largest local.


The leadership of UHW-W, particularly its president Sal Rosselli, has been at the forefront of a campaign within the SEIU against the increasing centralisation of power within the union — a process which it argues will rob rank-and-file members of a say in the contracts that govern their employment.

The announcement of the ballot followed six days of hearings to determine if there was grounds for the SEIU to place the UHW-W in trusteeship, thus allowing the SEIU to replace the UHW-W’s leadership with one loyal to the SEIU’s tops.

The UHW-W and other critics of the SEIU argue that the latter is determined to silence its critics by any means, and is simply seeking to legitimise the removal of the UHW-W leadership.

The UHW-W has responded with ongoing mobilisations by members in defence of union democracy.

The UHW-W’s opposition to the direction of the SEIU emerged from a range of differences over how best to organise workers, moves to break up the UHW-W and changes in the SEIU rules that the UHW-W argue would result in a significant concentration of power in the hands of the SEIU leadership.

In 2007, the UHW-W accused the SEIU leadership, which has intervened into UHW-W-run bargaining, of taking too many concessions in its effort to win agreement from employers to agree to neutrality in union recognition ballots in currently unorganised sites.

This reflects SEIU President Andy Stern’s view that central to successful union organising is to demonstrate that unions can “add value” to an employer.

In his 2006 book, A Country that Works: Getting America Back on Track, Stern argued that a “class-struggle mentality was a vestige of an earlier, rough era of industrial union[ism]”, and that the new labour movement should strive for “a ‘working relationship’ that can add value to the business and help improve performance [that] will result in workers sharing fairly in their employers’ success”.

A central part of the current round of union restructuring has included the transfer of 45,000 of UHW-W’s members working in home-care to Local 6345 (United Long Term Care) in California.

While members will get to vote on this transfer, the decision is to be taken as an aggregate of the
affected members of both locals, rather than of each separately. With Local 6345 having more members in this sector, they have the capacity to over-ride the decision of UHW-W members.

In the newly formed locals the leadership, at least initially, would be appointed by the SEIU international leadership.

In the lead up to the SEIU’s convention, the international leadership proposed a series of changes in SEIU policy under the title of “Justice for All”, which was passed overwhelmingly at the convention. The changes substantially increased the powers of the national union over its locals.

The UHW-W argued that the changes would reduce the input that rank-and-file members could have in collective bargaining, particularly the final wording of contracts, and shift the handling of grievances from local stewards and onto centralised call centres.

In response, the UHW-W issued a “Platform for Change” at the convention, that called for allowing rank and file members to elect representatives to the bargaining committees, and to vote on contract proposals and “any agreement” that affects working conditions.

The proposals also sought to limit forced mergers of locals as well as change elections for international officers by convention delegates to direct election by the membership.

Allegations against UHW-W
On August 25, Stern announced that a trusteeship hearing would be held into the UHW-W. The key allegation has been that the leadership of UHW-W had misappropriated union funds by using US$3 million of the locals fund to create a non-profit Patient Education Fund (PEF), in May 2007 to fund public education campaigns.

The SEIU leadership alleges that the fund was established to assist the UHW-W leadership to resist attempts to put it into trusteeship. On April 24, the UHW-W voted to close down the PEF.
On March 24, Stern had written to all 150,000 UHW-W members about a series of allegations. The letter was widely seen as the beginnings of a move to put the UHW-W into receivership.

On May 1, 101 pro-union writers, authors, and educators signed an open letter to Stern that was published as a half-page ad in the New York Times, expressing “deep concern” over the threat of placing UHW-W into trusteeship.

The letter stated such a move “would send a very troubling message and be viewed, by many, as a sign that internal democracy is not valued or tolerated within SEIU”. Stern and other local and international leaders of the SEIU have argued that there was no intention to put UHW-W into receivership.

On June 5, SEIU leader Bill Ragen sent an email to other officials that discussed possible options to intervene into the UHW-W. The email raised the possibility of trusteeship, but suggested such a move was problematic — “like Iraq, easy to get in and then a slog” .

The preferred option outlined in the email would be the local’s implosion, via the stripping away of members, luring away of senior staff, legal suits around the PEF and encouraging dissatisfaction among the UHW-W membership.

The charges against the UHW-W’s leadership mirror those in a court case that was brought against the UHW-W by the SEIU on June 20. In the case, the SEIU argued that 10 members of the UHW-W’s executive had, in establishing the PEF, breached their duty to use the union’s funds for the interests of the union and had breached the SEIU’s constitution and bylaws.

The SEIU’s case was subsequently dismissed on July 22 without a formal hearing.

Corruption in the SEIU
In August, a growing corruption scandal erupted surrounding three of Stern’s hand-picked officials within SEIU locals in California and Michigan.

In a series of articles, the Los Angeles Times reported that the Stern-appointed presidents of three SEIU locals, including the president of Local 6345 where 45,000 UHW-W members were to be transferred, and an executive vice-president of the SEIU, are accused of misspending hundreds of thousands of dollars of members money to enrich themselves and their families.

All three have been stood down from their positions.

In response to the scandal, Stern announced on September 3 the creation of an ethics commission and the establishment of an ethics code for the union.

Stern also announced that the board would be asked to examine the actions of the leadership of UHW-W.

The leadership of the UHW-W argued that the pursuit of the local reflects both an attempt to shift attention away from the corruption of SEIU officials close to Stern and to advance his goal of breaking up the UHW-W.

On September 10, Herman Benson, founder of the Association for Union Democracy, pointed out on his Union Democracy blog that,“unlike Stern’s own appointees, Rosselli has never been charged with trying to enrich himself or friends. The attack on Rosselli derives from his political opposition to Stern.”

A witch-hunt
The launching of the trusteeship process has to be taken in the context of the corruption crisis. The crisis makes it unlikely that the SEIU will be able to successfully transfer members from the UHW-W to local 6345.

The hearing process itself has been constructed to help give further cover to the SEIU.

Throughout the attacks on the local, the UHW-W has sought to mobilise its members to win new agreements and organise workplaces, as well as fight against the trusteeship process.

UHW-W members have mobilised in their thousands across California, including at the trusteeship hearings.

More than 5000 UHW-W members participated in rallies outside of the hearings on September 26 and 27. During the second series of trusteeship hearings held on November 12 and 13, UHW-W held “Keeping it Real” rallies both outside trusteeship hearing in San Jose, as well as outside of SEIU offices in Los Angeles and Oakland.

At the latter protests, they attempted to deliver a petition signed by 80,000 members calling on the SEIU to end the trusteeship hearings and enter into mediation with the UHW-W.

In Sacramento members protested outside the headquarters of Sutter Health, which has been delaying negotiating with UHW-W, to demand the company immediately negotiate with the local.

However, their efforts have been made difficult as companies seek to delay bargaining in the hope that the UHW-W will be put under trusteeship and the company will be able to bargain with a more pliant SIEU-controlled union.

Despite the SEIU’s control of the hearing process, it was unable to prove the allegations of misconduct against the UHW-W. Faced with the UHW-W memberships’ determination to maintain control of their union, the SEIU has established a new voting process that could be used to legitimise action against the local.

The ballot, which will close on December 11, asks all SEIU members in California whether the 65,000 homecare and nursing home workers wish to join a statewide long-term care union with leaders appointed by Stern, or whether the UHW-W should be dissolved and a new statewide healthcare workers union created with leaders appointed by Stern.

The UHW-W have raised a number of concerns with the ballot process.

Firstly, the vote is only advisory, so the SEIU can ignore the result if they wish. Secondly, as it is a ballot of all SEIU members in California, the votes of UHW-W members may be blunted if their vote is swamped by the remainder of SEIU members in the state. Thirdly, UHW-W were only informed of the ballot when it was mailed to members, while other Californian locals were informed prior to its mailing so they could begin campaigning support of the proposals.

As such, the UHW-W has decided to boycott the vote, encouraging members to instead send postcards protesting the ballot.

[For more information on the UHW-W and the campaign against it, visit http://www.seiuvoice.org/.]

Originally published in Green Left Weekly #777

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