• In this Issue >
  • Features
    • From the President
    • Is that a FLEX-FUEL you're driving?
    • Devastating news
    • Face time
    • UAW legislative priorities for 2006
    • UAW delegates meet with congressman
    • Workers Memorial Day
    • The Dangers below
    • Connecting dots, to Delphi’s Miller
    • Life on Line
  • Union Front
    • Company postpones filing court motions
    • Workers authorize strike
    • Anti-union group grasping at straws
    • Dana workers choose the UAW
    • Election results may be key to passage
    • Member minute
    • Organizing Roundup
  • Departments
    • From the Readers
    • Just the Facts
    • World of Work
    • UAW 101
    • Safer Work
    • Still Solid
    • Skilled Trades
    • Workers' Words
    • Solidarity Index / Past Issues

IN MEMORY

“Women, if the soul of the nation is to be saved, I believe that you must become its soul.”

Coretta Scott King
1927-2006

ORGANIZING ROUNDUP

More than 500 workers in Region 2B pick UAW

From sheriff’s deputies to snow removal crews, recent organizing activities in Region 2B have brought about 550 new members into the UAW.

In Toledo, Ohio, an election Jan. 26-27 by members of the Lucas County Sheriff’s Department’s noncommand unit netted 447 new members. The unit includes officers below the rank of corporal, deputy sheriffs, emergency dispatchers, corrections, court security and transportation officers, juvenile justice workers and counselors.

“We are thrilled because the UAW can do so much for us,” said Pam Boose, a deputy sheriff. “We called the UAW because we had some concerns, and the union came right in here and listened to what we had to say.”

Among concerns, she said, were problems with safety equipment, jail monitors and air quality.

Election results are awaiting certification by the State Employment Relations Board, which oversees collective bargaining for Ohio public workers.

The noncommand unit joins the 35 members of the sheriff’s command unit and 12 registered nurses and licensed practical nurses who joined the UAW in 2002.

Also in 2B, the Perkins Township Highway Department voted to join the UAW, along with workers at the Painesville (Ohio) City Department. Both units provide highway maintenance and snow removal.

In other victories:

• In Region 1C, workers at Ryder in Lansing, Mich., joined the UAW through a card-check election Feb. 2. They warehouse parts for General Motors Corp.

• In Region 5, workers in Fort Worth, Texas, are UAW members after an NLRB election at the Mercedes Parts Warehouse. They distribute parts to Daimler-

Chrysler dealerships.

• At Keen Transport in Oswego, Ill., Region 4 workers who prepare finished Caterpillar wheel loaders and other products for shipping joined the UAW.

• Workers at Plastech Engineered Products in Grandville, Mich., and Moraine, Ohio, won UAW representation through recent card checks. This included new Region 1D workers in Michigan who produce auto parts for Johnson Controls Inc., the Big Three, Nissan and Mercedes; and in Ohio, new Region 2B workers who produce plastic exterior molding for GM.

Sandra Davis

VFW NATIONAL HOME

Follow progress online

Members of the UAW can go online to check out the VFW National Home two-family duplex that their union dollars and brawn are building.

The 2,400-square-foot structure in Eaton Rapids, Mich., is scheduled for completion this spring.

Visit www.vfwnationalhome.org/new_house.

The UAW’s Veterans Affairs Department is the first non-VFW organization to partner with the National Home on such a major development. This duplex is the first new construction on the National Home campus in 40 years.

The VFW National Home for Children, founded in 1925, is a nonprofit child care agency that is privately funded through individual and organizational donations.