Our Life & Times

SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY ISSUE A JOURNAL OF 1199SEIU March/April 2009

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YEARS LATER In 1959, Mt. Sinai workers marched for union recognition. In 2009, 1199ers continue to march to preserve life-saving healthcare spending.

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Contents 3 4 5 6 8 10 11 12 13 14 15

LOOKING BACK TO MOVE FORWARD Following in the footsteps of our founders.

PRESIDENT’S COLUMN Fifty years of struggle and growth.

HOW DAVID DEFEATED GOLIATH How we became the major healthcare workers union.

THE POWER OF POLITICS Political mobilization has been key ingredient in our growth.

THE WORK WE DO The many faces of the 1199SEIU membership through the years.

ORGANIZING IS OUR LIFEBLOOD 1199SEIU bucks trend of labor’s decline.

HOW DIFFERENT GENERATIONS FIND THE UNION An intergenerational discussion.

OUR FAMILY OF FUNDS 1199ers benefit from variety of family benefits.

SOLIDARITY FOREVER An injury to one is an injury to all.

FRIENDS IN MANY PLACES 1199SEIU has won a wide variety of allies.

BREAD AND ROSES TOO We are in the vanguard of the workers’ cultural movement.

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Our Life And Times, March/April 2009, Vol. 27, No. 2 Published by 1199SEIU, United Healthcare Workers East 310 West 43rd St. New York, NY 10036 Telephone (212) 582-1890 www.1199seiu.org PRES I DE NT :

George Gresham S EC RETARY TREASURE R :

Maria Castaneda EXEC UTIVE VIC E PRES I DE NTS :

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Norma Amsterdam Yvonne Armstrong Angela Doyle Mike Fadel Aida Garcia George Kennedy Steve Kramer Patrick Lindsay Joyce Neil John Reid Bruce Richard Mike Rifkin Neva Shillingford Milly Silva Estela Vazquez E DITOR : J.J. Johnson STAFF WRITE R : Patricia Kenney PHOTOG RAPH E R :

Jim Tynan PHOTOG RAPHY ASS ISTANT : Belinda Gallegos ART DI RECTION & DES IG N : Maiarelli Studio COVE R PHOTOS : 1199 Archives; Jim Tynan

Our Life And Times is published 6 times a year by 1199SEIU, 310 West 43rd St., New York, NY 10036. Subscriptions $15 per year. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing offices.

ISSN 1090-3089.

USPS 000-392.

Postmaster: Send address changes to Our Life And Times, 310 West 43rd St., New York, NY 10036.

Years On The Frontlines

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50 Years of Progress ‘If there is no struggle, there is no progress.’ – FREDERICK DOUGLASS

Across the nation, working people are being pounded by a staggering economy.

Last February alone, U.S. employers shed 651,000 jobs, the largest one-month decline since 1949. At press time, job losses had reached 5 million since the economic downturn began in December 2007. Members of 1199SEIU have not been spared.

The economic collapse has wreaked havoc with state and local budgets. 1199ers from Maryland to Massachusetts have gone to battle with governors and legislators to prevent crippling cuts to state healthcare budgets In February, Caritas Healthcare, which operated St. John’s and Mary Immaculate hospitals in Queens, N.Y., closed both institutions, throwing some 2,500 workers, 1,500 of whom are 1199ers, onto the curb. At press time, the Job Security offices of the 1199SEIU Training and Employment Fund were working to assist our displaced members.

1199ers who are employed in New York City-area hospitals are also being asked to assist by ensuring that the jobs committees at their institutions identify available openings in which Caritas workers can be placed. And the Union leadership is working hard to shore up all available safety nets.

Today’s situation harkens back to an earlier period in 1199SEIU history— the 1959 campaign to represent the city’s voluntary hospital workers. Then, New York City’s hospital employees were the city’s forgotten workers. (See page 5.)

They called it a crusade when at that time a small union of dedicated drugstore workers— mostly Jewish men— decided to organize forgotten workers— mostly black and Puerto Rican women— in New York’s voluntary hospitals. That crusade led hospital workers from degradation to dignity and from weakness to unity.

The architect of that crusade was Leon Julius Davis, who was born Nov. 21, 1906 in the peasant village of Pinsk, White Russia (now Belarus). In his youth, Davis moved from Connecticut to New York to go to pharmacy school.

He never completed pharmacy school, but while working in Harlem drugstores, Davis learned principles that would become the hallmark of 1199 work. Interracial and interethnic solidarity were the first. Another was industrial unionism. Davis preached wall-towall unionism and unity among all job classifications.

Using these principles, 1199 in 1937 launched a successful

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campaign in Harlem to promote black drugstore porters to sodamen.

Local 1199 also was among the first unions to annually celebrate what was then called “Negro History Week.”

And alongside Davis during the hospital campaign was organizing genius Elliott Godoff and a dedicated, militant membership.

Drugstore workers, for example, awoke in the middle of the night to form “crack of dawn” brigades to leaflet the hospital workers.

That vision, courage, unity and spirit that transformed the lives of the workers and the healthcare

industry continue today. It is the spirit that brought tens of thousands to City Hall March 5 to protest N.Y. Gov. David Paterson’s shortsighted budget proposals. It is the spirit that last year helped to triple the size of our Massachusetts region.

It is that spirit that has sent 1199SEIU delegates to states far from home to fight for the right of workers to join unions and for national health care.

This issue describes how 1199 pioneers blazed the path that today’s 1199ers will take to lead us all forward.

The vision, courage, unity and spirit that transformed the lives of workers and the healthcare industry continue today.

Leon Davis (1906–1992), 1199 President.

THE PRESIDENT’S COLUMN George Gresham

50 Years of Struggle and Growth Our victories have transformed generations of lives.

Back in the 1950s, Local 1199 President Leon Davis and his colleagues opened a momentous new chapter in American labor history when they decided to organize New York’s hospital industry.

For a quarter of a century, 1199 had been a pharmacists’ union of 5,000 predominantly white, overwhelmingly male and largely Jewish members. The decision to organize tens of thousands of overworked and underpaid—$32 for a six-day workweek— predominantly African-American and Hispanic, mainly female hospital workers, changed the healthcare industry.

Nothing has been the same since that most courageous and audacious decision.

Taking inspiration from the civil rights revolution then growing in the southern states, Davis seized the moment. Like their southern brethren, the 1199 leaders knew that they would have to go to jail, to break unjust laws— New York State then made it illegal to organize hospital unions— and build public support and political power to make a new day come around. It was this vision that brought Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to declare that 1199 was his “favorite union.” It was this vision that led the dynamic Muslim leader Malcolm X to praise the Jewish Leon Davis and to choose 1199 as the only union he ever spoke before.

The breakthrough came 50 years ago this year, after mass marches, sit-ins, and work stoppages, when Dr. Martin Cherkasky, the CEO of Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, broke ranks with the rest of the industry by entering into collective bargaining with the union. The rest, as they say, is history.

On a personal note, I am 54 years old. So 1199 has been a hospital and healthcare union virtually my entire life. I was born and raised in the segregated South. When my family moved to New York, I was angry —my DNA contained the “social justice gene”— but unfocused. My father, a trade unionist, and I would argue about direction. He praised the power of organized labor, but too many unions looked only for more “bread and butter” for their members, without seeing the larger picture.

I joined 1199 in 1975 as a maintenance worker at Manhattan’s Presbyterian Hospital. 1199 was a different kind of union, one that believed in economic and social justice for all workers – not only those within our borders—and that acted on those beliefs. Our solidarity with sisters and brothers from Vietnam to Chile and El Salvador to South Africa was a source of pride—and remains so.

This issue of Our Life and Times commemorates our 50th anniversary of becoming a hospital union—and eventually a healthcare workers’ union representing every sector of our industry (hospitals, nursing homes, home care, clinics, etc.) and every job classification.

Today we are 340,000 strong and growing still, as new hospital workers in Massachusetts join our ranks, just as homecare workers do in Washington, DC. 1199SEIU is now the amalgamation of 17 smaller locals that have joined with the former Local 1199. Our diversity—a beautiful mosaic of women and men of virtually every national origin, color, and belief — continues to grow as we build in rural, suburban and exurban communities as well as big cities.

Later this year, we will celebrate these 50 years with 50 consecutive days of activities, cultural programs and parties. We will honor our history and the many thousands of leaders and activists who built our traditions and brought us to this moment. But we know that the best tribute we can make is to build upon what we have been given, and to make sure that 1199SEIU is ever bigger, ever stronger, ever greater when it reaches its 100th anniversary.

ON GAZA CONFLICT n a recent issue of Our Life and Times (Jan/Feb, 2009), Ghassan Fawzi presented a wrong and biased picture of the recent battle between Israel and Hamas terrorists who control Gaza. Through the use of false analysis, he attempts to fool us into believing that the recent conflict was Israel’s fault. Here are the facts: Fact: Hamas is a terrorist organization, declared so by the United Nations and the EU. It is not seeking a peace agreement which would result in a two-state solution.

Fact: Hamas prevents peace between Palestinians and Israel.

Fact: Hamas in its charter of formation, section seven, writes that its mission is to destroy Israel and murder Jewish people.

Fact: In 2006 Hamas declared openly it would not observe a cease-fire with Israel.

Fact: Since 2006 more than 6,000 rockets and mortars were fired into Israel’s population centers by Hamas, in violation of every human rights standard.

Fact: The Palestinian Center for Human Rights in Gaza reported, “32 Palestinians have been killed and dozens injured and tortured by Hamas during the fighting.”

Fact: The elected leaders of the Palestinians, Prime Minister Abbas, has been negotiating with Israel to achieve a comprehensive peace plan, which has been fought against

by Hamas in Gaza.

I could go on, but I believe my brothers and sisters in 1199 are able to distinguish fact from fiction.

Fawzi can try to fool us with words, but it is clear that Israel was acting to protect its citizens from terrorist attacks, as any country would do.

Israel showed forbearance and did not respond, hoping, instead, that negotiations with the Palestinian Authority and its unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 would move the peace process forward.

Hamas cynically and manipulatively used human shields as it fired rockets into Israel. It placed weapons and rocket launchers in homes, mosques and even schools.

Israel’s military response took Palestinian civilians into account, so much so that it put its own soldiers at risk. Over and over, polls in Israel show a willingness by the overwhelming majority of the people to make peace with the Palestinians, and for a two-state solution.

As long as those who rule Gaza reject Israel’s right to exist, and continue to engage in terror, that objective, which we all hope and pray for, will not be realized.

ANOTHER VIEW hassan Fawzi’s recent letter was a sobering slap amid my post-inaugural Obama-satisfaction. As a third generation healthcare worker from a family of 1199 members, I was raised with strong respect for the promotion of life and health in my work, community, and the world.

There is virtue and honor in making people feel well, or, when we can no longer do that, in making them as comfortable as possible.

The attacks on the people of Gaza were both cruel and disproportionate in their intensity and scope, as is clear to anyone who realizes the population density and travel prohibitions in the region.

The embargo imposed by Israel for nearly two years has left Gazan facilities woefully unstocked with basic medical supplies.

But most disturbing have been reports of the deliberate targeting of ambulances, hospitals, and aid convoys by the Israeli military, and its deliberate prevention of aid workers from reaching injured civilians. A relief boat carrying a crew of international journalists, teachers, doctors, and politicians was nearly sunk by the Israeli Navy.

These have been identified as violations of international law by nonprofit, nongovernmental, and nonsectarian human rights organizations such as the United Nations, the International Committee for the Red Cross, and Physicians for Human Rights.

The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that every individual has the right to the medical care necessary for the health and well-being of himself and of his family. Medical neutrality is guaranteed by the First and Second Geneva Conventions, and violation of this principle is a war crime.

Warring factions have a legal obligation to protect civilians, and to allow those injured to receive medical care. Implicit in these international laws are the following stipulations: access to medical supplies should never be restricted, health workers should never be prevented from fulfilling our professional duties, and we must never be deprived free passage to the areas where our services are needed. Just as our patients should not be denied care, we should not be prohibited from providing it, nor should we face the threat of deliberate attack in attempting to provide care for others.

Change has been the mantra of the nation since Obama’s campaign gained force, but the hope we share is not ours alone. There is a world which looks to our country, its leadership, and our people with the hope that they will share in the change our collective work has created here. And I hope that they are right.

SANDY MEYERS, LCSW Jewish Home Lifecare, Bronx, N.Y.

SUSAN DUNCAN Queens Hospital Center, Jamaica, N.Y.

Letters

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OUR UNION

How David Defeated Goliath How 1199 became the city’s major hospital workers union.

1199’s brilliant organizing director, the late Elliott Godoff.

ifty years ago this spring, Local 1199 and seven of New York City’s major hospitals were locked in a bitter David and Goliath strike that would change the face of the healthcare industry in New York and, eventually, the nation.

At first glance, the opponents seemed poorly matched.

The hospitals, some now closed or renamed, were Mount Sinai, Beth Israel, Bronx, Lenox Hill, Brooklyn Jewish, Beth David and Flower-Fifth Ave. Their boards of trustees included some of the city’s richest and most powerful men. They were strengthened by the law (voluntary hospitals at that time were exempted from labor law that gave almost all other workers the right to organize and bargain collectively), by widespread public indifference (hospital workers were mostly black and Hispanic women whose poverty existed beneath the radar of most middle-class New Yorkers) and by public opinion (for many, striking a hospital seemed unthinkable).

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he union was a 27-year-old, 5,000member organization of drugstore workers who voted to take on a challenge until then ignored by the labor movement. Moved by the $32 weekly wages of full-time hospital workers who in many cases qualified for public assistance and had no health care coverage, they had begun a hospital organizing drive on Dec. 30, 1958 with a 628-31 election victory at Montefiore Hospital in the Bronx. Following up with organizing campaigns throughout the city, they were met with a stone wall of management opposition.

“We don’t have to agree to elections, and we won’t. What are you going to do about it?” management said.

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Led by Pres. Leon Davis and organizing director Elliott Godoff, 1199’s staff and members took stock. They knew they were a small union with limited resources and few allies. But, they reasoned, with right on their side that could change. Especially, they saw, given the determination of the seven hospitals’ 3,000 workers. he walkout began on May 8, 1959.

Gloria Arana, a laundry worker at Mount Sinai and a strike leader, didn’t know what to expect. But when she got to the hospital and saw Madison Ave. crowded with pickets who convinced their coworkers not to go inside, she felt, she said later, that it was “a beautiful day!”

The strike continued for 46 days. It soon became apparent that 1199 had some powerful secret weapons. It had the crack-ofdawn brigades of drugstore workers, many of them Jewish pharmacists, who showed up daily at picket lines. It had a masterful public outreach that soon had major newspapers editorializing in favor of the union’s “crusade on behalf of New York’s forgotten workers.”

It had the crucial support of New York City Central Labor Council Pres. Harry Van Arsdale, Jr. It had the backing of black and Hispanic political and religious leaders.

But the strikers themselves were the union’s major weapon. Typical was Mount Sinai orderly Henry Nicholas, a future president of the 1199-initiated National Hospital Union. Explaining his round-theclock commitment as a picket captain, he said: “I knew my only salvation in terms of a job was to win and that I had to do what was necessary to make a win come about.”

When the strike ended on June 22, the union hadn’t won—at least not on paper.

The settlement created a foot-in-the-door

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David had beaten Goliath.

Hospitals in New York City were never the same again, and a pattern had been set for much of the rest of the country.

Permanent Advisory Committee (PAC) that allowed for speedy return of the strikers to their jobs, grievance machinery and minor bread-and-butter gains. But there was no union recognition.

The union, however, treated the settlement as a victory. The struggle, said one striker, had convinced the workers “they were part of a movement.” Moe Foner, the union’s public relations officer, said the workers “were prepared to go to hell and back for the union.” 1199 chapters soon were formed at most of the city’s 81 voluntary hospitals, even without management recognition. Workers at each hospital paid union dues, attended chapter meetings and felt their power grow over the course of several years. second major strike in 1962 followed by workplace and political victories (including the right to collective bargaining) led to the replacement of the PAC by management’s genuine recognition of 1199. By 1968, the union had 40,000 members and a citywide hospital contract bringing a $100 weekly minimum wage (triple that of only nine years earlier) plus health care and pension coverage and many other gains.

David had beaten Goliath. Hospitals in New York City were never the same again, and a pattern had been set for much of the rest of the country.

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From left: 1199 Pres. Leon Davis, N.Y.C. Mayor Robert Wagner, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other officials at an event held by the Brotherhood Party, a labor-backed coalition that supported Wagner’s re-election in 1961.

“THE GOVERNMENT ONLY UNDERSTANDS THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE UNITED” Politics has been major ingredient in growth of 1199SEIU

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olitics is in 1199SEIU’s blood.

The Union was founded by political radicals who came of age during the upsurge of labor and the Left in the 1930s. Led by Pres. Leon Davis, Local 1199 helped win the enactment of New Deal legislation such as the Social Security and Fair Labor Standard acts.

Unfortunately, New Deal labor reform excluded hospital workers. It would take the mobilization of 1199ers in their workplaces, the streets and legislative chambers to ultimately win collective bargaining rights.

While 1199 began signing up hospital workers to petition for a

union, it also began speaking to New York State legislators, the media, and allies in the labor and activists communities to press its campaign for bargaining rights.

1199’s string of hospital victories in 1959 did not lead to formal union recognition. (See story on page 5.)

In Not for Bread Alone, the excellent memoir of the late Moe Foner, the 1199 executive VP and PR expert, describes the multi-faceted campaign to win bargaining rights.

An aspect was 1199’s campaign in the state legislature, including its endorsement of New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller in 1962. Gov. Rockefeller, who was running for re-election, had promised to put his weight behind a bargaining bill.

“Dr. (Martin Luther) King called Rockefeller and asked him to live up to his promise and force the bill through,” wrote Foner.

A partial victory came in 1963

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POLITICS

1199SEIU’s endorsement is much sought out not only for our vast resources, but especially for the number of member volunteers we can bring to a campaign.

with the passage of a bill giving collective bargaining rights only to voluntary hospital workers in New York City. Workers throughout the state finally won bargaining rights after a 55-day strike of Lawrence Hospital service workers in suburban Bronxville, N.Y. Throughout its 1960s campaigns, 1199, famous for championing civil rights from its inception, preached the necessity of combining labor power with soul power. Dr. King is widely reported to have called 1199 his favorite union.

From Viet Nam to Iraq, 1199SEIU remained on the frontlines for peace.

1199ers also have led campaigns for the rights of women and immigrants and against police abuse. Hundreds of members have joined the Young Workers Program.

Today more than 60 percent of the 340,000 members of 1199SEIU make monthly voluntary contributions to the Union’s Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Political Action Fund. Thousands of members lobby elected officials in local, state and national legislative halls.

Beginning in the late 1980s under the leadership of Pres. Dennis Rivera, 1199 actually stepped up its political activity. It was among the key organizations that spearheaded the campaign to elect David Dinkins as New York’s first African American mayor. It played a similar role in the election of the nation’s first Puerto Rican member of Congress, Nydia Velazquez of New York’s 12th CD. 1199ers also have won legislative seats. In New York City, former 1199SEIU staffers Annabel Palma and Melissa Mark Viverito have been elected to the City Council. MarylandD.C. Region 1199SEIU Political Organizer Veronica Turner chairs the Maryland General Assembly’s Legislative Black Caucus.

1199SEIU’s endorsement is much

sought out not only for our vast resources, but especially for the number of member volunteers we can bring to a campaign. For example, on Nov. 4, more than 3,000 members and staff of 1199SEIU worked in the nation’s battleground states to get out the vote for Barack Obama.

Today 1199SEIU’s political strength is being sorely tested as state executives and legislators attempt to balance their budgets at the expense of patients and caregivers. And already underserved communities are at greatest risk.

1199SEIU’s Massachusetts Region in response has launched a “Put Patients First” coalition campaign to shield Boston Medical Center from painful cuts. The coalition has united some 50 organizations, and on the heels of a successful January rally, was planning an advocacy day for April 15.

New Yorkers also are battling to prevent life-threatening state budget

cuts. A high point in its campaign came on March 5 when some 70,000 demonstrators rallied near City Hall to denounce Gov. David Paterson’s budget proposals. 1199 was the largest contingent in the demonstration.

Among the 1199ers were several who returned from their vacations to attend the rally. Susan Lewis, a CNA at Bluepoint NH in Baltimore, Md., came to the rally with two busloads of 1199ers from Baltimore. Not far from Lewis, stood a delegation of 1199SEIU retirees “This is an injustice and I believe we must fight all injustices,” says Bronx Lebanon Hospital Patient Care Tech Israel Galindo, who came to the rally with homemade signs and a bugle. “The government only understands the power of the people united.”

At press time, members continued to lobby their legislators.

THE WORK WE DO

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THE WORK WE DO

A HISTORY OF CARING 1199SEIU members work in service, maintenance, clerical, and professional jobs in about 1,000 hospitals, nursing home, clinics, drugstores, medical schools and homes throughout Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Washington, D.C. 1199SEIU members also work in non-healthcare settings such as universities, legal, social service and mental-health agencies and childcare centers.

As the healthcare industry advances, 1199ers secure the training to remain up-to-date in their disciplines and to fill newly-created positions.

Throughout its history, 1199SEIU has fought for quality patient care and a safe and secure workplace, fair compensation and dignity for all its caregivers. 1199SEIU also has worked tirelessly for a better life for all Americans in a safe and secure world.

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ORGANIZING

In the last nine years the Union has organized almost 100,000 workers in New York, Massachusetts, Maryland and Washington, D.C. In the largest labor organizing drive in New England history, 22,000 personal care attendants in Massachusetts voted overwhelmingly to join 1199SEIU in Nov. 2007. Consumer Cindy Purcell from Rutland, Mass, left, who is quadriplegic, was among the activists and PCA’s supporters who spoke when the election results were announced on Nov. 8, 2007.

Geri Smith, a CNA at Sweetbrook Care center in Williamstown, Mass. Workers at Sweetbrook have been involved in an organizing struggle since in January and at press time were waiting for a decision from the National Labor Relations Board about their employer’s conduct during the organizing drive.

In Washington, D.C. 1199SEIU was the first union to organize homecare workers.

The Union won elections at three separate homecare agencies in 2008. In New York, the Union won collective bargaining agreements with agencies such as Best Care and Prestige after protracted battles. 1199SEIU is continuing to organize thousands of homecare workers. Improving their standards and conditions is among the Union’s major goals moving forward.

Organizing is Our Lifeblood “You deserve to be treated with respect.”

rganizing workers is the lifeblood of 1199SEIU. Whether it’s staying the course to win an election where the boss fights workers tooth and nail or negotiating an election agreement such as the landmark pact with the Caritas/Christi institutions in Massachusetts, 1199SEIU shows today as it did in the 1959 strike that the power of unified workers is a force for profound change.

“There’s such a feeling of jubilance and pride when workers win,” says Ruth Massey, a recently retired delegate from New York Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan. “It says that you deserve to be treated with respect and shows that if you demand it you can actually achieve it.” Massey was among the leaders of Presby’s historic organizing campaign in the early 1970’s.

In the last nine years the Union has organized almost 100,000 workers in New York State, Massachusetts, Maryland and

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Washington, D.C. That unity brings unprecedented power at the bargaining table, in the halls of government, and in the voting booth. n Massachusetts alone, the Union has in the last three years tripled the size of its membership from 10,000 to 34,000 workers. Hundreds of nursing home workers have joined the union in scores of elections.

And 22,000 personal care attendants won union membership in an historic 2007 election. But there are still some 50,000 unorganized hospital workers in the Greater Boston area, and the Union is working to build power among those workers and give them a voice on the job.

“I’ve talked to a lot of people who are in unions and who are in health care and it’s made a difference. A lot of times people don’t see the connection between the Union and patient care, but as soon as we get together as a group we can put the spotlight on things that need to be improved or changed,’ says

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hose victories continue the 1199SEIU tradition of using the strength of members and their political power to organize workers, improve their conditions, and win greater healthcare funding. Many 1199ers are working on a national campaign to win passage of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which is legislation that if passed would protect workers from being fired when they try to join unions. It would also allow workers to form a union when a majority sign cards indicating that’s what they desire. In addition, the Free Choice Act would mandate effective legal resolution through a neutral third party if a first contract was not reached within 90 days of unionization.

Robin Calef is a CNA at St. Joseph’s Manor in Brockton, Mass. where workers lost a union election in September, 2006.

The results were later thrown out when it was shown that workers were harassed and intimidated.

“We had 80% of our cards signed,” says Calef. “If the Employee Free Choice Act was in place it definitely would have benefited us.”

In March, Calef attended a national mobilization in Washington, D.C. that included lobbying and rallies in support of the Free Choice Act. “It isn’t just about our benefits,” she says of winning a union at St. Joseph’s. “A lot of us that are there put our patients first. We’re not just working for the money, we’re working for the best of our patients.”

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OUR MEMBERS

HOW I FOUND THE UNION An intergenerational discussion.

To mark the 50th anniversary of 1199SEIU becoming a hospital workers union, Our Life And Times and our website will publish moderated discussions between young members and retirees.

Following is the first of those discussions between retiree Larry Gonzalez, 79, who helped to organize workers from Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx into 1199 in the 1960s, and Sintcha Obas, 28, who recently went through a six-month strike at Kingsbridge NH in the Bronx where she is a therapeutic activity leader.

Gonzalez and Obas held their discussion in March in 1199SEIU’s Manhattan offices.

Obas: What was your introduction to the Union?

Gonzalez: My first introduction to the Union was through Bernie Minter, who was a friend of 1199 Pres. Leon Davis and who had lots of experience in the union movement.

Obas: Was he an 1199 organizer?

Gonzalez: No, Bernie was a worker in the Einstein machine shop. We were lucky to have someone there to educate us about what a union really is. My experience with unions up to then was what I read in the Daily News. To me unions were no more than Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters. Bernie explained that a union is a group of people trying to organize themselves against the boss who’s trying to pay them as little as possible.

One big problem we had was trying to organize different classification of workers. Some were working on research projects.

Some were cleaning the floors, doing custodial work. We had to impress upon them that although they were doing different work, we all had the same boss.

Obas: We had similar problems

“Before the strike I didn’t know very much about unions.”

—Sintcha Obas

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at Kingsbridge. For example in my department, I would say about half of the people weren’t willing to strike. We all were afraid because we didn’t know how we would survive during the strike. Also management told us that the Union couldn’t win because owner Helen Sieger was a millionaire.

I don’t believe that these workers were looking into the future because all they cared about was their next paycheck.

Management also paid workers more than the usual rate to get them to cross the picket line.

Gonzalez: Workers have to understand that they’re not just striking for themselves. They are striking for others and for future workers.

Obas: Some people, including relatives, told me that I was too young to go out on strike. They said that I should leave the picket line and get another job.

Gonzalez: I know that Bernie together with Joe James, who was also from Einstein, used to teach new member orientation classes.

I believe something like that is very important. We didn’t have that. We had to learn on the job.

“It’s important to listen and learn and try to influence other young workers…”

—Larry Gonzalez

Bernie taught me that when I was right, I should go into the boss’ office like a lion, but when I was wrong, I should go in like a lamb.

And I sometimes had to go in like a lamb when I represented members who were at fault.

Obas: I didn’t have new members classes. I was educated on the picket line while I was on strike. We would gather with the organizers, read the booklets and answer questions. Before the strike I didn’t know very much about unions.

Gonzalez: I worked for many years in Asia and Africa and that gave me an appreciation for what we have here and the importance of unions.

Obas: What advice would you give me as a young union member?

Gonzalez: It’s important to listen and learn and to try to influence other young workers to join and get involved in unions.

Without a union, the boss can do many things. With a union, you have rights and security. We’re also fortunate to work in an industry that’s growing and now we have Obama as president. We are in a unique position.

OUR FUNDS

Much More Than Wages Family of Funds enriches members’ lives. he growth of 1199SEIU has enabled members to win groundbreaking contractual benefits. This is especially true for members who are covered by the National and Greater New York Benefit Funds. The major funds cover more than 400,000 members, retirees and their families.

“Over the years, we’ve improved our benefits,” says retired Pathmark pharmacist Michael Varel, who joined 1199 in 1950, almost a decade before the Union hospital organizing campaign. “Now our benefits are the best,” Varel says. My wife and I can walk into a pharmacy, get our drugs and not pay a penny. That’s a lifesaver.”

“The Funds have played very important roles in my life and that of my family,” says Sybilla Daniel-Douglas, a RN at Brooklyn’s Brookdale Family Care Center. DanielDouglas’s family has taken full advantage of health, training and child care benefits.

“The Child Care Fund (CCF) has provided me with the opportunity for affordable, top-quality child care and services for my three daughters that I would not have been able to afford,” Daniel-Douglas says. “And through the RN Training Fund, I was able to return to school after 20 years to earn my Masters of Science degree in nursing.”

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Daniel-Douglas fits the profile of many 1199ers — mothers who are concerned about health care, education, job security and quality education and programs for their children.

Sybilla Daniel-Douglas, far right, an RN at Brooklyn’s Brookdale Family Center, with husband Leslie, and daughters (from right) Stephanie, 16, Kailah, 12, and Danielle, 20.

aniel-Douglas fits the profile of many 1199ers – mothers who are concerned about health care, education, job security and quality education and programs for their children.

After 1199SEIU was successful at winning a living wage for its members in the 1960s, it turned its attention to negotiating benefits.

For a union that was now majority women, family issues such as child care came to the fore. In 1991, 1199 was able to win League

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funding for the CCF. The CCF, Daniel-Douglas says, has had a profound effect on daughters Danielle, 20; Stephanie, 16, and Kailah, 12. “Danielle, who is now in college, made lifelong friendships through CCF college prep and camp programs,” says the proud mother.

“She was assisted with college applications, essays, financial aid forms, Regents and SAT review classes,” Daniel-Douglas says.

“Participating in these programs gave her the opportunity to interact with all kinds of people from different cultures and backgrounds.

“Stephanie and Kailah have both participated in the Anne Shore sleep-away camp programs and in the CCF’s holiday program during the one-week school holidays. And over the years, both girls have taken classes at Hofstra University and Queensborough Community College. During the summer they attended day camp at Hofstra. My kids would come home with so much to say because their days were full of interesting activities. These programs were all paid for by the CCF.” aniel-Douglas says that she is so grateful for what she and her family have received in union benefits that she strongly believes in giving back. She serves on the CCF Advisory Committee and is a member of the 1199SEIU League of Registered Nurses Office of Continuing Education Provider Unit.

She also continues her own education by attending Continuing Education classes. And lately has been attending parenting seminars offered by the CCF. Funds’ programs provide so much that members need, Daniel-Douglas says. “I just wish more nurses would take advantage of the programs that are being offered.”

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March/April • Our Life And Times

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“TRUE SOLIDARITY AMONG UNION PEOPLE” 1199SEIU has a long tradition of supporting struggles for peace and justice at home and around the world.

Solidarity is the taproot from which much of 1199’s strength has over the years grown. Members of 1199SEIU have a long tradition of participation in campaigns for worker’s rights, civil rights, social justice and peace at home and abroad.

The Union is closely bonded with the civil rights movement.

Dr. Martin Luther King called 1199 “his favorite union.” Dr. King and Malcolm X both addressed 1199 rallies. 1199ers broke down doors for minority workers in New York City, Baltimore, Philadelphia and even Charleston, S.C., where in 1969 the union lost a hard fought yet historic 113-day strike at Charleston County Hospital and the Medical College of South Carolina.

1199 was the first union to officially condemn the Vietnam War, a position that came not from the administration but directly from a rank-and file motion at a delegate assembly. The position helped pave the way for the formation of a national antiwar labor coalition. 1199SEIU was the first to issue an official statement condemning both Iraq Wars. 1199ers for Peace and Justice has been an active critic of the war and members of 1199SEIU regularly participate in activities sponsored by U.S. Labor Against The War. “Ending these monstrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is important if we’re trying to save jobs and preserve what we have.

We have to reduce that war budget. That goes back to Vietnam,” says Charlie McLauglin, a ultrasound technologist at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, N.Y. McLaughlin is an

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March/April • Our Life And Times

1199 was the first union to officially condemn the Vietnam War, a position that came directly from a rank-and-file motion at a delegate assembly.

Throughout its history, 1199’s members have been outspoken activists for peace.

Members demonstrated against the Vietnam War (top) and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (bottom).

active member of United for Peace and Justice.

The Union also took a stand against the U.S. Navy’s bombings of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques. Former 1199SEIU Pres.

Dennis Rivera, Rev. Al Sharpton and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. spent 30 days together in a Puerto Rican jail in 2001 for refusing to leave Vieques in an effort to halt naval bombing. The Navy eventually ended it’s bombing of the island.

The Union has been a vocal opponent of police brutality.

Members joined mobilizations calling for justice for victims including Abner Louima who in 1997 was forcibly sodomized with a plunger and Amadou Diallou, who in 1999 was shot

gations visiting many nations, including Brazil, Venezuela, Haiti and Cuba.

41 times and killed by New York City police.

In labor struggles, 1199ers have stood with farm workers in California, newspaper workers in Detroit and New York, and nurses in Kentucky. They’ve contributed money, time and resources to disaster relief after hurricanes in the Caribbean and the U.S. Gulf Coast Members and staff traveled in 1994 to South Africa to witness that nation’s first free elections after the end of apartheid.

They’ve also established a close relationship with our sister union there, the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (NEHAWU). 1199ers have joined trade unionist dele-

In 2007 Debra Friedland, a contract administrator at St. John’s Episcopal Hospital in Queens, N.Y., went to Cuba with a delegation of RNs to learn about universal health care. The group met with representatives from the Cuban Society of Nursing, the Cuban Nurses Union and other public health officials.

“It was true solidarity among union people,” says Friedland.

“We found that there were more things alike than there were different. They make do with what they have and so do we. They struggle and strive to provide quality care and so do we.”

1. Pres. Bill Clinton 2. Cesar Chavez 3. Rep. Charles Rangel 4. Coretta Scott King 5. Rep. Nydia Velazquez 6. Eleanor Roosevelt 7. Hillary Clinton 8. NYC Councilmember John Liu 9. Malcolm X 10. Ossie Davis & Ruby Dee

11. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy 12. Cardinal John O’Connor 13. Danny Glover 14. Mayor David Dinkins 15. Sen. Edward Kennedy 16. Russell Simmons 17. Rev. Jesse Jackson 18. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 19. Pres. Barack Obama

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March April • 1199SEIU News

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1199SEIU has had many notable supporters throughout the years. Just a few of them are pictured here.

Can you name them?

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THE ARTS

Bread and Roses Cultural program gives workers a chance to explore their own creativity. he Bread and Roses Cultural Project was founded in 1978.

It was the brainchild of late 1199 Exec.VP Moe Foner, who was inspired by labor leader Philip Murray. In the 1940s, Murray was asked what workers wanted. “Paintings on the wall, carpets on the floor and music in the home,” was his famous reply. Murray’s answer motivated Foner, who saw art and culture as powerful organizing tools, to create Bread and Roses.

Over the course of its thirty-year history, Bread and Roses has offered programs that proved time and time again that working people value the enrichment of their creative spirits as much as they do their pocketbooks.

Elaine Spiro, a social worker retired from the now-closed Brooklyn-Caledonian Hospital, participated in several of Bread and Roses’ Workers Write classes.

“Art, culture, writing—it helps you understand people and their needs and feelings as well as seeing your own needs and feelings,” she says. “It’s a way to connect with other people that can also enrich your own life.”

Bread and Roses over the years created a diverse array of projects and worked with notable artists such as Larry Rivers and Milton Glaser. The program produced the five-

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week tour in 1989 of the musical “Take Care II” about the lives of health care workers.

Some 10,000 people saw 28 performances.

Through Bread and Roses, workers have participated in creative writing classes, which were taught by Esther Cohen, who was Foner’s successor as Bread and Roses’ director, and put on gospel music concerts. They held readings of their original poetry, which were reviewed in the New York Times.

Workers’ original photography has been shown as part of the award-winning Unseenamerica photo project in prestigious exhibition spaces including Buffalo’s SEPA Gallery. And the program’s Women of Hope poster series, which featured such notable women as Rep. Nydia Velasquez and Nobel Prize-winning environmentalist Wangari Matthai, was displayed at the United Nations. he program gives workers a chance to display their artistic gifts that are often put on the back burner because of the demands of working life, says Wayne Bowen, an accomplished painter who works in materials management at Beth Israel Medical Center. Bowen regularly showed his work in Bread and Roses’ Member Art Shows.

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The program gives workers a chance to display their artistic gifts that are often put on the back burner because of the demands of working life.

Above: 1199 Exec. VP Moe Foner with Peter Yarrow, Gloria Steinem and Ossie Davis at the Bread and Roses Gallery at 1199SEIU headquarters in Manhattan in 1980.

Top right: Performers in the musical “Take Care” which was an original production

by Bread and Roses about the lives of health care workers. Bottom right: Bread and Roses’ Women of Hope poster featuring Maya Angelou.

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March/April • Our Life And Times

“There is not enough support for the arts in general, but when you have a platform like Bread and Roses it really helps,” says Bowen. “It’s a difficult thing to commit to art, but you can’t let your life drown you.

Part of you will die.” owen has worked full time to support his artistic career and has been drawing and painting since his childhood in Jamaica.

Bowen’s work has been shown at The Museum of Contemporary Arts in San Antonio, Texas; the Gallery of Graphic Arts in New York City and in many other group shows. Today his work is considered collectible and several dealers represent him.

“Bread and Roses has been a phenomenal support,” says Bowen. “It took my art to where it is today.”

Angela Sampson, a former home attendant with the Jewish Community and United Homecare, performed at several of Bread and Roses’ Gospel Cafes with her Rock of Holiness Deliverance Ministries Choir. “The program helps you see that you’re not just a worker when you have the opportunity,” says Sampson. “Most unions wouldn’t think to offer such a thing, but with Bread and Roses and 1199 there’s a place for everyone.”

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THE BACK PAGE

The Spark That Lit the Flame The 46-day strike in 1959 that established 1199 as New York’s hospital workers union included Mt. Sinai’s Maria Cruz (third from front) and two of her daughters.

Cruz earned just $36 before taxes for a six-day workweek and needed relief payments to survive. See page 5.