UE Northeast Region The Northeast's Rank-and-File Union

UE General Executive Board member Larsene Taylor led a spirited contingent from UE Local 150 in Saturday's HKonJ (Historic Thousands on Jones Street) march for social justice, sponsored by the NAACP, UE and other labor, religious, civil rights and community organizations. It was sponsored by the NAACP, UE and other labor, religious, civil rights and community organizations ...

Greenfield, MA GETTING INVOLVED: Justin Durgin, (UE Local 262 at Madico in Woburn, MA) and Ali Goguen were

By a 78-19 vote on Tuesday night March 2, Senate Democrats crashed through the Republican roadblock set up by retiring Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY), and passed an extension of unemployment benefits.

This is what a Congressional train wreck must look like...

Politicians keep talking while the insurance companies rake in the profits...

A settlement of pay and benefit claims has been reached between the members of UE Local 1174, who formerly worked at Quad City Die Casting (QCDC), and the trustee in charge of the company’s assets. UE members will be paid for vacation to which they were entitled in 2009, and the trustee will place money from the sale of the company’s assets into a fund to settle workers’ outstanding medical bills that went unpaid when the company retroactively cancelled health coverage last year. The medical fund will be sufficient to settle these bills with healthcare providers at approximately 50 cents on the dollar, which is expected to be enough to relieve the workers of any liability.

Members of Local 274 at Lamson & Goodnow Manufacturing in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts are scheduled to return to work on Wednesday, February 17, after being locked out by management since December 4, 2009. Just four days ago, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) informed the union and the company that it would be issuing a large group of complaints against Lamson & Goodnow.

Our patience is at an end. The agency that's supposed to enforce U.S. labor law and protect worker rights needs to get back to full strength and back to work.

No more fooling around with these racketeers.

Warehouse Workers for Justice and clergy members in Joliet, Illinois are organizing a consumer boycott of vacuum cleaner manufacturer Bissell. The boycott movement was prompted by the firing last November of 70 workers at Bissell’ warehouse near Joliet, after the workers filed charges over violations of workers’ rights at the facility, including violations of wage and hour laws, and began union organizing.

The coming year will make or break the Democrats.

UE gained 160 new members today as drivers who work at Renzenberger Incorporated in Chicago voted by a 3 to 1 margin to join UE. The election victory is also a win for Warehouse Workers for Justice (WWJ), a broad campaign to improve conditions for thousands of transportation and logistics workers in greater Chicago.

Clergy and other religious leaders in Joliet, Illinois will conduct a press conference on Martin Luther King Day (Monday, Jan. 18) to announce a boycott of Bissell products. Their goal is to secure justice for a group of Bissell warehouse workers who were fired last year when they blew the whistle on violations at the warehouse near Joliet.

Members of UE Local 893 picketed the Anamosa State Penitentiary on January 9, to make the public aware of the impact of pending layoffs of correctional counselors at state correctional institutions in Iowa. The action received extensive coverage on TV news broadcasts in the region.

Taxing our health benefits is not a new scheme, but a bad idea from the past that has come back.

For workers at Cummins Rocky Mount Engine Plant (formerly Consolidated Diesel Co.), Martin Luther King Day 2010 marks an anniversary of one of their own struggles. It was 20 years ago that employees in the plant circulated a petition calling on company to grant workers a paid holiday for King Day. The petition was presented to management on January 15, 1990. Following another eight months of struggle by the workers, CDC management announced on August 1, 1990 that it would grant the new paid holiday.

The New Year is here - what does this mean for public sector workers and taxpayers?

UE Local 170 is once again in the front line of a worker justice issue in West Virginia. In November, the Finance Board of the Public Employee Insurance Agency hatched a plot to increase employee contributions, deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums for state employees. State law requires public hearings on such changes, and the board got an earful of protest from workers and other citizens at six events around the state. Dozens of UE members attended the hearings and composed the largest group in attendance at several of them.

Members of UE Locals 625 and 626 defeated company attacks on their pension and healthcare, and negotiated new four-year contracts including wage increases. The new agreements were overwhelmingly ratified by the members on October 31. These workers make circuit breakers, and are employed by the multinational electrical equipment manufacturer ABB; Local 625 is the production and maintenance unit and Local 626 represents clerical workers, including drafters.

UE dispatchers in Winsted, CT have turned back an attempt to privatize their jobs.