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BURLINGTON VT - UE AND COTS WORKERS GET COTS BOARD TO ACCEPT COMMUNITY ELECTION

BURLINGTON FREE PRESS
COTS board accepts workers' union election
November 16, 2006

A threatened strike at the Committee on Temporary Shelter was averted today when the 16-person board voted unanimously to support a "community election" by workers to decide if they will be represented by the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America.

"The COTS Board accepts the proposal made to the Board by Rabbi Chasan, state Rep. Mark Larson and Mayor Kiss and other community representatives that COTS and its employees engage in a community election to determine if United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) should represent COTS staff," the board said in a written statement directed to COTS workers.

The board also strongly endorsed the leadership at COTS of Executive Director Rita Markley, saying she had their "confidence" and "complete support."

Emily Casey, a COTS case manager and one of the union activists, said last week that if the board had come out against unionization, the workers were prepared to strike.

Following the board decision, she said the workers are "very relieved. It's a huge weight off our shoulders to know they're not going to ignore us," she said. "We're really looking forward to getting back and focusing on our work. We hope this is going to make us a stronger organization."

COTS is a nonprofit agency formed in 1982 to provide shelter and counseling to the homeless in greater Burlington. Forty-seven employees work at the agency.

Casey and others such as Rabbi Joshua Chasan and Larson, who responded to worker requests that they mediate between the workers and the COTS board, said 80 percent of the COTS workers already have joined UE.

That would seem to make the outcome of the community election a foregone conclusion, but it isn't yet clear whether part-time workers and some managers will participate in the election.

Shortly after the board statement was released, Chasan said he met with the workers. He said they were "very happy" with the decision.

"I'm grateful to the workers for their patience and to the board for its wisdom," Chasan said. "I'm delighted that the board voted unanimously to accept the results of a community election, which means that this thing can be settled within our community.

"I've been assured by a member of the board that they are interested in processing this quickly," he said, "and I know the workers want to put it behind them and move on with fulfilling the mission of COTS."

Casey said the workers are putting together a proposal for the board that would set next Monday as the election day.

"Ideally," she said, "we'd have two hours in the morning and two in the evening, on site." The voting, she said, under the workers' proposal, would be overseen by union representatives, management or board members and neutral community representatives