Senate Hears Testimony on Employee Free Choice Act

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/03/27/senate-hears-testimony-on-employee-free-choice-act/

Senate Hears Testimony on Employee Free Choice Act

by Mike Hall, Mar 27, 2007

Employee Free Choice Act -- AFL-CIO

After management at the Front Range Energy ethanol plant ignored workers’ complaints about safety procedures and dangerous working conditions and reneged on the promises of wage increases and improved health benefits, Errol Hohrein says he and other workers decided they wanted to form a union to bargain for a better life.

Ninety percent of the workers, based in Windsor, Colo., signed cards through a majority verification process saying they wanted to join the United Steelworkers (USW) but were harassed and threatened with job loss by their employer, says Hohrein. He spoke this morning at a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee this morning on the Employee Free Choice Act, which would level the playing field when workers try to form unions.

The House passed the Employee Free Choice Act March 1 and the Senate version is expected to be introduced soon. The legislation would put an end to the kind of employer harassment, intimidation and anti-worker tactics Hohrein and tens of thousands of workers encounter every year when they try to form unions. Others testifying today included Cynthia Estlund, a law professor at the New York University School of Law, Larry Mishel, president of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), and Peter Hurtgen, a management lawyer with Morgan, Lewis & Bockius.

Hohrein says Front Range denied the workers’ choice of USW representation and forced them to go through the flawed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) election process. Hohrein, with 20 years experience as a union member on his previous job, was the point man on the drive to win a voice at work.

They forced us to attend meetings where they slammed the union and hardly let us say anything. They said if we went union it would come out of our paychecks…the company questioned everyone on how they were going to vote. They took them into backrooms and browbeat them.…

They would follow me around the workplace and not permit me to talk to my co-workers…during the election they stood at the door of the break room where we were voting as a silent reminder of their threats.

Even after the campaign of harassment, the workers voted for a union. Then, when the election was certified, Front Range fired Hohrein.

FULL story at link.

[BayCityProgressive]

1. I hope the senate passes this

but I am betting on a GOP fillibuster.