IN THIS EDITION
- Portland Voters to Consider “Responsible Contracting” Ballot Measure
- $15 Minimum Wage on the Ballots in Portland and Rockland
- Register Now for the Virtual Climate Jobs and Just Transition Summit
- Can We Count on You to Help Elect Pro-Labor Candidates?
- Corporations Funnel Billions to Billionaire Investors as Millions Struggle
- 127 Years Ago This Week: The First Major Shoe Strike in Maine
Portland Referendum Would Require Responsible Contracting on Publicly Funded Construction Projects
This November, voters in Portland will have the opportunity to vote on a referendum that would require that contractors on publicly funded construction projects over $50,000 use skilled labor and pay living wages with benefits. Dubbed a “Green New Deal for Portland,” the ballot measure would raise environmental standards for new public buildings in the city while requiring contractors that win bids on these projects use registered apprenticeships, provide safety training, and pay their workers the prevailing wage. "After years of Council inaction, Portland voters finally have the opportunity to take matters into their own hands and ensure that their taxpayer dollars are spent with working families' values in mind," said Lewis Overlock, labor rep for the Laborers' International Union Local 327
The "responsible contracting" ordinance would apply to the construction of buildings, roads, highways, bridges, streets, alleys, sewers, ditches, sewage disposal plants, waterworks, airports, schools and other projects. The proposal would also require developers to increase the number of affordable units in new housing developments.
The "responsible contracting" ordinance would apply to the construction of buildings, roads, highways, bridges, streets, alleys, sewers, ditches, sewage disposal plants, waterworks, airports, schools and other projects. The proposal would also require developers to increase the number of affordable units in new housing developments.
$15 Minimum Wage on the Ballots in Portland and Rockland
This November, voters in Portland and Rockland will have the opportunity to vote on ballot measures to gradually increase the hourly minimum wage from $12 to $15 from 2022 to 2024. If approved, the two proposals would increase the minimum wages in Rockland and Portland from the current statewide $12 an hour level to $13 beginning Jan. 1, 2022, $14 in 2023, $15 in 2024 and then annual cost-of-living increases. The Rockland proposalwould only apply to employers with more than 25 workers.
It’s well established that the current minimum wage still too low as a person working a 40-hour a week job earns just $24,960 annually at $12 per hour, before taxes are deducted. A 2015 study found that a living wage in Maine for a single person was $15.77 and$29.08 for a single parent with two children.
Register Now for the Virtual Climate Jobs and Just Transition Summit - Tuesday Sept. 22nd
On Tuesday September 22, the virtual Climate Jobs and Just Transition Summit will bring together labor leaders, union climate activists, environmental and environmental justice advocates, clean-energy developers, policymakers, scientists, and anyone who wants to build the clean-energy economy of tomorrow with good union jobs. The Summit will feature speakers and panelists from around the country and the world, including our very own Maine AFL-CIO President Cynthia Phinney and Executive Director Matt Schlobohm.
The agenda will focus on how to tackle climate change in ways that create good union jobs. Sessions will include: “Combating Climate Change, Reversing Inequality,” “Climate Change, Racial Justice and Economic Justice,” “Green Recovery: Building Clean Energy Industries and a Low-Carbon Economy that Works for All” and more.
Can We Count on You to Help Elect Pro-Labor Candidates?
With just 43 days until election day and many Mainers casting their votes by mail, we need all hands on deck now to help elect pro-labor candidates to state and federal offices. There are lots of ways you can get involved to help elect pro-union candidates, so if you can, please fill out click here to fill out our “Count Me In” form and let us know how you can help. This includes:
- Calling fellow union members
- Texting union members to remind them to vote
- Talking to your friends and family about voting
- Sending mail
- Sharing content on social media
- Volunteering as a poll worker on election day
This year the Maine AFL-CIO and other groups are creating a “Yearbook” mailer with photos and quotes from union members about why they are supporting pro-labor candidates. To be involved click here to provide a high resolution headshot photo to show your support for Maine AFL-CIO endorsed candidates Speaker Sara Gideon and Congressman Jared Golden.
Corporations Funnel Billions to Billionaire Investors as Millions Struggle, Report Finds
Since the Covid-19 pandemic hit the US, more than 200,000 people have died of the disease while tens of millions of workers have been thrown out of work. But even as this crisis has worsened income equality, a new report by the charitable organization Oxfam recently found that our broken economic system has has allowed some of the world’s largest corporations to funnel billions of dollars in profits to shareholders, giving yet another windfall to a tiny group of billionaires.
“Since the onset of the pandemic, large corporations have put profits before workers’ safety, pushed costs down the supply chain and used their political influence to shape policy responses,” the Oxfam report states. “COVID-19 should be the catalyst for radically reining in corporate power, restructuring business models with purpose and rewarding all those that work with profits, creating an economy for all.”
This report blows a gaping hole in Senator Susan Collins’ argument that the 2017 tax cuts for the rich she voted for would somehow "create jobs here in Maine and around the country.” It’s time to elect leaders who will make the wealthy pay their fair share in taxes so we can invest in our communities.
127 Years Ago Last Week: The First Major Shoe Strike in Maine
127 years ago — on September 15, 1893 — the first major shoe strike in Maine began in Auburn. At a packed meeting in G.A. R. Hall in Auburn members of the International Shoe Worker’ Union, No 21 voted to leave the shops until “the existing troubles were settled,” according to the Lewiston Evening Journal.
The strike would see the use of strike breakers, the first issuance of a court injunction in a Maine labor dispute, and the eventual defeat of the strikers who were forced to sign "free shop" contracts, reaffirming Lewiston and Auburn's status as the "citadel of the open shop.”
Right: news clipping from the Lewiston Evening Journal.