by Seth Michaels, Jul 16, 2008
Union volunteers around the country are getting involved and making a difference in this election in a number of ways. One of the most important is through worksite leafleting.
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Member-to-member contact is at the heart of the AFL-CIO Labor 2008 political program, and this outreach is key to our unprecedented national mobilization to elect Sen. Barack Obama and a working family-friendly Congress this fall.
Check out the video of union volunteers taking part in this important work in Colorado, New Mexico, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Frank Snyder, Labor 2008 state director for Pennsylvania, reports that a comprehensive leafleting program is in full swing around the state, with local unions distributing worksite fliers this month. Volunteers are educating union members about the issues important to them, and how Obama and Sen. John McCain would address those issues.
Snyder reports that one local union thoroughly covering their members in all their units and all their shifts is IBEW Local 1637, a telecommunications union based in Erie. Local 1637 president Robin Pirrello, vice president Drew Klaus, shop steward Joshua Atkinson and executive board member Megan Cessna distributed leaflets July 10 in front of their Verizon worksite.
The fliers were ordered through the AFL-CIO Working Families Toolkit, an online resource for grassroots union activists that Atkinson describes as “an important and easy tool to use to get information out to the members.”
Pirrello says workers speaking to other workers at the workplace are the most effective messengers about the importance of the election.
Worksite leafleting is powerful because the members get the facts straight from us. The leaflets get people asking questions, and then they want to get involved. I have members who volunteered to help out after seeing us at the worksite handing out leaflets.
I think when we take the time to sit down with our members we really make an impact. People were so receptive today, and I think they really appreciate that we were down there talking about our candidate. We have a lot of work to do, but today was a great start.
It’s important to be out talking to members about the candidates, Pirrello says, because there is so much at stake this year.
The Bush administration let us down, and John McCain will only be more of that. Barack Obama is the best choice for labor because he supports the Employee Free Choice Act, health care, job security, fair wages and trade regulation. It is time that we take America for the working people and elect a candidate that cares about us.
Pirrello feels the personal contact is the most important aspect of worksite leafleting.
Meanwhile, across the state, members of USW Local 719 leafleted a Tredgar Film Products plant in Marlin, Pa., on July 10. They let union members know that McCain’s policies are bad for union members and that Obama is the candidate who stands with working families.
Northeast Area Labor Federation Chair Liz Bettinger coordinated the efforts with USW Local 719 president Sue Duffy, and the member response was overwhelmingly positive.
USW Local 719 recording secretary and Schuylkill County Labor Council President Ann Kurtek said that “the past eight years have been hard on working families.”
Everyone says we have to go global. But we have been living with the trade agreements of the Bush administration, and the only thing I see is the middle class being ripped apart. We don’t need free trade agreements; we need fair trade agreements.
Voting for McCain is like giving the Bush administration another four years. We need a change for the better, and that means working people need to vote for Barack Obama.
With the election less than four months away, Snyder says it’s not too early to start talking with members about the issues that directly affect them like trade, collective bargaining rights, and health care.
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Paid for by the AFL-CIO Committee on Political Education Political Contributions Committee, www.aflcio.org, and not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.