Skip to main content

AFL-Cio Executive Council OKS 'solidarity charters' for locals from departed unions

Date Posted: September 16 2005

WASHINGTON (PAI) - The AFL-CIO Executive Council approved offering "Solidarity Charters" to locals from non-AFL-CIO unions that want to participate in local Central Labor Committees (CLCs) and state feds, AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney said.

The decision responded to "hundreds" of locals from four unions that have left the federation - the Teamsters, the Service Employees, the Carpenters and the United Food and Commercial Workers - who contacted the AFL-CIO about staying in the state and local bodies, Sweeney said in brief comments after an Aug. 30 press conference.

The charters were designed so that the state AFL-CIOs and CLCs could recoup some of the people and funds they lost with the exit of those unions.

Departure of the Teamsters, SEIU and UFCW, with almost 4 million members combined, left some state feds and CLCs with drastic cuts - 40 percent or more - in money and people to enlist for causes. But at the same time, leaders of the three big departing unions said they wanted their locals to stay in the state feds and CLCs.

The charters respond to those needs, with payments from the incoming locals set at what they would have paid had their international unions remained in the AFL-CIO, plus 10 percent for mobilization costs. The charters also limit the role the incoming locals can play in the state feds and CLCs, including their political role.

Even though the charters were approved and are now being offered to the locals, "We're still in discussions with the various unions and with those unions who are still affiliated with the AFL-CIO about this," Sweeney added. Some details still need to be worked out to respond to locals' concerns, he noted. "But we want to have a united labor movement at the local level and the national level," he emphasized.

And he asked the state feds and CLCs to reach out themselves to the locals from the departed unions, to see if they want to get charters.

Despite their differences, "I'll continue to talk with the principal officers of the unions that have split" from the AFL-CIO, Sweeney said. The presidents of three that left in July are Joseph Hansen of UFCW, Andy Stern of SEIU and James Hoffa of the Teamsters. Douglas McCarron is president of the Carpenters. "Whatever it takes, we are committed to building the strength that workers need," Sweeney said.