the guy by the door …

Mako Hill

Eben Moglen, President of the Software Freedom Law Center made some interesting remarks about why Free Software managed to get as far as it did, whereas other works have suffered more damage. Basically, software was easy to protect because there was not a prior body of law rigidly defining property rights. Other works are covered by pre-existing long standing law.

Meeting in Pound Hall [where Registration also happens] with a few sessions in the Ames Courtroom in AUstin Hall, It is really quite exciting. I don’t multi-task as well as the young people so my reporting will lag a bit, but you can follow the action through streams on the conference website. The conference will continue through this afternoon, Saturday, and Sunday. Y’all come! It does cost money. People with employers that respect them could ask for professional development money? Details are on the conference website.

Jimbo Wales talk gave a much richer picture of the political economy/sociology/cognitive model of the organization behind Wikipedia and related projects. It is much more realistic than catch phrases that appear in the news. At the same time, Wales has built what is overwhelmingly a volunteer organization and seems to understand that he has to take direction from them as well as give it. It is a relatively open communication model. Very different from … oh … say … the Harvard College Library. I’ll go into this in more detail in time.

My apologies to the folks in Harvard’s Lamont, Littauer, and Widener Libraries. I misjudged my time and didn’t get to invite y’all personally.

I must further apoligize! I should have invited everybody in Havard College Library. Heck Harvard University Library. Heck alll 5000 members of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers. Ok Derek, you can come too.

Randy.f

Union steward AFSCME local 3650

Have you ever showed a co-worker how to perform a task at work? Have you ever been asked to look over someone else’s work? If so, the Bush appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is poised to make a decision which could affect your right to join a union.

Jobs with Justice has the full story….

The guy by the door missed this call on Wednesday from S.E.I.U 615 to support Harvard janitors laid off for the summer. Fortunately, SLAM was on the case:

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RALLY TO SUPPORT HARVARD JANITORS!

Every year the Unicco Service Company at Harvard temporarily lays off several
janitors and during this period the janitors lose their health insurance.

Many of the workers have children and it’s dangerous for them to be without
insurance.

Join in solidarity with the janitors from SEIU Local 615 to say:

STOP PLAYING WITH OUR HEALTH!
CONSISTENT HEALTH COVERAGE FOR ALL!

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Unicco’s labor practices were the subject of the hunger strike at University of Miami this spring. Unfortunately, I can’t give you any of my own coverage of Wednesday’s rally and the Crimson didn’t cover it. However, the SLAM Website has gone to “community portal” software. Anyone who went to the rally can hop over to the site, create an account* and post an article. There is no substitute for a good rally, but why get as much mileage as you can out of it?

*The account create function works. Thanks to the Havard Computer Society.

We’ve been getting ready for you.

And we’re glad to do it, but here’s the thing. We need to live. That pretty much means we need a living wage. Some of y’all worked on that as did some of today’s graduates. The new bunch changed the name to Student Labor Action Movement [SLAM]. I understand that each generation of students has to have it’s own sense of contribution, but the idea that they alone can transform Harvard permanently is probably a bit of infantile omnipotence. Certainly leaving y’all out of the picture [as they pretty much did this year] makes no sense.

Anyhow, the Dining Service Workers, represented by Unite-HERE! Local 26, are coming up on contract renewal [June 19]. There is apparently a tentative contract agreement. Administration, no doubt, wanted to put the best possible spin on this for y’all. Harvard’s PR machine also cooked up this new bit for y’all. SLAM doesn’t have quite the same resources as administration :), so give them a bit to come up with their response.

SLAM has pointed out on their list that the tentative agreement says nothing about summer employment. Without new language in the contract, most of Harvard’s cooks will not work during the summer and thanks to the Bush administration [there’s that ugly word again] they cannot collect unemployment. Long ago, Dining Service workers could bid on other summer jobs on campus. Harvard administration no longer allows that.

There is another point in the tentative agreement that SLAM has not looked at yet. Joe Wrinn cites $31,000/year as the average salary. Is that an actual $31,000 or is it $23,250 for nine months ANNUALIZED! Lest you think I’m just being picky, administration did something like the latter with the HUCTW contract. They claimed a 4.5%/year increase for the first year, but it would not take effect until 4 months into the contract. In dollar terms that worked out to 2.8% which was about the the rate of inflaltion at the time of contract negotiation. Subsequent oil shock inflation pushed our “raise” into the negative in real terms.

So I hope y’all enjoy your visit. Sorry about the whether. I told Sally to order up some better whether, but she’s the last one to listen to the employees. Anyhow, I hope y’all will keep an eye on things over the summer. We won’t have as much student support so your help is unusually important.

Thanks.

Not quite the picture described by Billy Joel, occupants of the the houses in the Yard move out on completion of their first year at Harvard. In many cases, they have the help of Harvard parents. In other cases, they call on professionals:

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Organizer Dan Nicolai of S.E.I.U. Local 615 outside UNICCO headquarters in Boston.

TO: Allies & student leaders in Boston area

As you know, janitors are in the 7th week of a strike against UNICCO at the University of Miami. Also, a hunger strike by workers and students has now been going on for 18 days. At least three workers and one student have been hospitalized.

Last week, a group of students occupied the Admissions Office to demand union recognition for striking janitors. More information about student and community actions can be found at www.yeswecane.org

http://www.yeswecane.org/> .

University of Miami President Donna Shalala so far refuses to agree to janitors’ demands for card-check recognition of the union. Workers are demanding card-check instead of an election because UNICCO has already threatened and intimidated workers (this is under investigation by the National Labor Relations Board) and would continue to do so in an election campaign.
Beginning tomorrow (Saturday 4/22) leaders from community, student and religious organizations around the U.S. are going to Miami to meet with the hunger strikers, student leaders, and SEIU President Andy Stern. WE ARE PUTTING TOGETHER AN EMERGENCY DELEGATION TO MIAMI, LEAVING ON SATURDAY OR SUNDAY AND RETURNING MONDAY. THIS IS AN INVITATION FOR STUDENT LEADERS AT CAMPUSES CLEANED BY UNICCO.

I know it’s a busy time of year, but please consider taking a couple of days to participate in this. If you are interested and/or have questions, please email or contact me at 617-523-6150 ext. 425 or 617-416-8577(cell).

Dan Nicolai
Organizer, SEIU Local 615
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Of the two legal routes to Union recognition, card-check is preferred to NLRB [i.e. Bush Administration] supervised elections. UNICCO after weeks of striking and hunger striking has admitted that they have agreed to card check at other sites. The refusal is clearly coming from “liberal” president Donna Shalala. Rumor has it she is on the short list for president of Harvard. Is this any way to run a University?

… and the World.

Did or did not the late Larry Summers exhort us to be a global university? Well the net is a bit Amerocentric, but it’s a start. This Harvard SLAM list has been alive with notices about vigourous student action on other campuses. :

• Students at the University of Miami joined with SEIU hunger strikers Wedenesday Feb 12, but were locked out of the Ashe Building.
• Students at the University of Virginia began a sit-in on Wednesday February 12th to demand that the university pay its employees a living wage! [More from IndyMedia Richmond.]
• Students at the University of Colorado are currently on Hunger Strike until the University adopts the Designated Suppliers Program.
• At midnight, police arrested TEN students at the University of California-Riverside for participating in a non-violent civil disobedience demanding that their university adopt a policy ensuring that university apparel and uniforms are produced in factories in which workers are represented by a democratic union and earn a living wage.[ A second round of arrests.][More from LA IndyMedia. and WWW IndyMedia.]
• Students at ColombiaUniversity who are sitting in at the Low Library to demand that Columbia adopt the Designated Suppliers Program, so that collegiate apparel be made in factories where workers have democratic representation. [More from Zach of the Graduate Students Union]

Most support to living wage campaigns at other campaigns[universities?], and complaints to the administration can be done at

http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/uvalivingwage/alerts

with the exception of the call to action at Colombia University. I include below a draft of my letter to the president of Colombia; do feel free to use it as a template.

Cheers
K…

Dear Mr. Bollinger,

I am writing to support the struggle of those brave students at Colombia
University who are sitting in at the Low Library to demand that Columbia
adopt the Designated Suppliers Program, so that collegiate apparel be made
in factories where workers have democratic representation, and to which
companies pay enough to allow workers to negotiate for a living wage from
management.

The students claim to have presented this proposal to Columbia in
September and have not seen any action despite going through many meetings
and attempts to work with the University administration. You’ve stated
support for “the goal of promoting basic fairness in wages, working
conditions, and a voice for workers”, and this student request is asking
you to live up to those exemplary principles and to act to make sure those
goals are met.

My thanks, and best wishes,
_______ ________
_______ University

SEIU Local 615 and friends in front of UNICCO Hq. – Boston City hall behind.

Boston Community Leaders and Clergy join Miami workers.

Workers of UNITE HERE! Local 26 supporting the fast. Many workers in this union are cooks.

Picketline reports from Miami that a few of the hunger strikers are having problems with blood pressure and Odalys Rodriguez has been taken to the hospital.

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Workers from the University of Miami who will fast in Boston support of their compa�eros back in Miami. together with Harvard SLAMmers and friends.

Janitorial workers at University of Miami employed by Massachusetts based UNICCO Services Company began a hunger strike on April 5. This in addition to already being on strike and after a sit-in by students. [Wikipedia] recounts this in more detail and mentions the picketline blog and the Students for a New Democracy website. Picketline asserts [among other things] that while UNICCO finds Card Check undemocratic at UM, it has found it acceptable in many other cases. [Last fall, tGbtD was invited to speak to a working group of the Institute of Politics of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. I suggested that they look at card check neutrality as a means to enable the right to unionize. I ain’t got no R.O.I. ! This would be a good time!]

SEIU local 615 is hosting their compa�eros from Univeristy of Miami. On Tuesday April 11, 2006 they will fast in front of UNICCO Service Company Northeast Region headquarters. There will also be a SLAM event at Harvard.

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Y’all come. They should be able to see you.

The event will be from 9 AM to 5 PM, but the hightlights are:

——

*I am 1/2 Pennsylvania Dutch who are German Protestants migrated to the US to escape religious persecution. It is a guilt based religion with bad experience in Germany. Is that an connection with Judaism?

…. keep the bad people out. [Well the one’s that don’t have Harvard ID’s, anyway.]

“gil”

They deserve a living wage too. The only known tool to do that, is the right to unionize.
SEIU which represents the custodial workers is also organizing security guards – Nationwide and at Harvard.

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This spring SLAM is upping the pressure so that even The Crimson has noticed.

The guy by the door remembers the good times of the Harvard Living Wage Campaign. I also remember Steve, then president of HUSPMGU. But a particular memory, most fond because of it’s contrast with the context of pain and loneliness I felt at the time, is of late night visits to the Widener guard house and Howard.

..[or even flood for that matter] shall keep my scholars from their chosen labors. I simply won’t allow it.

The Littauer Library is was Open Sunday

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Of course, I can’t do it alone. He has a stronger [and younger] back. a better Union …	… and a bigger shovel.

I would like the MBTA Police to please notice that I was not actually in Andrew Station when I took the gentleman’s picture. Also, I would like to show the circulation people who came to work to today, but I can’t because HCL management doesn’t allow pictures in the library. [I would have liked to show you the throng of intrepid scholars that came today, but the same rule forbids it.]

�H�la, compa�ero!

I have lived my whole adult life in “mixed” neighborhoods, yet I have learned very little Spanish. Google Translate says compa�ero means “companion”, but as I have heard it spoken, it seems to have much more “la vida” than that.

Union Wide:

The Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers is holding an election on Dec. 6 2005, to fill vacancies on the Executive Board, some Joint Councils, and some Union Representatives. I cannot tell you all that is going on Union wide because that information is not routinely provided by the Union Office.
I believe that a healthy Union would.

FAS Arts: Fenstermacher casts support to Butler:

The Guy by the Door nominated himself for Executive Board from the Arts Region of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. While I have worked with the Reform slate in the past, I felt then and still feel that their campaign approach is rigid and narrow. The issues are good, but the presentation is a tedious monotone. I think their are people who would vote the platform if arguments were less didactic and more dialectical . However, I have been unable to execute the kind of campaign I think the HUCTW rank and file deserve. My clear second choice is Genevieve Butler who while less experienced in campaigning than I am, is younger and stronger than I am. Further, she has more time to learn. I ask anyone who had considered voting for me to consider voting for her. If you do vote for her based on my suggestion, you are welcome to ask me to intervene if you feel that, in the excercise of her office, she is not communicating with you as well as she should. Hopefully, this will not be necessary.