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Janet Baic Looks to Engage Next Generation of Women Activists at Local 9548 When Janet Baic first started working at Tenaris Algoma Tubes in Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, in 2013, she was only one of a handful of women at the Canadian pipe manufacturing facility. Now, in 2024, an influx of women at the plant is bringing a sense of revival to Local 9548’s Women of Steel (WOS) committee. Figure 1: Janet Baic pictured on far right “Out of the nearly 700 people in the union, I don’t even know how many women we have,” said Baic. “I’ve lost count, actually.” Baic is using this opportunity to breathe new life into the local’s WOS committee and engage more of the women in union work. “The focus for us right now is spreading the word to all of these new women,” Baic said. “I was also able to give each of them the USW guide on Raising the Bar on Women’s Health and Safety, which is super helpful.” Baic said these types of resources are necessary for women who have jobs like hers—laborious, dirty, and sometimes dangerous. “There are some issues that only women see and experience, so having that support is vital.” Baic also acknowledged the importance of creating a space in the movement specifically for women, making the WOS program a no-brainer for the activist and committee chair. “It can be very healing for us to talk about what we’re going through or have gone through,” said Baic. One highlight from Baic’s involvement with the WOS committee occurred last year on International Women’s Day, when she hosted a family-friendly movie night at a neighborhood theater. “A lot of members brought their children, and a lot of folks started talking who had never talked before,” said Baic. The committee also assists a local organization with Tampon Tuesday, a campaign that occurs each year in March. The members donate hundreds of dollars of menstrual hygiene products, which the organization provides to those in need. Baic’s advice to women who feel alone or hesitant to get involved in the union is to simply reach out. “If you don’t have a Women of Steel committee in your local, find another local that does and ask them for help,” said Baic. “We all need community.” Click here to access the action guide on women’s health and safety. — May 23
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Local 9544 Member Takes Infection Control Expertise to CDC with New Appointment Lisa Baum got her start in the labor movement as a secretary at New York University in the 1990s. Now a proud member of USW Local 9544 and nationally recognized subject matter expert on occupational risk management for health care workers, Baum's passion for the labor movement began as she and her coworkers stood up to a hostile employer in an industry marked by high turnover and low wages. Even as Baum worked at the university to obtain an expense-free degree in an unrelated field, her experience as a rank-and-file member left her determined to pave a career in the labor movement instead. Today, Baum is an Occupational Health and Safety Representative for the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA), a union of 42,000 front-line nurses advocating for safe staffing, a voice on the job, and health care for all. The staff at NYSNA are members of USW Local 9544. Now, Baum begins her next chapter in her storied 25-year occupational health and safety career as she joins the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC). As a member of the committee, Baum will advise the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on infection control practices in health care. Baum will become the first HICPAC member representing frontline health care workers. HICPAC makes critical infection control decisions that can impact worker health and safety, making it especially crucial that frontline workers have a voice on the committee. “What’s significant with this appointment is the recognition that frontline workers have something important to say about infection control," said Baum. "This is about getting a seat at the table for the people who do this work and know firsthand what’s best for health care workers and patients." You can read more about HICPAC here. — May 20
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The Grassroots Difference: USW Activists Run – and Win – in Political Races Around the Country The following article was originally published in the Spring 2024 issue of USW@Work. When USW member Ed Price ran for a seat in the Louisiana State Senate in 2017, he faced long odds, facing a wealthy sugar cane farmer with the deep pockets and name recognition of a well-known political family. Price, however, had the union difference on his side. As a member of Local 620 in Gonzales, La., Price had a coalition of fellow workers ready to knock on doors, make phone calls and speak to voters one-on-one about the issues. That grassroots campaign had a significant impact, and the Democrat won his seat with 63 percent of the vote. “We didn’t have the largest budget, but it was door-to-door, walking, knocking, talking to people,” Price said. “We probably had anywhere from 25 to 35 people walking through the neighborhood every day, knocking on doors, talking to people. That made a huge difference.” Longtime Leader Price, who served for 26 years on his local school board before joining the legislature, credited his experience as a union negotiator with giving him the skills and knowledge to seek office. In neighboring Mississippi, that same union difference has helped Sherry Guyton Odneal hold public office for more than 20 years. Odneal was re-elected in November 2023 to her seat on the Lowndes County Election Commission. Odneal serves as financial secretary of Local 351L at the BF Goodrich plant in Tuscaloosa, Ala., as the local Women of Steel committee chair and as a member of the West Alabama Labor Council. She also lends her efforts to the USW’s Rapid Response grassroots education and mobilization program. Besides providing a better quality of life for workers, Odneal said, the USW’s contract language on political work allows her to devote time to her second career in public service. “If I didn’t have the union, I wouldn’t be able to hold this position,” she said. “When I see something wrong, I don’t just want to complain. I want to do something about it.” Odneal said she urges more of her USW colleagues to get involved in the political process for that reason, arguing that union members should put more people like them into office. “We can make a big difference, getting out there, volunteering,” she said. “We want the people in office to be for working people.” That can turn the tide on issues like health and safety, union organizing rights, wages, retirement security, health care, and other important policies, Odneal said. “It’s not about the R or the D,” she said. “It’s about who is going to support working people.” ‘It Was Worth It’ Like Odneal, JoJo Burgess knows the value of one-on-one interactions with voters. He credits grassroots politics with his election win in November making him the first Black mayor of Washington, Pa., 30 miles southwest of Pittsburgh. Burgess, a member of Local 1557 at U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works, faced long odds at the outset of his campaign. Ultimately, he defeated the incumbent mayor in the primary and won the general election by 39 votes. “Nobody thought I could win,” Burgess said. “If I don’t knock on those doors, I don’t win that race.” Burgess said he ran for mayor because he believed he could make the biggest impact on the local level, and he wanted to show others that they, too, had the power to change their communities. “I wanted to let people know that they have a voice and have a say in what’s going on,” he said. “I’m not a politician, but that was a means of getting where I needed to be.” Burgess said he was proud to be his city’s first Black mayor, but that wasn’t his goal. “I don’t want to be known as the first,” he said. “I want someone else to be known as the next.” Positive Role Model The chance to set an example for his younger siblings was part of what motivated Justin Willis of Local 7-507 to seek office. As a commissioner for Bridgeview in Cook County, near Chicago, Justin said the education he gained as a USW member played a big role in his election. “We need to step up as leaders every chance we get,” Willis said. “Our union has a responsibility to make our communities better.” Inspiring others and bringing them into the movement is part of being an effective leader, Willis said, whether it is in politics or in the union. “We all have a chance to grow and learn,” he said. “The power of the tongue is mighty.” Willis, Odneal and Burgess are just a few of the dozens of current or former elected officials with USW connections across the United States. They include Local 9 member Kathy Wilder, who won a write-in campaign for her Maine school board, and U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, who helped his fellow faculty members at the University of Pittsburgh win USW representation in 2021 before winning a seat in Congress the following year. Those victories prove that “labor is not on defense anymore,” Deluzio said. ‘A Chance to Move Someone’ It was the 1967 election of the first black mayor of Gary, Ind., Richard G. Hatcher, that inspired DeWitt Walton to get involved in politics. Walton, who was born in Mississippi and grew up in Gary went to work for Inland Steel in 1976 and quickly became active in his local union and his community. He went on to serve for more than 25 years as a union organizer and USW staff member, and later served as the program director for the Pittsburgh chapter of the A. Philip Randolph Institute’s “Breaking The Chains of Poverty” workforce development program. Walton, who witnessed violent racism in high school and college, and later saw the steel industry’s struggles of the 1980s and 1990s first-hand, said he learned early on that he needed to speak out for himself and for others. Since 2016, he has held a seat on the 15-member Allegheny County Council, the legislative body serving more than 1.2 million people in Western Pennsylvania. “My entire life has been one where I’ve had to deal with adversity,” he said. “I knew if I wasn’t at the table and part of the process, I’d be on the menu.” Walton said that it’s important that all USW members get involved in the electoral process, through knocking on doors, talking to voters at their work sites, making phone calls, writing letters and other avenues. “You have a chance to move someone,” he said. “You can’t ask for a better interaction than that.” The need for lawmakers who share workers’ values pushed DeJonaé Shaw, a licensed vocational nurse and member of Local 7600 in California, to run for election to the California State Assembly. Shaw said she would fight for the USW’s core values of workers’ rights, good jobs and quality health care. “We need lawmakers who understand what it’s like to be a renter or to struggle to pay the mortgage,” said Shaw. “We need lawmakers who know what it means to decide between food and the medication you need. That’s why I’ve decided to run for office and why we need other union members to do the same.” ‘Get Out There’ Shaw and Odneal agreed that voters should choose the candidates who will fight for the issues that are most important to them. When it comes to issues like workers’ rights, workplace safety and other priorities, “it’s all about who holds office,” Odneal said. “It’s important for union members to get out there.” Walton said he hoped more union workers would vote and also consider seeking political office to help him and others push a workers-first agenda. “There’s no better organization to help you get there,” he said, “than the United Steelworkers.” — May 17
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Local 7-507 Members Ratify Contract Eliminating Tiered Wages at Ingredion Members of Local 7-507 recently ratified a strong contract that eliminates a tiered system at Ingredion in Illinois. The unit represents nearly 250 workers at the Bedford Park site that manufactures food grade and pharmaceutical starches. Bargaining over the four-year contract began in February. After several weeks of negotiations, the members voted down the first tentative agreement because it still included tiered wages that pitted workers against each other. Local President Derrick Davis said the group made it clear from the start that keeping the tiers was not an option. “That was the main thing the members wanted,” said Davis, who has served as president for more than 15 years. “This [tier system] is not working for the company, either. It’s hard to maintain quality workers when they’re working beside someone they know is making more than they are doing the same job.” The amalgamated local also found solidarity with union siblings at the company’s Indianapolis site, where management had also tried to push members last year to eliminate their USW health insurance plan. Both units remained rooted in each other’s strength and were able to fight off the cut. “Their support was critical,” said Davis. District 7 Sub-District Director Anthony Alfano said it was the steadfastness of the membership that brought this contract over the finish line. “We had a really invested team of workers who knew what was at stake and didn’t want to waive their right to bargain over health insurance,” Alfano said. The agreement also secured significant lump sum bonuses and wage hikes, including up to more than 20 percent for some employees over the length of the contract, as well as increased vacation time for new hires. — May 16
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USW Activists Take to the Streets on May Day to Honor Global Labor Movement Members of the USW and the greater labor movement took to the streets May 1 to rally and march for global economic and social justice on International Workers’ Day. From Pittsburgh to Los Angeles, activists stood side-by-side with immigrant organizations to declare that all workers deserve respect and dignity on the job, and that in the union, everyone is in. Jessica Ríos Viner, member of USW Local 3657, serves as president of the Pittsburgh chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA), a constituency group within the AFL-CIO. Each year, she organizes the Pittsburgh May Day rally and march through the busy downtown area with help from the Thomas Merton Center, Casa San José, and the Pittsburgh chapter of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA). “No matter the color of the hands covered in dirt of the people working next to you, you have way more in common with them than you have with your boss,” Viner told the crowd of nearly 400, which included a horn section, university and library workers, grad students, baristas, striking journalists, families, and children. For Viner, who proudly hails from Puerto Rico, the saying “We’re stronger together” is about the kind of solidarity that extends even beyond the labor movement. “We’re all one human family,” said Viner. “All across the world people have the same needs: job security, living wages, safe workplaces, healthcare, and respect. We have to have each other’s backs.” Sabrina Liu, who works in the USW Strategic Campaigns department, leads the Pittsburgh chapter of APALA and helps organize the annual march. She noted that May Day is also the first day of Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month. “Our struggle is interconnected, and it takes all of us standing together to make our communities better,” said Liu, who migrated to the United States from Taiwan. Xochitl Cobarruvias, chief of staff of Local 675 and active member of LCLAA in Los Angeles, also joined a diverse coalition in Hollywood to honor workers around the world on May 1. “This day is a day of pride,” said Cobarruvias. “A day that we, as workers, immigrants and the community, should be proud of.” The May Day holiday began to commemorate the fight for the eight-hour day in the 1880s as well as the lives of the campaign’s organizers who were executed in the wake of the 1886 Haymarket Affair. Click here to learn more about LCLAA and how you can get involved. — May 9
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United Steelworkers Press Releases Feed
- Janet Baic Looks to Engage Next Generation of Women Activists at Local 9548
- Local 9544 Member Takes Infection Control Expertise to CDC with New Appointment
- The Grassroots Difference: USW Activists Run – and Win – in Political Races Around the Country
- Local 7-507 Members Ratify Contract Eliminating Tiered Wages at Ingredion
- USW Activists Take to the Streets on May Day to Honor Global Labor Movement
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