nwlaborpress.org | October 17, 2008

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October 17, 2008 Volume 109 Number 20
		Carrying the vote: Union workers handle, count ballots Though nearly all of it is behind the scenes, union members are a big part of making Oregon's vote-by-mail system clean, fair, and efficient. That's because much of the handling, delivery and counting of the ballots is done by union workers. [Left, Rod Cardwell, a member of National Postal Mail Handlers Union Local 315, uses a hydraulic hand truck to lift a three-quarter-ton pallet of Voters’ Pamphlets.]
When Wall Street stumbles, others pick up the tab For six weeks, working people have been looking from the sidelines at a financial system meltdown, while government has taken panicked, inconsistent, expensive and so far ineffective action to stop it. Ordinary citizens didn’t engineer the collapse, but they may be footing the bill — through lost retirement savings, lowered wages, and the taxes they pay. Labor opposes ‘top two’ primary With Measures 58 through 64, staring down at organized labor like a partly-loaded pistol, measures at the beginning and end of the ballot aren’t getting as much attention. But labor organizations are taking sides on those as well. Steelworkers mount union campaign at Oregon Steel United Steelworkers is nearing the end of a three-month campaign to unionize 566 employees at Evraz Oregon Steel Mills. The Portland complex has been nonunion since the company — then known as Gilmore Steel — permanently replaced striking union members in 1983. Union-sponsored Oregon Working Families Party runs candidate on ballot For the first and maybe the last time, Oregon voters will get a chance this November to vote for a candidate from a union-sponsored political party — the Oregon Working Families Party.