Purple Palace Imposes Trusteeship on SEIU Local 73 in Chicago

Eliseo Medina, Trustee

Today, SEIU International imposed an “emergency trusteeship” on SEIU Local 73 “to protect the local’s members from serious collapse in the local’s leadership and governance,” according to an SEIU press release and the Chicago Tribune (“Infighting at SEIU Leads to ‘Collapse of Leadership,’ Removal of Top Officers”).

The local represents 25,000 public-sector workers in Illinois and Northwestern Indiana.

Here’s why SEIU says it seized control of the local:

Immediate action was required because incessant infighting between Local 73’s top elected officers, President Christine Boardman and Secretary-Treasurer Matthew Brandon, reached a boiling point and seriously disrupted the operations and functioning of the Local, putting members’ interests at risk…

Serious charges and accusations between the Local’s two top officers caused an egregious breakdown in governance. President Boardman and Secretary-Treasurer Brandon each challenge the basic legitimacy of the other’s authority to hold office or lead the Local, resulting in a debilitating dysfunction of the Local’s governance process as well as causing instability and confusion within the Local and its membership.

Circumstances deteriorated so badly that the Local was unable to conduct the July 15, 2016 Executive Board meeting to carry out union business or hold a basic membership meeting scheduled for the next day. The Local is mired in internal charges, contested suspension of its secretary-treasurer and allegations that the local president can no longer serve due to a previous announcement of retirement.

Christine Boardman, former president of SEIU Local 73

Boardman also serves on the SEIU International Executive Board in Washington DC.

According to the Cook County Record (“SEIU Chicago Leadership Deposed by National Union”), additional controversies also are at play. It reports:

[SEIU Local 73 President Christine] Boardman had been considered an ally of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, having publicly supported the city's attempts to rewrite public employee pension rules. Those rule changes were struck down by the Illinois Supreme Court as violations of the state constitution's pension protection clause.

The internal struggle has been played out in local courtrooms, as well, where Local 73 officials have each accused those on the other side of the struggle of defamation and leveling false accusations.

On July 1, Wayne Lindwall, assistant to the chief of staff of Local 73, sued Boardman in Cook County Circuit Court, alleging the Local 73 president had orchestrated a campaign to besmirch his name and reputation purportedly in response to his opposition to Boardman’s “proposed initiatives.” According to the lawsuit, Boardman then ordered union investigators to examine Lindwall’s private communications, without his consent, and shared them with other union members and officials.

Lindwall’s action came about five months after he had been sued by other Local 73 members and officials for allegedly maligning them in emails sent shortly after Boardman had temporarily removed him from his job last summer.

Boardman supported Rahm Emanuel in mayoral election

SEIU has been dismissed recently as a defendant in that action, but not before Lindwall opposed an attempt by Local 73 and the plaintiffs to settle the action, according to Lindwall’s attorney, Phil Turcy, of the Chicago firm of Turcy Chute.

While Turcy said the national union’s recent actions in Local 73 may impact the outcome of that case against Lindwall, they will not slow Lindwall’s lawsuit against Boardman. Turcy said other defendants from SEIU Local 73 may be added to the action in coming days, as well.

According to the Chicago Sun-Times (“Civil War Triggers Trustee Takeover at Emanuel-Allied Union”), the trusteeship represents “a bit of a blow to [Chicago Mayor Rahm] Emanuel” because Local 73, which represents 14,000 City of Chicago employees, has backed Emanuel in recent elections.

Last year, SEIU Local 73 filed a “cease-and-desist” request asking that SEIU Health Care stop bankrolling the campaign of vanquished mayoral challenger Jesus “Chuy” Garcia.

Local 73 was determined to enforce a “neutrality vote” that had been taken by the union’s state council.

Eliseo Medina, who served as a trustee of SEIU-UHW in 2009 alongside Dave Regan, has been appointed as Local 73’s trustee. 

Dian Palmer (President of SEIU Healthcare Wisconsin) and Lenore Friedlander (from SEIU Local 32BJ in New York) have been appointed as “Deputy Trustees.”

Local 73’s officers and Executive Board have been removed from office. In 2015, SEIU Local 73 President Christine Boardman was paid $202,714 while Secretary-Treasurer Matthew Brandon received $147,450, according to records from the US Department of Labor.

Philly Guards Trounce SEIU in Election

Remember this post about an NLRB election for security guards in Philadelphia? The election, which took place Wednesday, pitted a small independent union against SEIU in an effort to unionize guards employed by AlliedBarton, a giant U.S. security company owned by billionaire Ron Perelman.  

Back in 2007, SEIU’s Andy Stern cut a secret deal with AlliedBarton that caused SEIU to pull the plug on its effort to unionize the Philadelphia guards, “leaving openly pro-union workers to face management’s wrath,” according to this article.

When the workers recently announced they planned to join the newly created Philadelphia Security Officers Union (PSOU), AlliedBarton teamed up with SEIU to undermine the effort and tried to force the workers to join SEIU. AlliedBarton announced that the guards could join SEIU without an election, and then gave lists of the guards’ home addresses to SEIU so its purple-shirted organizers could bang on their doors and pressure them to sign up with SEIU.

Fortunately, the guards resisted AlliedBarton’s joint campaign with its company union, SEIU. And on Wednesday, the guards voted 72-2 to join PSOU in an NLRB election!

The election may be small, but it’s making waves across the country. Why? Because it shines a spotlight on SEIU’s backroom deals with bosses that sell out workers. And it shows the power that workers have to take control of their unions.

Tasty recommends this article in Labor Notes about yesterday's election: “Philly Security Guards Choose Independent Union, Spurning SEIU.” Here are some excerpts:

The [guards] filed for an election in March—and were immediately hit with a blitz of purple-clad SEIU door knockers...

SEIU organizers quickly hit the doors, and six PSOU organizing committee members report that their pitch included a promise of neutrality from AlliedBarton.

“Neutrality was not an offer that was extended to PSOU,” said Penn officer Terrell Rivers. “I wonder why. Is it because SEIU and our bosses at AlliedBarton are friends?”

SEIU organizers told workers a bigger union could win better contracts. But PSOU supporters were adamant that a union that cuts deals without inviting rank and filers into the conversation was not a union they want.

“They negotiated on my behalf with my boss,” said Colin Koch. “Whatever deal was cut did not include our voice. If this is the start of our relationship with the SEIU, then what can we expect in the future?”

Andy Stern Delivers Philly Payback to Billionaire Sugar Daddy

Remember the recent revelations about Andy Stern and his billionaire sugar daddy, Ron Perelman?

Well, their infamous “bromance” is making more headlines.

Readers may recall that in 2007, Stern cut a secret deal with Perelman that caused SEIU to pull the plug on its effort to unionize thousands of Philadelphia security guards employed by AlliedBarton, one of Perelman’s many companies.

According to this article, “The D.C.-based SEIU split town without warning, leaving openly pro-union workers to face management's wrath.” 

Following SEIU's sudden departure, the security guards decided to join an independent union called the Philadelphia Security Officers Union (PSOU). Hundreds of guards at the University of Pennsylvania are now awaiting an NLRB election, scheduled for April 11th, so they can join PSOU.

And here’s where our story gets interesting. It turns out that AlliedBarton is terrified about the prospect of negotiating with a real union. That's why the company’s executives phoned their favorite company union, SEIU, for help.

What happened next? AlliedBarton's executives handed over all of the guards’ personal contact info to SEIU and announced that AlliedBarton would be “neutral” towards SEIU… but not towards PSOU. One newspaper put it this way:

A March 17 letter from AlliedBarton vice president Jim Gorman sent to Penn guards declared neutrality — not to PSOU, but to SEIU organizing efforts. It pledged, "if a majority of AlliedBarton security officers in Philadelphia choose to authorize SEIU to represent them, we will ... recognize the SEIU as the union representative."

That has drawn the ire of PSOU backers in the Penn security force, many of whom are still bitter from SEIU's last organizing drive in Philly.

Here’s how another article -- entitled “Company Hands Out Employee Names, Numbers” -- describes it:

Why would AlliedBarton Security Services, the Conshohocken-based security guard company, give the names, addresses and phone numbers of its Philadelphia employees to the Service Employees International Union, SEIU Local 32BJ? 

That's a question that the Philadelphia Securities Officers Union posed to David Chapla, director of labor relations…. "Our lawyer asked if we could have a similar courtesy," said Fabricio Rodriguez, who serves as the union's administrator.  So far, he said, the company has declined to reply.

SEIU, armed with the company’s lists of employees, has been visiting the guards' homes. And if it’s anything like what has happened in California, AlliedBarton’s supervisors are inviting purple-shirted SEIU organizers to attend company-run employee meetings to campaign for SEIU.

And Andy Stern -- with his twin titles of "SEIU President Emeritus" and “the Ronald O. Perelman Senior Fellow” -- has made SEIU the ultimate symbol of company-dominated unionism in the U.S. labor movement.