Top SEIU Official to Leave at End of Month

Laphonza Butler and Mary Kay Henry

Laphonza Butler -- the President of SEIU Local 2015 -- is quitting her job at the end of December.

Readers will recall that she was appointed to run the union after its former president, Tyrone Freeman, went to jail for a massive corruption scandal. 

During Butler’s tenure, more local unions were merged into the mega-union including 65,000 long-term care workers transferred from Dave Regan’s SEIU-UHW. Butler also serves on SEIU’s International Executive Board and is reportedly a close ally of Mary Kay Henry.

So why is Butler leaving her position atop a giant union with hundreds of thousands of members? 

Here’s what she’s saying publicly: “The time has come for new leadership to take Local 2015 to its next great victories.”

What’s the real story?

It turns out she’s jumping ship to become a partner at a political consulting/communications firm based in California, according to a Dec. 7 article in the Los Angeles Times:

“Butler will be a partner in the newly rechristened firm SCRB Strategies, along with veteran strategists Ace Smith, Sean Clegg and Juan Rodriguez. Their clients include Newsom, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), a frequent subject of speculation in her own right about 2020 presidential ambitions.”

According to the firm’s website, “SCRB also advises Fortune 500 companies, major developers, and sports franchises regarding crisis, PR, and public affairs.” 

One of the firm’s corporate clients is PG&E, which is facing allegations that its faulty equipment sparked the massive wildfires that ravaged California during the past two years and killed more than 100 people. PG&E will no doubt pay a pretty penny to SCRB.

In other words, Butler’s motivation might be summarized as “ka-ching.”

The firm, formerly known as “SCN Strategies,” has added a “B” at the end of its name to indicate its fourth partner, Laphonza Butler, along with partners Smith, Clegg and Rodriguez.

Interestingly, Butler may soon find herself across a table from Dave Regan, whom she reportedly can’t stomach.

How?

Regan has hired the firm to run some of his failed ballot initiatives, including SEIU-UHW’s 2014 ballot initiative targeting the California Hospital Association.

Like planets caught in the same gravitational field, their paths may soon collide again. 

SEIU’s Tyrone Freeman: Entrepreneur of the Year

Since Tasty’s recent post about Tyrone Freeman, several readers have spotted him in Los Angeles.

What’s Ty up to these days?

Well, it looks like he’s taken a page out of Andy Stern’s “entrepreneurial” playbook.

Freeman, who formerly headed the nation’s largest union of homecare workers (SEIU Local 6434), is now running a consulting firm to help homecare companies make more profit.

No joke.

Tyrone’s firm is called Maven Innovative Consultancy, LLC. The company’s homepage has images like this:

  

And this:

But wait a sec. Tasty thought Tyrone wanted to defend workers?

Nope.

His website says,

“Mr. Freeman specializes in the defense of small business, in the full range of business matters, including advising business owners. In addition, Mr. Freeman is an Executive with substantial business development, management/leadership experience. High premium on providing cost saving management practices… operational cost saving… Maven Innovative Consultancy, LLC – a boutique consulting firm specializing in the exclusive representation of management in business affairs. A large portion of the Firm’s clients are home care agencies and other health-care related employers.”

Tyrone says he’s a “specialist” in “housing development strategies.”

That’s interesting.

When Freeman was the president of SEIU Local 6434 and also a member of SEIU’s International Executive Board, he set up a housing scam that helped land him in jail.

In 2004, Freeman set up a nonprofit housing organization called the “Long Term Care Housing Corp” to supposedly build housing for low-income workers.

Only… it didn’t.

Freeman, who controlled the organization, listed the home of one of his aides, Rickman Jackson, as the organization’s administrative office. Ty then paid Jackson tens of thousands of dollars in “rent,” which Jackson pocketed.

Btw, despite stealing $33,000 from workers, Jackson is still on SEIU’s payroll to this day.

That’s not all.

Freeman also had the housing organization hire him as a “consultant” and pay him tens of thousands of dollars of the in consulting fees, according to an SEIU report described by the Los Angeles Times. (Paul Pringle, “Union-founded nonprofit spent zero on its charitable purpose in two years,” Los Angeles Times, December 13, 2008)

In other words, Freeman is quite an expert in “housing development strategies.”

Which brings us to the elephant in the room.

Why did SEIU’s top officials reportedly devise a scheme to secretly fund Freeman’s legal defense after he was indicted in February 2012 for stealing millions of dollars from SEIU’s own members?

In 2008 -- after the Los Angeles Times published a series of revelations about Freeman’s corruption (remember the Grand Havana Room cigar club?) -- SEIU officials ousted Freeman, banned him for life from SEIU membership, and ordered him to pay back more than $1 million in money he stole from SEIU’s members.

Tasty bets dollars to donuts that Freeman never paid back the $1 million.

So… why the f*ck did SEIU officials secretly give him six and seven figures to fund his criminal defense?

What role did Andy Stern play in the secret payments? What about Mary Kay Henry? She became president of SEIU on May 8, 2010 and presumably was involved in funding Freeman’s legal defense until his appeal was dismissed in October 2014.

SEIU officials are struggling with the union’s widening sexual harassment scandal. They also need to investigate the massive ethical questions swirling around the Freeman scandal. For example, did SEIU officials commit conflict-of-interest violations by diverting SEIU cash to Freeman in order to buy his silence about their involvement in his crimes?

Workers have enough problems with greedy bosses and corrupt politicians. They deserve democratic, transparent and accountable unions. It's time for SEIU to come clean.

More on SEIU's Transfer of California Longterm Care Workers

Here’s additional news, analysis, and commentary on SEIU's transfer of California long-term care workers as well as the "leaked memo" authored by SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan: (1) an excerpt from labor journalist Cal Winslow’s article and (2) NUHW’s perspective on the situation.

Late last week, Winslow -- author of "Labor’s Civil War in California" -- published "SEIU: Pawns in Their Game" in CounterPunch and Beyond Chron. Here’s an excerpt:

The announcement of the new union itself came from the desk of Mary Kay Henry, the President of SEIU. Good news? SEIU is always about being the biggest, triumphalist in its campaigns – and gimmicks…

The details? Just how will all this happen? Well, we’ll have to wait. So will the workers. Not to worry, however; according to the mailer, “We are developing an orderly transition plan and will be in regular communication with you and all affected members over the next few months.” Questions? “Please call 844-259-1694. Your fellow union members are standing by to take your call.”

I called and was informed that eight members were ahead of me but “your call is important to us.” However, I could leave a question and receive a call back “within two business days.” I held on and after 16 minutes spoke to Minh, a “staff organizer” in Los Angeles. I asked him if it was indeed a done deal he said yes. And would the new local be headed by Laphonza Butler, a Henry protégé, now of Local 6364, “yes, at this point… it is still a process in transition.” And would there be any informational meetings in my area, North Bay, Santa Rosa? “No, none were scheduled.”

…Widely despised in trade union circles, not to mention amongst his own members, Regan came to California in 2008, parachuted in by Andy Stern, then President of SEIU, to take command of a trusteed UHW. Since then he has established himself as a friend of the hospital bosses par excellence, a grantor of concessions, champion of partnerships. His latest secret deal has been with Kaiser Permanente and its hospitals, one that stops the public (and the authorities) from knowing about quality of care problems in the state’s massive healthcare industry.

Finally, here’s NUHW’s take:

"Corporate Collaborator" Dave Regan undercut by SEIU International; SEIU-UHW members caught in crossfire

"In the labor movement, there are two kinds of leaders — those who fight big corporations, and those who collaborate with them," Consumer Watchdog President Jamie Court wrote in the Huffington Post this week. "The poster child for the collaborators just had half his membership taken away.

"David Regan, head of United Healthcare Workers West, who inked sweetheart deals with California's largest HMO, Kaiser and its hospitals, to keep quality-of-care problems hush-hush, and only fought for corporations' political goals, lost 70,000 of his 150,000 members recently. 

"It's a fitting fate for one of labor's biggest corporate sellouts."

Mary Kay Henry, president of SEIU International, is shoring up her power base within the union by unilaterally cutting SEIU–UHW in half and moving 70,000 home care workers into a new local. SEIU–UHW members not only didn't get to vote on the move, they were not even aware of it until the deal was done. 

Those who remember the 2009 trusteeship of SEIU–UHW will appreciate the irony of this latest fiasco, which Cal Winslow has dissected in his latest article, "Pawns in SEIU's Game," published this week by CounterPunch and BeyondChron.  

This same top-down decision to eviscerate SEIU–UHW was the basis for the trusteeship that resulted in the ouster of the union's previous leaders, who went on to form democratic, member-led NUHW with the support of thousands of SEIU–UHW members. It was clear then that the transfer was purely a political move, a scheme by SEIU International's then President Andy Stern and then Vice President Mary Kay Henry to get rid of the democratic leadership of SEIU–UHW and put it firmly under the control of SEIU International in Washington DC.

And if anyone doubted that fact, it was later made abundantly clear when Stern and Henry decided not to follow through on the move once they'd installed their friend Dave Regan as president of SEIU–UHW. 

Stern has since moved on to join the ranks of corporate America, leaving Mary Kay Henry in charge, and now she's resurrected the scheme, this time to undermine her former protégé, Regan, who has responded with an outlandishly hypocritical memo that rails against the very same actions that helped get him his job in 2009. Regan was in favor of carving up SEIU–UHW when it worked in his favor but calls it "a massive betrayal" now that it doesn't.

Click here to read Dave Regan's memo. If you think it sounds familiar, it is. These are the same arguments voiced by NUHW leaders when they were ousted from SEIU–UHW by Regan, Henry, and Stern six years ago. 

One could almost find it amusing if it weren't so tragic. A once democratic union that was built through decades of struggle has been steadily undermined over the past six years until it has become a corporatized branch of the autocratic SEIU International. And now, with the transfer of half of SEIU–UHW's membership into a new local, the dismantling of what was once the biggest, strongest, proudest healthcare union in California is nearly complete. 

Our condolences to SEIU–UHW members, who remain trapped in an undemocratic and increasingly corporate-minded union whose leaders protect their own power at the expense of the workers they ostensibly represent. 

Mary Kay Henry to 283,000 CA Workers: “You will soon be joining SEIU Local 2015”

Here's confirmation that SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan lost his "war" with SEIU’s Mary Kay Henry.

In a letter dated June 3, 2015, Mary Kay Henry announced that SEIU is transferring 283,000 of its California home care and nursing home workers into a new statewide local union called “SEIU Local 2015.”

For SEIU-UHW, this will result in the loss of approximately 65,000 of its members to a new local union that’s presumably headed by the president of SEIU Local 6434, Laphonza Butler.

This earlier post discusses some of the internal intrigue and politics behind the Henry's move.

The letter -- which comes from the “Desk of Mary Kay Henry” with her photo emblazoned on the letterhead – says:

"I'm writing with exciting news. SEIU has begun the process of uniting all long-term care members of California in one strong statewide local union… We are developing an orderly transition plan and will be in regular communication with you at all affected members over the next few months.”

Here's the letter (the home address has been blocked out with a piece of scrap paper).

Source: SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan Caved in on Transfer of Long-Term Care Workers

Dave Regan has reportedly surrendered his sword to SEIU President Mary Kay Henry by agreeing to transfer SEIU-UHW's long-term care workers to SEIU Local 6434, according to one source whose report has not yet been confirmed.

Earlier this year, Henry appointed former SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Eliseo Medina to serve as a "hearing officer" to iron out the details of transferring the long-term care workers. Henry tasked Medina with producing a recommendation by June 2.

In recent months, Regan threatened Henry with "a war" and violated a gag order imposed by SEIU's International Executive Board. Regan also had SEIU-UHW's Executive Board pass a resolution that opposed the transfer of the workers and also labeled Henry "a disappointment."

Nonetheless, Tasty's source says Reagan recently threw in the towel after months of energetic chest-puffing and posturing that appears to have been little more than bluster.

More to follow.

SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan Fires Another Salvo in His Battle with Mary Kay Henry

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan has fired another salvo in his war with SEIU President Mary Kay Henry and SEIU's International Executive Board (IEB).

In January, SEIU's IEB ordered SEIU-UHW and SEIU Local 521 to finally carry out a six-year-old order to transfer their long-term care workers to SEIU Local 6434.

This week, California home care workers tell Tasty they’re receiving an SEIU-UHW "survey" in the mail that’s designed to build opposition to Mary Kay Henry and the IEB’s order. Here's a copy of the mailer, which says in part:

Below is a short survey about what you think nursing home, home care workers and our patients and clients need. This is our chance to shape the future of home care and healthcare in California...

How do you think your needs and your patient's/client’s needs will be better met? Choose one:

• Being united in a single, statewide healthcare union with ALL California hospital, nursing home and home care workers?

                    OR 

• Being separated from hospital workers and put into a different union of only home care and nursing home workers?

Regan also posted an electronic version of the survey on SEIU-UHW's website at http://www.seiu-uhw.org/betterfuture, where any member of the public can fill it out.

Regan’s "push poll" will undoubtedly cause SEIU officials to hit the roof. In March, the Purple Palace erupted in anger when Diamond Dave had SEIU-UHW’s Executive Board pass a resolution opposing the IEB’s order.

In addition to the survey, Tasty hears that Regan has assigned large numbers of SEIU-UHW staffers to organize home care and nursing home workers to oppose Mary Kay Henry and SEIU.

Will Regan try to use the results of the "survey" in his public battle with Mary Kay Henry? You betcha. But even if the survey had been conducted in a reliable fashion (which it wasn't), experience tells us you can't trust the results. Why? Because Diamond Dave loves to stuff the ballot box.

For example, Regan was famously apprehended while stuffing the ballot box in two unionization elections in Southern California at Chapman Medical Center and HCA’s Thousands Oaks Surgical Hospital. The NLRB documented the ballot-box-stuffing, overturned the elections, and cited SEIU-UHW for violating federal labor law.

Stay tuned.

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan: “Mary Kay Henry is a disappointment”

Regan and Henry during a friendlier moment

Here's the complete version of the resolution that Dave Regan had SEIU-UHW's Executive Board pass at its March meeting. The resolution is one of the volleys in Regan’s self-described war against SEIU's President Mary Kay Henry and the SEIU International Executive Board (IEB).

In January, the SEIU IEB ordered SEIU-UHW and SEIU Local 521 to finally carry out a six-year-old order to consolidate SEIU's California long-term care workers into a single local union, SEIU Local 6434. At the January meeting, the presidents of the three affected local unions pledged to refrain from talking publicly about the IEB's order.

That's why SEIU officials erupted in anger when Regan had SEIU-UHW's Executive Board pass the following resolution just weeks later.

Here are a few excerpts from the resolution, with full text below. (Fyi, SEIU Local 6434 is also known as “ULTCW” or "United Long Term Care Workers Union.")

In January 2015, SEIU International President Mary Kay Henry announced that she had decided to re-visit the question of local union structure for healthcare workers in California. SEIU-UHW invited President Henry to come and talk to our elected leadership about this decision and she declined to do so.

Therefore be it resolved that in the spirit of our union’s slogan, “Stronger Together,” the SEIU-UHW Executive Board calls for the creation of one statewide healthcare union in California that unites home care, nursing home and hospital workers…

Be it further resolved that SEIU-UHW strongly opposes efforts to divide healthcare workers in California because it would weaken all healthcare workers and make the previously referenced goals unachievable.

Be it further resolved that SEIU-UHW expresses its disappointment that the International President of SEIU declined our invitation to come and talk to our elected leadership about this decision that will have a profound impact on healthcare workers and patients in California.

Be it further resolved that this resolution, expressing the strongly held convictions of the leadership of SEIU-UHW’s home care, hospital, Kaiser and nursing home members, be distributed to the leadership of the International Union and to others within SEIU who care about the future of healthcare workers.  

  SEIU-UHW Executive Board's Resolution against SEIU IEB Order on California Long-term Care Workers Marc...

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan: “We’re at war!”

Dave Regan recently had a conference call with SEIU-UHW’s staff and told them, "We're at war with the International union," according to sources inside the union.

This is the latest chapter in Reagan's deepening battle with SEIU President Mary Kay Henry and SEIU's International Executive Board, which in January ordered Regan to finally comply with a six-year-old order to transfer SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 home care and nursing home workers to SEIU Local 6434.

According to Tasty’s sources, some of SEIU-UHW’s staff were taken aback by Regan's call to arms. 

Meanwhile, a bunker-like atmosphere has reportedly descended on the union, with the union’s top officials and staffers nervously looking over their shoulders amid suspicions about loyalties. "Is s/he with us or against us?"

A number of SEIU-UHW staffers formerly worked for Mary Kay Henry and SEIU International. These staffers have greater loyalty to the Purple Palace than to Regan. Diamond Dave and his top lieutenants are fully aware of this, say sources, and are growing increasingly nervous about “moles” inside SEIU-UHW who are leaking information to Mary Kay Henry.

Regan, who’s notorious for conducting "witchhunts" and loyalty trials among the union's membership, will likely soon be deploying these tactics on his own staff.

Stay tuned.

Dave Regan Is Taken to Task for Violating SEIU's Order... even as Regan Plots More Violations

Diamond Dave and Mary Kay during an earlier time

Here's the latest on Diamond Dave's battle with the Purple Palace.

Sources say the Purple Palace erupted in anger when, earlier this month, Dave Regan had SEIU-UHW’s Executive Board pass a resolution opposing the January order issued by SEIU's International Executive Board (IEB). The IEB’s order directs SEIU-UHW and SEIU Local 521 to transfer their home care and nursing home workers to SEIU Local 6434, which is headed by Laphonza Butler.

In January, the IEB apparently placed a gag order on the three affected local unions. Each of the leaders of the three affected local unions (SEIU-UHW, Local 521 and Local 6434) pledged to abide by the gag rule, which bars them from speaking publicly about the matter.

So… when Regan passed his own resolution opposing the IEB’s order, Local 6434's Laphonza Butler and Local 521’s CEO Luisa Blue reportedly “flipped out" in anger and called for the immediate transfer of the long-term care workers rather than waiting until June, say Tasty's sources.

In recent days, Butler, Blue and Regan met with retired SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Eliseo Medina. SEIU President Mary Kay Henry brought Medina out of retirement to serve as a hearing officer to iron out the details of transferring the long-term care workers. Henry tasked Medina with producing a recommendation by June 2.

During Medina’s recent meeting with Butler, Blue and Regan, tensions between the three local union leaders were reportedly sky high. Sources say Medina ultimately convinced Blue to withdraw her demand that the workers be transferred immediately due to Regan’s violation of the gag order. Meanwhile, speaking of the gag order, Medina reportedly told Regan to "keep his mouth shut."

Despite Medina's warning, sources report that Regan is already planning more violations of the gag rule -- basically thumbing his nose at Mary Kay Henry, the IEB and Medina.

Here's what the sources say:

First, Regan has convinced George Gresham (the president to SEIU 1199 New York) to send a letter to Mary Kay Henry backing Regan's position on the long-term care workers. As described in an earlier post, Regan and Gresham are reportedly working together to try to unseat Mary Kay Henry in SEIU’s internal officer elections in 2016. These political ambitions are the underlying dynamics driving the SEIU infighting… the deep subterranean plates that are producing earthquakes on the earth’s surface.

In addition, Regan reportedly announced to SEIU-UHW staffers that he’s approaching the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions ("the partnership unions") to get their support in battling Mary Kay Henry. This promises to spread SEIU's infighting to the broader U.S. labor movement. The Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions is made up of 28 local unions across the US, including the Teamsters, Steelworkers and UFCW.

Regan's outreach to other Kaiser unions also points to his real motivations for delaying the transfer of the long-term care workers until June. At its January meeting, the IEB initially ordered Regan to transfer the workers on a rapid timeframe. Regan successfully argued for a delay until June, claiming that the transfer of the long-term care workers would somehow weaken SEIU-UHW’s ability to negotiate a contract with Kaiser Permanente.

 

Eliseo Medina

At the end of March, Regan and the partnership unions begin their “negotiations” with Kaiser -- which will undoubtedly follow Regan's recipe of backdoor deals with the boss and a pathetically choreographed “show” to try to get worker buy-in.

So... with Regan now poised to commit more violations of the IEB's gag order, how will the Purple Palace respond?

Stay tuned...

Did SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan find religion?

As SEIU President Mary Kay Henry celebrates the miraculous resurrection of SEIU's order to transfer 65,000 California long-term care workers, SEIU-UHW President Dave Regan is experiencing his own kind of religious moment.

Did "Diamond Dave" find religion?

Not quite.

But he has undergone a sudden “religious conversion” that’s allowed him to perform a flip-flop of biblical proportions. 

In a fantastic about-face that's befitting of only the sleaziest politician, Regan -- who has fervently supported SEIU’s order to "unite" all of California's long-term care workers into SEIU Local 6434 – is now suddenly opposed to it.

It's like that famous politician who said, "I voted for it, uh..., before I voted against it."

Well, that's Dave Regan. But on steroids.

Back in 2007 and 2008, Regan was a member of SEIU’s Long Term Care Division Steering Council and aggressively pushed for the transfer of SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 long-term care workers into Local 6434.

And in June of 2008 at SEIU’s convention in Puerto Rico, Regan aggressively campaigned in support of “Resolution # 206a” which called for the transfer of SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 long-term care workers to Local 6434.

Regan even worked hand-in-hand with Tyrone Freeman to launch a PR and direct-mail campaign in California to push for the transfer of the 65,000 members... including a website called www.StrongerAsOne.com

Then, in January of 2009, Regan was a member of SEIU’s International Executive Board and voted in favor of ordering SEIU-UHW to transfer the 65,000 members.

Soon thereafter, Regan voted to put SEIU-UHW into trusteeship when its governing board failed to transfer the 65,000 workers fast enough.

But today, my friends, is apparently a brand new day for Diamond Dave. 

Dave has miraculously found religion. Or maybe he was struck by lightning. Or bumped his head too hard on the underside of Duane Dauner’s desk.

Whatever happened, Diamond Dave has flip-flopped so hard that his head is bouncing back and forth like one of those plastic bobble heads you get at the baseball game.

Quite the image of integrity...

SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan Fires Salvo in Escalating War with Mary Kay Henry

Here's the latest on the escalating war between SEIU President Mary Kay Henry and SEIU-UHW President Dave Regan.

Last weekend, Regan had SEIU-UHW’s Executive Board approve a resolution that directly opposes the recent decision by SEIU’s International Executive Board to finally carry out its 2009 order to transfer SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 long-term care workers to SEIU Local 6434.

Instead... Regan's resolution calls for transferring more than 200,000 members out of Local 6434 and SEIU Local 521 and into Regan's union!

Here's an excerpt from Regan’s resolution (a full copy is below):

Therefore be it resolved that in the spirit of our union’s slogan “Stronger Together” the SEIU-UHW Executive Board calls for the creation of one statewide healthcare union in California that unites home care, nursing home and hospital workers…

Be it further resolved that SEIU-UHW strongly opposes efforts to divide healthcare workers in California because it would weaken all healthcare workers…

Be it further resolved that this resolution, expressing the strongly held convictions of the leadership of SEIU-UHW’s home care, hospital, Kaiser and nursing home members be distributed to the leadership of the International Union and to others within SEIU who care about the future of healthcare workers.

Regan’s resolution -- which has more contradictions than Oxford's Unabridged Compendium of Oxymorons -- is the latest salvo in his war with Henry and the SEIU International Executive Board. 

More info soon about Diamond Dave's copious contradictions.

Here’s Regan's resolution in its original and text-only format.

Resolution in Support of Unifying

Healthcare Workers in California

Resolution 15-15

Whereas, Harris vs. Quinn has created a “right to work” environment for IHSS workers.  Historically, wherever local unions have been predominantly open shop, their membership has declined steeply over time and the employment standards of their members have suffered.

Whereas, SEIU-UHW members have worked successfully to defend our union from mass decertification attempts because we have united to support each other. Home care and nursing home members came to defend Kaiser members in two elections. Hospital members signed up home care members after Harris vs. Quinn, resulting in an 80% membership rate, and Kaiser, home care, nursing home and hospital members all worked together to enroll some 20,000 Californians into healthcare coverage.

Whereas, SEIU has always stood for uniting workers within their industries, and healthcare workers have been united in New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota and elsewhere. In the few examples where healthcare worker have not been united in SEIU, such as California, it has been because of internal political, not strategic, considerations.

Therefore be it resolved that in the spirit of our union’s slogan “Stronger Together” the SEIU-UHW Executive Board calls for the creation of one statewide healthcare union in California that unites home care, nursing home and hospital workers to allow healthcare workers to:

·         Become stronger together in a movement that will fight to ensure that no member of the healthcare team makes less than $15 an hour and that all healthcare workers enjoy a rising standard of living, utilizing ballot measures, contract campaigns and unified political action to achieve that goal.

·         Speak with one healthcare worker voice to dramatically raise Medi-Cal rates to end the two tier healthcare system that disproportionately underserves women, immigrants and people of color, resulting in immoral racial, gender and economic disparities in health outcomes, and to maximize job security for those providing healthcare to low-income Californians.

·         Unite the resources of healthcare workers to organize hundreds of thousands of healthcare workers in all segments of the industry, including private home care, nursing homes, assisted living, medical groups, acute care and outpatient care, while maintaining a super-majority membership rate to ensure a continued strong voice for IHSS workers.

Be it further resolved that SEIU-UHW strongly opposes efforts to divide healthcare workers in California because it would weaken all healthcare workers and make the previously referenced goals unachievable.

Be it further resolved that all SEIU California healthcare members and the SEIU Healthcare Division should be given the opportunity to discuss, debate and provide input into the decisions that impact their future.

Be it further resolved that this resolution, expressing the strongly held convictions of the leadership of SEIU-UHW’s home care, hospital, Kaiser and nursing home members be distributed to the leadership of the International Union and to others within SEIU who care about the future of healthcare workers.

Presented:        March 2015      

Adopted:                                 

                        Amended:                                

SEIU UHW Executive Board Meeting

War Intensifies between SEIU’s Mary Kay Henry and Dave Regan

Sources describe an escalating war between SEIU President Mary Kay Henry and SEIU-UHW President Dave Regan.

At a January meeting in Puerto Rico, Henry and the SEIU International Executive Board (IEB) ordered Regan to transfer SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 nursing home and home care workers to SEIU Local 6434. 

Regan successfully pleaded with the IEB to postpone the transfer until this summer.

In recent weeks, however, Regan changed his tune... and delivered a new response to Henry’s order: 

“Hell No!”

In fact, Regan reportedly told Henry she will face “a war” unless she reverses the decision. 

That's not all. Regan threatened Henry by saying his war will be bigger than anything experienced by SEIU… ever!

Way to go, Dave!

So what's going on?

Regan is reportedly maneuvering behind the scenes to oust Henry from her presidential suite at the Purple Palace during SEIU's 2016 elections, which are held at SEIU’s once-every-four-years convention.

In response, Henry has rallied her supporters on the IEB to get Regan to transfer SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 nursing home and home care workers to SEIU Local 6434. By transferring the workers, Regan will lose the "delegated votes" of these 65,000 homecare members during the 2016 elections… and the votes will instead be cast by Henry's ally, Laphonza Butler (the president of Local 6434).

These, my friends, are the political motives that fuel the war between Regan and Henry.

So where does order to transfer SEIU-UHW’s 65,000 long-term care workers come from?

Back in January of 2009, Henry’s predecessor (Andy Stern) manufactured the order as a pretext for ousting his internal critics and pro-democracy reformers -- Sal Rosselli and his team -- from SEIU.

After removing Rosselli and thousands of rank-and-file stewards and elected officers, Stern and Mary Kay Henry conveniently ignored Stern’s order -- essentially acknowledging it was nothing more than a blatant political ploy. 

Now, fast-forward six years… and Stern's long-neglected “transfer” order has been resurrected once again because it's found a new political purpose inside the Machiavellian machinations that swirl inside the dark corridors of the Purple Palace.

Quite a story, right?

More to follow…

SEIU's IEB Contemplates Massive Flip-Flop in Puerto Rico as Dave Regan hunts Mega-Merger

This week, SEIU’s International Executive Board (IEB) is meeting in sunny Puerto Rico where they plan to decide the fate of more than 200,000 California home care and nursing home workers.

According to a January 17th email penned by Greg Pullman ("Chief of Staff" for SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan), the IEB is deciding whether or not to merge California's homecare, nursing home, and hospital workers into a giant mega-local that presumably will be controlled by Regan.

Here's what the e-mail says (see complete copy below):

As many of you are aware, there has been a long standing debate in SEIU over whether homecare and nursing home workers are members of the healthcare delivery team and are stronger united with all healthcare workers or if they are better off separated out into a long term care only local union. That question is again being taken up by the SEIU International Executive Board in Puerto Rico next week. We expect a spirited debate. This is a question that has significant consequences for our members and many of us have strong feelings about it. We hope that there will be a healthy process to debate and decide on this matter. We will be holding a staff meeting on Monday, January 26 at 10am to report back on the discussion. In the meantime, please stay focused on the important work we are doing. No change will be occurring immediately and there will be ample time to discuss this and address the obvious number of questions and concerns it raises. Thank you for your continued focus on improving the lives of healthcare workers in California.

Regan has been gunning to merge SEIU Local 6434’s members into his union for some time, thereby sparking a war with Local 6434’s president LaPhonza Butler, who also serves as the President of the SEIU California State Council.

A pro-merger decision from Puerto Rico would showcase the apparently limitless capacity of SEIU’s top officials to simply “make sh*t up” to suit their political whims.

Back in 2008, SEIU’s IEB took exactly the opposite position.

The IEB hired a former UAW attorney named Leonard Page (a personal friend of SEIU General Counsel Judy Scott) to conduct “impartial” hearings about the future of California's healthcare workers. At the end of Page’s kangaroo court, the IEB issued a decree ordering hospital and long-term care workers to be segregated into separate SEIU locals.

 

SEIU's Judy Scott

SEIU officials claimed the decision would ‘make workers stronger.’ The real reason behind the decision, of course, was purely political:  to strip 60,000 workers from Sal Rosselli’s local because its leaders had rightfully criticized secret backroom deals orchestrated by Andy Stern, Mary Kay Henry and Co. that sold out rank-and-file workers and undermined worker democracy.

In January of 2009, Stern and Co. used Page’s report as the rationale for imposing an “emergency" trusteeship on Rosselli’s local.

After the trusteeship, the IEB never implemented the transfer of the 60,000 workers… which apparently wasn't such a big “emergency.” In fact, it's been six long years, and the IEB has still not implemented their decision.

Which brings us back to this week's seaside confab in San Juan…  

It promises to offer quite a spectacle to observers. IEB members may be masters of contradiction, but this sort of flip-flopping will require them to twist themselves into mind-bending pretzels.

And Regan will end up as the most contorted pretzel of them all.

In 2008, he served on the IEB and voted in favor of segregating California’s hospital and long-term care workers into separate locals. In fact, he was one of the main proponents and conspired with Tyrone Freeman to coordinate the pro-separation campaign.

Today, Regan is absolutely opposed to… uhh… what he voted for then. Has the flip-flopping politician so famously said: "I voted for it before I voted against it."

At least Regan gets a vote. That's a lot more than can be said for the 200,000 rank-and-file workers who’ll be affected by the decision.

P.S. Tasty will share more details about that Regan's after-hours meeting with Tyrone… which happened to involve cigars!

  SEIU International Executive Board meeting in Puerto Rico about a possible merger of California healthcare...