Union bill stirs threat of backlash
Right-to-work discussions
By Tom McGhee
Denver Post Staff Writer
Denver Post

Article Last Updated:02/04/2007 10:30:44 PM MST

Colorado business leaders can expect a political battle on a national scale if they decide to push a constitutional amendment to make Colorado a right-to-work state, said Rick Bender, president of the Washington State Labor Council.

"If there is any attempt to move toward right-to-work, the whole labor movement across the country will come in to help," Bender said. "It would be the whole package."

During the past two weeks, talk within the business community has heightened about proposing a right-to-work amendment in response to House Bill 1072, which would make it easier for unions to organize by eliminating a second vote needed to form an all-union shop. Such shops allow unions to collect dues from their members as well as "agency fees" from employees not in the union.

Economic-development officials and business owners contend the bill would crimp job growth and deter companies from relocating to Colorado. The bill has passed the House, and the Senate is expected to take a final vote today. Gov. Bill Ritter is likely to sign it.

Tom Clark, executive vice president of the Metro Denver Economic Development Corp., said it is premature to discuss amending the Colorado Constitution, especially when the fate of House Bill 1072 hasn't been decided.

Responding to Bender's promise that national labor would bring tremendous resources to Colorado, Clark said: "If they were intent on having that fight, then I guess they did the right thing by introducing House Bill 1072, because it was certainly not a fight we picked."

Fight "ugly" in Oklahoma

Colorado is surrounded by right-to-work states, which bar unions from making payment of dues a condition of employment.

In Oklahoma, union and business interests waged an expensive battle in 2001 over a statewide right-to-work initiative. The Greater Oklahoma City Chamber alone spent $5 million to get it passed, said Dean Schirf, the chamber's vice president of government affairs.

"It got a little ugly at times," Schirf said.

Across the country, organized labor faces growing pressure to hold political ground and retain membership.

In 2006, union membership nationwide fell by 326,000 workers to 15.4 million, or 12 percent of all workers, according to statistics released last week by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. About 186,000 Colorado workers are represented by unions, or 8.6 percent of the workforce.

Bender recently was sent to Colorado by the national AFL- CIO to resolve conflicts and strengthen the state chapter, which had been beset by internal divisions that began in 2005 when a group of unions pulled out of the AFL-CIO.

The breakup, which removed thousands of dues-paying members from the AFL-CIO's rolls, left state offices throughout the country with depleted coffers.

Tensions within the AFL-CIO arose again last fall during Denver's push to win the Democratic National Convention, when the stagehands union refused to sign a no-strike clause.

Colorado union affiliates, state president Steve Adams and others asked national leaders to step in, Bender said.

Washington's AFL-CIO and other organizations were able to bring most of their large union affiliates back into the fold through a "solidarity charters" program.

But Colorado was particularly hard-hit and has not been able to recover as well as other states, Bender said.

"They lost about 34 percent of their income," he said.

The Service Employees International Union returned to the Colorado AFL-CIO, along with some of the other unions that dropped out. But the United Food and Commercial Workers, with more than 22,000 workers, hasn't returned.

Bender said he plans to talk to the state's UFCW leaders to lure them back to the fold. The effort to fortify allegiances is happening at a time when labor finds the political climate more hospitable to its agenda, as Democrats now control the state legislature and governor's office.

Dwindling membership and financial difficulties, however, are spotlighting problems within unions that in the past wouldn't have become public, said Gary Chaison, professor of labor relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass.

"Unions are very reluctant to air their dirty laundry," Chaison said. "The most important creed for the labor movement is solidarity."

Bender and Keith Maddox, a national AFL-CIO official, have been interviewing Colorado labor leaders. The pair will submit a report on their findings to AFL-CIO president John Sweeney, who will decide how to proceed.

Bender said he doesn't know if any of the state leaders will be replaced. The process is expected to take several months.

Staff writer Will Shanley contributed to this report. Staff writer Tom McGhee can be reached at 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com.