1199 Magazine: Setting the Scene

Setting t he Scene

Members lobby lawmakers before budget.

The time has come to demand what we deserve.

There’s an old saying that if you want the rich to work harder, you pay them more. If you want the poor to work harder, you pay them less.

Sadly, the truth of that adage is being demonstrated over and over again in the healthcare industry these days. Hospital CEOs rake in ever more bloated “compensation packages”, while insisting there is no money available to pay a living wage to all their employees.

Instead of recognizing that the key to stemming the healthcare resignation epidemic is to increase wages and improve benefits, many employers instead resort to union-busting tactics like hiring agency workers to fill their staffing gaps.

It’s time for us to fight back! No longer should we have to face the triple threats of Covid-19, Influenza and the RSV virus every time we go to work, without any extra compensation in return. These are extraordinary times, and as extraordinary people who are stepping up, looking after the sick and vulnerable members of our community — we deserve a lot more recognition than we are getting.

We celebrated with our co-workers in the New York State Nurses Association when they won substantial pay increases at private sector hospitals in New York City. Now, it is time to fight for what is our due.

As we go to press, it is clear that we will have a monumental battle on our hands when it comes to getting the League of Voluntary Hospitals and Homes – in whose institutions more than 90,000 members of our union work – to reopen the contract they settled with 1199SEIU roughly a year-and-ahalf ago.

We will need to mobilize beyond what we have ever known. These are exciting times, but also very challenging times. The New York State Governor — whose recent election owes a lot to 1199 members’ work in getting out the vote — unveiled her draft budget on February 1. It wasn’t pretty. What Governor Kathy Hochul proposes to spend on healthcare falls very far short of what is needed in this moment.

The Union has a lot of work to do in order to ensure that League institutions — and the many other settings in which 1199ers work — have sufficient state money for significant wage increases.

NYS lawmakers recognize the

healthcare funding shortfall. They need to make it their business to convince the Governor to allocate more. That is why the Union is planning to mobilize thousands of members for a mega-rally in Albany on March 21, the likes of which the NYS capital has rarely seen before. (See p. 7 for sign up details)

This is about our future and the future of our families. We may have overcome chattel slavery, but too many of us are still tied to jobs that do not pay enough for us to be able to advance our families.

1199 Magazine January-February 2023 Vol. 41 No.1 ISSN 2474-7009

Published

4 Home Care Members Lobby To increase the New York State minimum wage.

5 The President’s Column Honoring Black History Month.

6 Putting our Mouths where the Money is 1199ers lobby Albany lawmakers on healthcare priorities.

16 Building a Multiracial Democracy

crucial role that labor unions can play.

18

long-term activist who leads by example. 20 Paying it Forward

Editorial: We’re on the Move

Cover: Suzette Kiffin (left) and Elise Colbert (right), two CNAs who work at the Schaffer Extended Care Center at Montefiore New Rochelle, pictured in Albany attending a recent lobby day.

Home Care Members Rise Up

To increase the New York State minimum wage.

1199 Home Care members convened at the New York State capital on January 25, for a press conference to urge lawmakers to pass a much-needed increase to the state’s minimum wage.

After a successful campaign last year to raise home care workers’ wages in NYS, which are linked to the state’s minimum wage, it was time to join forces with the RaiseUpNy campaign aimed at improving the minimum wage for all.

“We recently got a raise, but it’s not enough. I get paid every two weeks and my check matches what I owe for rent. That doesn’t include the light bill, the phone, and I have to eat. I leave home at 6am to work two to three cases a day to keep a roof over my head. It’s a struggle,” said Donna Cumberbatch, a home care member who works at the

RiseBoro Homecare Services in Brooklyn, adding, “Elected officials should ask themselves, when they get older, do they want quality care? If they want quality care, then they have to have good aides. If they want good aides, then they have to pay for them.”

The 1199 Home Care members that boarded busses up to Albany joined hundreds of fellow union workers, organizers and activists from New York City to call for legislation that would raise the minimum wage in NYC and its suburbs to $21.25 by 2026 and tie future raises to cost-of-living increases.

The Raise Up NY (S1978) bill, proposed by State Senator Jessica Ramos and State Assembly Member Latoya Joyner, would also raise the minimum wage in parts of the state outside of the city to

$20 by 2026.

Six years ago, New York was one of the first states to adopt a $15 minimum wage—following a spirted campaign by 1199SEIU— improving the lives of millions of New York families. But with costs rapidly rising and no increases in the minimum wage for the last four years in much of the state, too many New York families are again unable to make ends meet.

In a poll conducted last November, 80 percent of respondents supported increasing the minimum wage in New York. The federal minimum wage has not increased in over a decade, and is worth less now than it was 60 years ago. As congressional attempts to raise it flounder in the face of Republican pushback, Union members are taking their fight to their state governments instead.

“We recently got a raise, but it’s not enough. I get paid every two weeks and my check matches what I owe for rent. That doesn’t include the light bill, the phone, and I have to eat. I leave home at 6am to work 2-3 cases a day to keep a roof over my head. It’s a struggle.”

Black History Month

Let’s make sure it does not get whitewashed.

Our country has been celebrating Black History Month for nearly half a century, since it was adopted in 1976, following a campaign by African-American scholars.

“Negro History Week” was celebrated 50 years prior to that, but it was determined that a week was insufficient to celebrate the entirety of Black history.

It is a good thing we now celebrate Black History Month, but it would be much more appropriate to appreciate Black history all year-long. For Black history is American history, and vice versa. There simply is no U.S. history without Black history, much as many people might wish it were otherwise.

Black History Month is supposed to be a corrective to what has traditionally been taught in schools about presidents, military generals and leaders of industry — all of them white, all of them men.

In our schools, we finally began learning that U.S. history is much more than that. Crispus Attucks, a Black man shot down in the Boston Massacre, was the first man to die in the American revolution. Benjamin Banneker, another Black man, was the landscape architect who designed the city of Washington, DC. Every February, millions of school children choose a Black hero or celebrity to write about—Martin Luther King Jr, Jackie Robinson, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, W.E.B. Dubois, Aretha Franklin, Angela Davis, Barack Obama, LeBron James—the list goes on.

This is all well and good, but it barely scratches the surface of Black-American history. After all, there are 42 million Black Americans—14 percent of the country’s

population. It is telling that, nearly 250 years after our country’s founding, we are still celebrating “firsts”—just last year the first Black woman was selected to serve on the Supreme Court. These “firsts” tell us much about Black history and U.S. history as whole.

Some 600,000 enslaved Africans were brought here in chains, beginning in 1619. This is not only Black history, it is American history, the history of our country’s origin. Enslaved for 250 years and living under U.S.style apartheid for another 100 years, Black Americans built much of the country’s wealth, industry and institutions. Black labor built our Ivy League universities, our textile and apparel industries, cotton, tobacco, peanut and sugar plantations, our ports and waterfronts. And much more. That is Black History that should be celebrated, not ignored.

Four hundred years of resistance—both organized and individualized—to white supremacist terror, police violence, lynchings, whippings, rapes and all manner of brutality and barbarism—this is also Black history. But it is largely ignored by the hypocrites who celebrate Martin Luther King Day, but not the ideas, principles and leadership of the man himself. In many states and school districts today, schools that are closed on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, are banned from teaching what the man believed and wrote about.

The celebration of the great achievements of Black jurists, scientists, artists, political and religious figures is important, hard-earned, and well past due. But Black History Month must also recognize the history that tens of

“The celebration of the great achievements of Black jurists, scientists, artists, political and religious figures is important, hard-earned, and well past due. But Black History Month must also recognize the history that tens of millions of Black Americans are making every day, living under and fighting to overcome systemic racism.”

millions of Black Americans are making every day, living under and fighting to overcome systemic racism. Even after centuries of oppression, Black Americans face earlier deaths, huge disparities in wealth and income, more dismal health outcomes, fewer educational and employment opportunities, and open hostility from one of our two major political parties, as well as from all levels of our criminal justice system—from the cop on the beat—to the U.S. Supreme Court majority.

It is likely that, were U.S. history taught and understood properly— that is, in all its multicultural, multinational complexities and struggles for social justice and equality—there might not be a need for Black History Month. Meantime, let us all take a moment this month to reflect on the beauty, struggle, resistance and, yes—heroism of Black Americans who’ve survived and flourished against all odds over the last four centuries.

The President’s Column by George Gresham

– Donna Cumberbatch, a home care member with the Riseboro Homecare agency in Brooklyn

 Bertha Motta, a home care member with the Sunnyside agency in Queens speaks at the Albany press conference.

Putting our Mouths where the Money is

1199ers lobby Albany lawmakers on healthcare priorities.

It’s been just a few months since 1199ers pulled out all the stops to secure a full-term for New York State Governor Kathy Hochul. Members were able to feel their power in Pennsylvania too, when their canvassing helped secure a narrow victory for John Fetterman in the U.S. Senate last November. And as far afield as Georgia, the might of the Union was on display to help push Raphael Warnock over the top in his own Senate race runoff in December.

But in spite of this clear demonstration of union power at the polls, 1199 members have to keep showing up and showing out every time, no matter what victories have been won in the past — just like they do at each and every contract fight.

Elected officials in Albany need to keep hearing firsthand from 1199 members about what it is like working on the frontlines while dealing with staffing shortages and resource gaps. The New York State budget will be finalized come April. Hundreds of 1199ers from all five boroughs, Long Island and the Hudson Valley have already started boarding busses to Albany to make sure their voices are heard at a time when crucial funding decisions are being made.

When Union members meet with legislators it is to protect their children and secure their futures — a future where they can grow up healthy and strong. When 1199ers speak out, it’s to guarantee they will be able to continue to provide exceptional care to their patients and confirm legislators’ commitments to working people that we’ll have access to good jobs and quality healthcare in our own neighborhoods.

It is clear that healthcare and home care workers have not yet recovered from the pandemic. Solving the shortage of home care workers and the staffing crisis across most hospitals and nursing homes will require significant investment from New York State. Some 1199 employers are in real danger of failure if state assistance is not provided. And Governor Hochul’s initial budget proposals fall far short of what is needed. In fact, hospitals and nursing homes will be held to break even, given no significant new resources to address the crisis. In home care, she has even proposed cutting wages and undermining our hardwon standards.

One member from Niagara Falls put it this way, “We are the last free-standing hospital in Niagara County, serving underrepresented people in in the city of Niagara Falls,” Evelyn Harris, a long time Delegate and PCA at Niagara Falls Memorial, said. “We provide care to a lot of elderly and low income people who have nowhere else to go. We need to have our hospital there and we need proper funding to keep it running.”

As well as telling individual stories, members have been asking the Legislature to stand up to the Governor and allocate real resources to addressing the healthcare crisis, including across the board Medicaid rate increases with no givebacks, at least $1 3 billion in safety net funding and continued wage increases for home care workers. To achieve these ambitious goals, we will need to mobilize like never before, and we have called for a massive mobilization in Albany on March 21st.

 Upstate members meet NYS Assembly member, Monica Wallace.

 1199ers from the Bronx share their concerns with NYS Senator Gustavo Rivera.

 Newly elected NYS Senator Nathalia Fernandez meets her Union constituents.

It’s not too late to take part! On March 21st we’ll be in Albany for a massive rally. Talk to your organizer or delegate today about signing up.

Around the Regions

1199 Social Workers Lobby NYC for Pay

Equity

New York City contracts with nonprofits to provide billions of dollars’ worth of critical social services to New Yorkers in need. But according to a recent study by the New School, roughly two-thirds of all full-time human services workers had earnings in 2019 which fell below the city’s near-poverty threshold.

That is why 1199ers testified at a City Council hearing on January 30 in support of legislation, known as intro 510, which would establish citywide prevailing wage for human service providers. Such legislation would result in improved wages for Union members working as social workers at

NYC nonprofits and also improve recruitment and retention in this crucial sector.

William Perez has been an 1199 behavioral health Social Worker at Callen Lorde for one year. “For 17 years [before that], I literally bounced from one agency to another and back, just seeking higher pay,” he told the NYC councilors, “With two kids to support and tens of thousands of dollars in student loans, I could only afford a tiny studio apartment. Three daily meals were unaffordable and at times, I went without food for myself so I could feed my kids. Getting to where I am today has been a struggle and it is for that reason

Massachusetts Holds Statewide Delegate Assembly

that I come before you today.”

“Many people use community health clinics as steppingstones to gain the necessary experience and move to jobs with higher salaries,” said Maria Oritz, an 1199 Certified Social Worker who works in East Harlem, “It does not have to be this way. I can easily earn over $10,000 more elsewhere, but serving my community is my objective and I plan to do that for as long as I can, which will depend on increasing expenses. The clinics have a difficult time recruiting and retaining long-term workers. Establishing prevailing wages for them will go a long way toward ensuring long term worker retention.”

“Three daily meals were unaffordable and at times, I went without food for myself so I could feed my kids. Getting to where I am today has been a struggle and it is for that reason that I come before you today.”

Child Care Fund Celebrates 30 Year Anniversary

For three decades the 1199SEIU Child Care Funds and the Child Care Corporation have provided quality services to over 400,000 children and families of both Union members and the community at large. The Care for Kids Awards Gala on December 6 at the Lighthouse in Chelsea Piers was the first time since 2019 that members, officers and supporters were able to celebrate in person together since the pandemic began.

Janet Kaledzi, an 1199 RN at Mt Sinai Beth Israel told the audience that all her four children, now aged between 18 and 30 had benefitted enormously from the Child Care Fund. “We lived in New Jersey and every summer my children would spend eight weeks at the camp in New York City, learning to swim and going to museums,” she said, “They were exposed to experiences that I would not have had the time or money to share with them.”

When they got older her children also benefited from the Joseph Tauber Scholarship Program during their undergraduate years. Her eldest daughter became a teacher, her second eldest obtained a Master’s Degree in Public Health and her youngest daughter is now working as a paralegal after studying criminal justice. Her youngest son is following in her footsteps and has just started nursing school.

“Every summer my children would spend eight weeks at the camp in New York City, learning to swim and going to museums. They were exposed to experiences that I would not have had the time or money to share with them.”

On January 18, nearly 200 Massachusetts members united in-person and virtually for a statewide 1199 delegate and leader assembly. They came together to celebrate recent victories, identify and prioritize the challenges they face and to develop a shared vision for 2023. Together, the delegates created action plans to build the union in each of their workplaces and approved policy priorities to tackle low wages and inadequate staffing across the board.

The keynote speaker was Michael Curry, the CEO of the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers, which represents 52 health centers, serving over one million patients out of over 314 practice sites throughout the state. He also serves on the Health Equity Compact, of which 1199SEIU is a member, that aims to combat racial and ethnic disparities in Massachusetts laid bare by the pandemic.

His speech to the assembly emphasized that equity and justice must be central to all healthcare decisions.

 Members gather at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester.

 Delegates Donna Nixon and Maryanne Villani of St. Elizabeth’s Medical Center in Boston, MA, share a moment.

Strong Memorial commemorates Dr King

1199SEIU members in Rochester held their 42nd Annual Martin Luther King Celebration at Strong Memorial Hospital on January 17. Members came together to celebrate the legacy of Dr. King with music, dance, and poetry.

Tina Hawkins, Materials Processing Specialist at the hospital, said: “Dr King taught us the value of equality and

freedom of speech regardless of race, creed and color. We are important and must use our voice to make changes that will make this world a better place.”

The keynote speaker, New York State Senator for Rochester, Jeremy Cooney, told the assembly: “Labor leaders and the workers they represent are strong partners in his advocacy for civil rights and anti-poverty policies.”

NEW YORK

– Janet Kaledzi, 1199 RN at Mt Sinai Beth Israel

– William Perez, 1199 behavioral health Social Worker at Callen Lorde

Around the Regions

Tackling Maryland’s Long Term Care Crisis

1199 members joined the Caring Across Maryland coalition of workers and healthcare advocates as they unveiled a package of bills for state lawmakers aimed at improving conditions for caregivers. The legislation would increase wages and provide greater oversight of nursing home acquisitions.

Cynthia Neely, a home care aide, said she loved her job, but she's overworked and underpaid -- earning just $13.50 an hour. Staffing shortages are severe, she added. At some places, there are

just two employees responsible for as many as 40 patients.

“I love taking care of people,” said Neely, “Unfortunately, I have to work multiple jobs as a caregiver to make ends meet. It is unacceptable to treat the people who take care of our most vulnerable loved ones so badly. I’m out there every day as a caregiver and I see clearly that caregivers in Maryland are headed in the wrong direction. I urge the Maryland General Assembly to take action and pass these bills for a more caring healthcare system.”

The Caring Across Maryland coalition says their state currently has the third-longest wait list for long-term care services in the country. If nothing is done to address it, the situation will only get worse, says 1199’s Maryland/ DC Political Director, Ricarra Jones: "Our aging population is set to explode by 40 percent in 2030.” Not only that, but the caregiving needs of adults are becoming more diverse as individuals with chronic conditions like Alzheimer’s Disease or dementia are living longer.

“It is unacceptable to treat the people who take care of our most vulnerable loved ones so badly. I urge the Maryland General Assembly to take action and pass these bills for a more caring healthcare system.”

Facilities Staff

Providing high quality healthcare means being there when it counts – not only at the bedside, but behind the scenes as well. The Union’s Facilities members play a vital role, even though many patients who pass through a hospital’s hallways may never come across them.

Keeping the building warm enough in winter and cool enough in summer is the work that tends to go unnoticed until something goes wrong. When it does, rapid repair by the in-house team is crucial. Everyone relies on secure construction and appreciates a bright environment too, but they don’t always recognize what it takes to create that atmosphere. 1199 Magazine visited NewYork Presbyterian Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn and met some of the members taking care of the physical plant.

– Cynthia Neely, home care aide

 Cynthia Neely, an 1199 home care worker in MD, speaks at the press conference.

1. Most of the work Sonny Nicholas does as a hospital Carpenter involves interior installation. Sometimes, he repairs holes in walls or replaces ceiling tiles. He worked through the height of the COVID-19 emergency. “The pandemic was horrible,” the 11-year hospital veteran says. “No one else wanted to go into the Covid rooms. People were scared. I was here when they brought in the trailer—I was the one who built the shelves for the bodies.”

The hospital lost 60 people during one three-day period.

“We lost one of the painters in our team to Covid,” Nicholas adds. “I had the virus twice in the early days. But now I’ve had the shots and three rounds of the booster.”

2. Philip Gunraj is in charge of Heating, Ventilation and Air-Conditioning (HVAC) at the hospital. “People get very frustrated very quickly when the air conditioning goes off in the summer,” the 14-year hospital veteran says. “I get to put a smile back on people’s faces all the time.”

Unfortunately, Gunraj just doesn’t have enough people on the team. They’re always operating short-staffed. “There are only six of us in the department covering a hospital with roughly 250 beds,” he says. “Around 75 percent of all the calls to Facilities staff come to the HVAC team. I never stop getting calls. I could work seven-days-a-week if I wanted to.”

The new director put Gunraj in charge of the Operating Rooms, so he comes in at 6 a.m. every day to make sure everything is working properly before the patients arrive. “Sometimes I’m here more than 36 hours in a row. I can do carpentry, too. I never refuse to do anything,” he says.

3. A large part of Eduard Zarubin’s job is to make sure all the switches and lighting in the operating rooms are working properly. “If there is an operation going on and something goes wrong, I will suit up and go into a live operation to fix it. If they need something done, we have to be there,” he says.

The Facilities team came in every day throughout the pandemic. “We were essential workers just as much as the doctors and nurses,” Zarubin says. “When people were out banging pots and clapping, we knew it was for us, too.”

At one point, the emergency room was turned into an admitting room. “We had no PPE and we had to refit and install all the electrical equipment while the patients were there,” Zarubin remembers. “But I didn’t catch the virus until about 18 months later.”

The team spirit Zarubin enjoyed with his co-workers helped keep everyone motivated whenever times got especially tough. “We are not just working here for the money,” he says.

4. Lead Painter Kevin Mulcahy has his work cut out for him keeping the hospital looking fresh and clean. “There are always holes to be filled on the walls; the paint needs to be constantly refreshed or it will look dirty in no time,” he says.

With 14 years under his belt, Mulcahy is one of the longest-serving members on the Facilities team. He lives in Westchester, but believes the 90-minute daily commute is worth it because of the 1199 benefits he can count on. “Union members stay here for a long time,” he says. “It is the management that keeps changing.”

“I get to put a smile back on people’s faces all the time.”

– Philip Gunraj

MEMBERS HO P E

The first Western New York Home Care workers vote to join 1199.

When home care workers at Schofield Residence in Kenmore, New York, celebrated forming a union with 1199SEIU last December, it marked the beginning of a new chapter in home care organizing across the state. When these workers came together near Buffalo to vote ‘Yes’, they became one of the first licensed home health care agencies in Western New York to unionize. Their victory comes after years of dedicated development of home care worker leaders in Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Rochester & Syracuse. In 2022, there were 1,734 workers taking part in activities and advocacy with Healthcare Workers Rising (HWR), which works closely with 1199.

Diana Goudelock was one of the HWR worker leaders who was instrumental during the unionization campaign at Schofield – speaking to other workers who shared cases with her to bring them along.

She’s enthusiastic about making sure that Schofield proves to be the start of a domino effect in Western New York. “We’re the first agency in Western New York to unionize. Hopefully more will come along behind us,” said Goudelock, who hopes to become a Union delegate once their contract is ratified.

“Some workers are set in their ways and see red flags when we talk about a union and they worry about retaliation,” she added, “But I ask them what is it about our job that we can’t have benefits? Nursing homes are unionized, we should be too!”

Goudelock used to work as a CNA in a nursing home but prefers home care because of the personal attention she is able to give her clients. She is currently looking after two people suffering from traumatic brain injury, taking care of them overnight. In order to make ends meet, she currently works 84 hours a week.

Monique Parks is another lifelong care giver who has been a HWR member since its formation. She provides 24-hour care to her father and has seen her benefits slowly eroded over the years.

“With everything going up, it is hard to get by on our wages. I just work, go home, eat, sleep and keep myself clean. That’s all I can do,” says Parks. Her father recently returned home from a two-week hospital stay. During that time, her wages were not paid.

But like so many other 1199 home care members, Parks is dedicated to providing companionship and care, while fighting for fair wages and benefits at the same time.

Last April, HWR members celebrated alongside 1199’s Downstate home care members and community allies when the Fair Pay for Homecare campaign won a $3.60 raise [for Upstate workers] that will be fully realized by Oct 1, 2023.

HWR is not only about organizing and political action. It is also about promoting wellness and providing training opportunities. More than 2,000 caregivers took part in a range of activities including cooking

“Some workers see red flags when we talk about a union and they worry about retaliation. But I ask them what is it about our job that we can’t have benefits? Nursing homes are unionized, we should be too!”

–Diana Goudelock,

1199 Home Care member at Schofield Residence

classes, stress management, civic engagement training and caregiver-to-caregiver outreach.

 Home care member activists Monique Parks (top) and Diana Goudelock

HWR members also benefitted from free Lyft rides – a major benefit in Upstate New York where the distance between cases can be long and public transportation is unreliable or non-existent.

Homecare workers stood up in other ways as well. Coming together in the wake of the racist mass shooting in Buffalo and addressing

violence in their communities across New York State.

For the new Union members like Goudelock and Parks, the next mobilization on the horizon will be negotiating the strongest contract language possible with Schofield as they bargain their first contract. For the rest of the HWR members, the recent victory of their co-workers’ union drive provides a model and a beacon for unionization battles at their own agencies.

 Healthcare Workers Rising action in Rochester, NY.

(bottom)

Building a Multiracial Democracy

The crucial role that labor unions can play.

When other children were dreaming of becoming astronauts, doctors or train conductors, Dr. Peniel Joseph had his heart set on being an organizer. That drive came from his mother, Germaine Joseph, who was an 1199 Lab Tech for nearly 40 years at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.

Dr. Joseph remembers joining his mom on the picket line in elementary school, and that affinity with political activism only grew stronger during his teenage years.

“I was very active as a teenager attending different demonstrations,” he says. “When I attended Stonybrook University my freshman year, in the fall of 1990, we had sit-ins. The university still had ties to South Africa, and we had protests for that and for Black Studies to be a department and not just a program. It’s a department now.”

Watching his mother work with other 1199 members showed Dr. Joseph how multiracial

solidarity could strengthen and underpin democracy. “My mother showed me Black women’s ability to be leaders, theorists, and organizers,” he says, “She spoke four languages and built solidarity with everyone. Even though we were in a racially segregated community in Queens, we would go out to Mt. Sinai and connect with people [from all backgrounds] with 1199, I would see that there was this wider world. It was a challenge because, as I learned, proximity is very important for solidarity and activism.”

It is a lack of proximity that generally makes building multiracial coalitions difficult.

“We don’t live around each other, we don’t go to the same churches because of continued structural segregation,” Dr. Joseph says. “We have cultural differences in how we speak and organize, how we relate to each other. We

have to be able to listen to each other’s stories, see how we fit into each other’s stories and then how we fit into the larger story of America that we’re trying to create and co-create together.”

Dr. Joseph continues, “It’s a story that has to confront racism, sexism, violence, and inequality that is a part of it. The only way we can build truly resonant and resilient multiracial solidarity is listening to each other’s stories and having whites and other groups who are in solidarity being willing to share power by giving up power.”

Labor and the healthcare industry have a vital role in building these coalitions.

“Healthcare is going to be the biggest industry in the 21st century in my mind,” Dr. Joseph says. “There is such a big rush of people that are about to be elderly and need home health aides, physical therapy, rehab,

help with [getting] groceries, cleaning themselves, all that stuff. Healthcare workers are key. Labor is trying to self-organize, which you see in all the recent strikes and [unionization efforts], but we need more help. We need more coalitions with people [inside and] outside the labor unions, like in higher education. When you see the strikes in higher education with graduate students that have unionized and being represented by UAW (United Auto Workers), we need that kind of solidarity to ensure the resiliency and strength of all our democratic institutions.”

According to Dr. Joseph, we are now living in a “Third Reconstruction” period—one that actually offers hope for the future.

“These are cycles [in history] where you see all these juxtapositions of progress and backlash,” he says. “You have a win of centering racial justice as a

moral and political good nationally and you get the Obamas [in the White House]—but then voting rights and critical race theory are attacked, January 6, happens, etc. The backlash occurs because more people know the truth of our history, and there is a move to suppress that and not make it institutionalized.”

Dr. Joseph adds, “The past is not the past, history is a battle for the present and the future. History is the stories we tell ourselves that shape our legislation, culture, politics, resource distribution; it impacts who’s treated like a human being and who’s not.”

Joseph concludes, “I hope this is the last period of reconstruction and we won’t need more uprisings to achieve black dignity and citizenship. I hope we come out of this with real equitable outcomes for black people and achieving deep democracy which encompasses everyone.”

 Dr. Peniel Joseph takes a selfie at the MLK Community March in Austin, Texas in January.

“My mother showed me Black women’s ability to be leaders, theorists, and organizers.”

– Dr Peniel

Joseph

Dr Joseph’s latest book, The Third Reconstruction, about America’s struggle for racial justice in the 21st century is available here

Delegate Profile Charlie Hilario

A long-term activist decides to lead by example.

Charlie Hilario has been an 1199 activist for more than two decades, volunteering to take part in the Union’s political campaigns from the very beginning. During his time as a Delegate at NewYorkPresbyterian Hospital’s main campus in Washington Heights, he’s led so many new members through their orientations that he’s lost track of the exact number.

At a recent orientation with a contract administrator, Hilario had a moment of overwhelming clarity when he got to the part about the importance of contributing to the union’s PAC — Political Action Committee.

“I told the member that the Republicans and the Democrats all have super PACs,” Hilario recalls. “The real estate industry has a super PAC. So, as Union members, one of the best ways to get what’s fair for us is to use our PAC. It is the 1199 PAC that makes us a powerhouse in the political world. By using our PAC fund, we have the tools to get what we deserve.”

But the new member still wasn’t convinced. So, Hilario explained how much of the money that pays for the wages and benefits Union members negotiate at the table comes from government funding. To make

sure both national and state representatives continue to allocate vital dollars to healthcare, Union members need to demonstrate their political power again and again.

Hilario further explained how he was one of the many 1199 members who went to Albany on Union chartered buses to lobby Governor Kathy Hochul and the legislature to pass her proposed $3,000 bonus for hospital workers who worked through the deadly coronavirus pandemic. When transportation, housekeeping and food service titles were left out of the initial bonus allocation, 1199ers made their voices heard in the New York State capital once again – and won.

This last example from Hilario convinced the member to consider making a regular 1199 PAC contribution. That’s when Hilario, 54, and an 1199 union member for more than 20 years, announced he was increasing his own automatic PAC contribution by $50 a paycheck – and he expects that amount may grow.

“When he said, 'let me think about it,’ that was what inspired me to step up,” Hilario says. “You gotta lead by example. And by next year, I’m already planning to raise

it a little more.”

A laundryman at Presbyterian charged with making sure fresh bedsheets and linen get to where they need to be, Hilario said he’s seen the difference 1199 has made for members at the hospital — from job security to benefits like tuition reimbursements and no copays on most doctor visits.

“People used to be hired and have to work a long time as parttime help, with no benefits,” he says. “The union fought and now when people come in, they have a full-time job with benefits. The union did that.”

Hilario adds, “People get to work with peace of mind because they have job security. A lot of people in other jobs don’t have that.”

Born in Brooklyn, Hilario has lived in Washington Heights since he was five-years-old. Though there have been tough times – he was once homeless and lived on an apartment roof for two weeks –Hilario says he always knew hard work would get him through. “I got a job with McDonalds and was soon named employee of the month,” he says. “After that, I got a factory job and was named employee of the year.”

He started at NewYork-

CHARLIE HILARIO

Presbyterian Hospital in 2002 in the food service department, and after a year there, he moved to the hospital laundry. Hilario loves delivering linens around the hospital, where he knows everyone, and everyone knows him. “I like that I work at one of the top hospitals in the city,” he adds.

Hilario has been active in union lobbying efforts from the very beginning. In addition to traveling to Albany and DC, he’s boarded buses to meetings and

election rallies in Philadelphia, Pa. and many other cities. He’s scheduled to return to Albany later this month, to lobby legislators on the latest New York State budget.

“In 2004, the union sent me to Orlando for the ‘Push the Bush’ campaign,” Hilario recalls. While he flew to Orlando, he prefers riding the bus with fellow 1199ers.

“I love being on the buses,” he says. “We’re on there laughing and singing and dancing, getting ready to do what we came to do.”

“As Union members, one of the best ways to get what’s fair for us is to use our PAC. It is the 1199 PAC that makes us a powerhouse in the political world.”

– Charlie Hilario

Delegate at NewYork Presbyterian Hospital

Payin g it Forward

Lillian Bannister became an 1199 member in 1994, when she started as PCA at Our Lady of Mercy in the Bronx. By the time she retired at age 62, she had 27 years of service under her belt. Kadeen Kingston, a new Delegate and Unit Clerk at NewYork Presbyterian Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn was born one year later.

Despite Kingston being less than half Bannster’s age, when the two meet for the first time to talk about the value and importance of Union dues they realize they have a lot more in common than they thought. Dealing with pushback they sometimes get when signing up new members, is an almost universal experience for Union Delegates.

For younger members who do not yet understand the value of

Union healthcare and pension benefits, and complain that their dues are an extra expense, Bannister tells them, “You’re wearing $250 sneakers and carrying a fancy pocketbook with no money to put in it.”

“If you don’t do your part to fund the Union,” she adds, “pretty soon you’re going to find that you stop getting those annual pay increases.”

Without the money from dues, there would be no Union lawyers at the bargaining table. There would be no research team to feed strong arguments to the Bargaining Committee about how their institution could access more local, state and federal funding.

Kingston may be less experienced than Bannister, but she is already very well aware of the connection between who gets into

public office and how much money is allocated towards healthcare.

During last November’s midterm elections, she took part in one of the “Brigades” that helped ensure Kathy Hochul finished out her term as New York State Governor. As well as working full-time and engaging in political action, Kingston is also studying to be an RN, with the help of her 1199 education benefits.

A few years before she retired, Bannister’s hospital was taken over and became known at Montefiore Medical Center Wakefield Campus. It is currently the only hospital in the Montefiore network with 1199 RNs. Kingston was glad to hear it. “I definitely want to go to work in an 1199 hospital when I become an RN,” she says.

Both agree that it is not just younger members who need convincing about dues. “Sometimes the elders have a mindset that the union doesn’t do anything for them,” says Kingston. “So, I tell them my story—that I came here at six-years-old from Guyana and graduated high school when I was 19, and then I found a union job. The union gave me the opportunity to be somebody.”

Bannister is more pragmatic. “Management is always going to try to make us pay for our healthcare, by trying to introduce co-pays and what have you. Rising healthcare costs are going to hit the elders first,” she says.

“Management is sliding in nondues paying members into the hospitals more and more,” she adds, “If you don’t catch them at member

orientation, it is hard to find out who is paying and who is not.”

During the pandemic, many institutions stopped the practice of new member orientation. In too many institutions it never came back.

That is one of the reasons why charting your department is so important, Bannister tells Kingston. “You have to know exactly who is in your department and their level of seniority.”

1199ers are able to negotiate some of the highest pay and best benefit packages in the country because the Union brings large groups of workers together to fight collectively. Maintaining that collective energy requires constant vigilance, though. Nobody wins unless everybody pays their fair share.

“Management is sliding in nondues paying members into the hospitals more and more.

If you don’t catch them at member orientation, it is hard to find out who is paying and who is not.”

 Kadeen Kingston (left) and Lillian Bannister (right) share a moment.

– Lillian Bannister

Nobody wins unless everybody pays their fair share.

1969 CHARLESTON STRIKE

VICTORY

The 1969 Charleston, South Carolina hospitals strike was an early test of 1199’s strategy of joining union power with soul (civil rights) power. It was also an example of the Union’s deft use of its political influence in a hostile environment.

In the spring of 1969, some 450 workers – 90 percent African-American women – struck the Medical College Hospital of the University of South Carolina (MCH) and the smaller Charleston County Hospital after 12 workers at MCH were unjustly fired. One of those fired, an MCH nurse’s aide named Mary Moultrie who had previously worked in New York City as an LPN but whose credentials MCH management refused to accept, led the strikers. Months earlier, Moultrie had been elected president of

Local 1199B, the Union’s first out-ofstate local.

William McCord, the contemptuous president of MCH, was born to American parents in South Africa and his views mirrored those of that apartheid nation. When questioned about union recognition, Business Week reported McCord replied, “I’m not about to turn a $2.5 million complex over to a bunch of people who don’t have a grammar school education.”

His attitude was shared by the overwhelming majority of the state’s power structure. Every formal lever of power and influence was overtly hostile to the organizing effort. The workers were treated like chattel and earned poverty wages. Although about one-third of Charleston residents were Black, there wasn’t a single Black member of the state legislature, and very few Black city officials. Nearly half of Black residents lived below the poverty line.

The city represented a clear example of racial and economic oppression. That is why 1199 joined hands in the fight with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the late Dr. Martin Luther King’s civil rights organization. Many of the workers spoke about the inspiration they drew from Coretta Scott-King’s presence — the honorary chairperson of 1199’s national union.

power

hospitals saw the organizing campaign as outside intrusion by Northern radicals. To negotiate was out of the question.

were demanded at the 1963 March on Washington. He stressed that Dr. King had given his life fighting for the rights of poor workers. Soon, members of Congress, some 25 Representatives and 17 Senators, led by Jacob Javits (R-NY) and Walter Mondale (D-MN), urged federal mediation.

SCLC’s Andrew Young, who would later serve as Atlanta’s mayor and the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, played a prominent role in the campaign, organizing a town boycott and building local support. The local Catholic Church was especially supportive.

Civil rights heroes including the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the late John Lewis helped gather political support, which also included members of the Kennedy family.

 Mary Moultrie (second from left) is next to former 1199SEIU President Leon Davis and Elliot Godoff (at podium), who master-minded the Unions first hospital campaigns.

 Reverend Ralph David Abernathy (left) and Mary Moultrie (center) march for justice.

The city’s power structure and the hospitals saw the organizing campaign as outside intrusion by Northern radicals. To negotiate was out of the question. The bitter strike lasted 113 days, during which 1,000 people—including 1199 Pres. Leon Davis and SCLC head. Rev. Ralph David Abernathy—were jailed. Violence against the strikers included the bombing of organizer Henry Nicholas’s hotel room. Ultra-conservative racists such as Republicans Sen. Strom Thurmond and Rep. L Mendel Rivers worked behind the scenes against the strike.

A national political campaign helped turn the tide. 1199’s genius publicist Moe Foner contacted media and public officials who focused the nation’s attention on the struggle, noting that the struggle was for the jobs and freedom that

The Nixon administration remained reluctant to intervene, but a conversation with James Farmer, the founder of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), who was undersecretary of the Department of Health Education and Welfare (HEW) at the time, indicated a path forward.

HEW had initiated an investigation of the Medical College Hospital for violations of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the firing of the 12 workers—$15 million in federal funding was at stake. The hospital settled on June 27.

The settlement did not recognize the Union, but it returned the 12 fired workers, provided a grievance procedure, a wage increase, and a credit union. Other changes had also been set in motion. Black workers finally began to be treated with respect. African-Americans were elected to the state legislature, and over the next decade Black representation in Charleston’s City Council jumped from one to six.

The Union leads the charge against racial and economic oppression.

The city’s

structure and the

See

Philip Gunraj, who is in charge of Heating, Ventilation and AirConditioning at NewYork Presbyterian Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, quips: “I get to put a smile back on people’s faces all the time.”

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