When it comes to public service, law enforcement officers serve on the frontlines – sacrificing their very lives to keep communities safe for the rest of us. And when it comes to law enforcement, AFSCME stands on the frontlines of the fight for better pay and benefits, safer work environments and the highest standards of professionalism.

On the heels of National Police Week – held annually May 11 through 15 – the union renewed its call for public safety officer legislation. This would provide health care benefits for the families of those killed in the line of duty, secure collective bargaining rights for public safety officers (including those working in corrections) and enable more officers to rely on the promise of a secure retirement by receiving Social Security benefits.

AFSCME Connecticut Council 15 Exec. Dir. Jim Howell, who heads the union’s law enforcement initiative, says it best: “Public safety officers put their lives on the line every day to protect our nation and keep it strong. We deserve basic workplace protections.”

As the saying goes, respect is earned, never given. New York’s child care providers know it better than anyone given their long fight to gain recognition for the critical work they perform.

Earning an average $19,000 a year and having little or no benefits, providers just took a momentous step forward as Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D) signed an executive order granting them the freedom join a union and bargain for a better future (for more on their win, read this article from The New York Times.)

Not ones to rest on their laurels, their union, the Voice of Organized Independent Childcare Educators (CSEA/VOICE), has already filed with a solid majority of signed providers for recognition from the New York State Employment Relations Board.

Providers in New York have added their voice to that of the more than 220,000 family child care providers, day care center workers, Head Start teachers and early childhood employees who have joined AFSCME across the country to secure greater investment in our children.

Six years is a long time to wait, especially when the care of our kids is at stake.

For the past six years, the Bush administration and the Republican-led Congress has consistently frozen federal funding for child care services despite yearly increases in the number of families needing these services. The results have been disastrous, according to a report by the National Women’s Law Center (PDF).

Inadequate funding has resulted in reduced child care availability and dramatic cost increases for low-income families. In addition, child care providers are sometimes forced to refuse care for children receiving subsidies because they cannot afford to accept the low reimbursement rates. This limits the child care choices for parents or even cuts off access to good care completely. Those providers who do accept the lower, subsidized rates are faced with cutting corners. They may pay lower salaries and offer leaner benefits to their staff, thus precluding the child care providers from attracting and retaining highly qualified employees.

AFSCME, with our child care affiliates, is the union for tens of thousands of child care providers across the country. We are demanding that Congress increase child care funding. Specifically, we are asking for a $720 million increase for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG).

This is not an issue just for child care providers. It’s for all of us who believe in fair wages for workers and quality care for kids. Everyone can take part in our campaign at:
http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/fund_child_care

This additional funding will make up for ground that was lost due to inadequate funding in recent years, and will provide child care help to at least a portion of the 150,000 children who have lost assistance since 2000.

It’s the least we can do for our kids.

Whether it’s inspecting highways, plowing snow, directing traffic, driving buses, or designing roads and bridges, AFSCME transportation workers keep America moving.

If only the Bush administration would see things the same way.

Over the last few years, transportation workers across the country have endured corporate takeaways, shrunken paychecks and terminated pensions. The present administration, which has never met a job it didn’t want to privatize or send abroad, has sat idly by as corporations do what they please.

It is time to tell the government and the privateers that enough is enough. In the spirit of solidarity with our sisters and brothers of the International Association of Machinists, thousands of union members and representatives will gather today at the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for a “Transportation Day of Action.” Presidential candidates and labor leaders including President McEntee and Secretary-Treasurer Lucy will be speaking.

AFSCME alone represents nearly 140,000 transportation workers. We have an opportunity to show them and thousands of others in the transportation sector our support. Let’s make sure their message is heard in the White House and in the halls of Congress.

In the effort to make ends meet, many working families have learned an unforgettable lesson: Credit cards can be a double-edged sword when the convenience they provide turns into a nightmare of hidden fees and punitive rates. Union members, however, enjoy a distinct advantage with exclusive products such as the Union Plus Credit Card, known to AFSCME members as the AFSCME Advantage card.

Union Plus recently earned praise from Gerri Detweiler, a highly-respected consumer educator and credit expert, who called it a “good guy” example of “a card with strong protections for cardholders.” The card is available from Union Privilege, an organization providing union members and their families with valuable consumer benefits.

As Detweiler claimed, “Union Plus should be the standard, not the exception” when it comes to credit cards. Read more of what she had to say at the financial website CreditBloggers.com.

Rhode Island Council 94 has taken to the airwaves to preserve public services provided by its 10,000 members, some of whom work as dietary and housekeeping employees at a state hospital and a veterans’ home.

Rhode Island Gov. Don Carcieri’s (R) proposed 2008 budget would outsource those services at the Eleanor Slater Hospital in Cranston and the Rhode Island Veterans Home in Bristol.

Council 94 knows the nation’s veterans deserve better care than to receive services from a for-profit employer whose main concern is the bottom line. That’s why the council is fighting back with a media campaign. Watch their television ads below or at these links on YouTube: “Family” and “Taking On Privatization”.

Read more about Council 94’s ad campaign on Working Rhode Island’s site.

President George W. Bush came to office promising to privatize more than 450,000 federal jobs. For more than six years, he has tried to implement his radical agenda to cut vital public services. In his most recent blog on the Huffington Post, President McEntee takes aim at a cynical letter President Bush issued to commemorate Public Service Recognition Week.

President McEntee writes: “Never has the White House had an occupant more opposed to public service and more intent on destroying the institutions of government that people rely on for security, safety and support. He’s filled the federal government with political appointees of low character and even lower competence, driving outstanding career employees away from their jobs.”

History was made this week in Maryland, where Governor Martin O’Malley became the first governor in the United States to sign living-wage legislation. The new law requires state contractors to pay at least $8.50 an hour to workers in most of Maryland, while contractors in the more expensive Baltimore-Washington area must pay $11.30 an hour.

President McEntee notes in his most recent blog on the Huffington Post that “Maryland’s new law is an important victory not just for underpaid workers in that state, but for workers across the country.” He also highlights recent developments in the battle custodians are waging for fair pay in the University of California system (AFSCME Local 3299).

This week, the custodians received some great support from students at UC-Berkeley who took over the business school. These young people are doing their part to support the cause of working people, not just on their campus, but throughout the country.

Four years ago today, President George W. Bush gave his “Mission Accomplished” speech from the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln and declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended. As we enter the fifth year of this conflict, our troops are still in harm’s way and there’s no end in sight.

Four years later, more than 3,700 American soldiers have lost their lives in the military operations overseas – 3,328 in Iraq, and 378 in Afghanistan – and thousands more have been wounded. As yet another year passes after Bush’s political stunt, an American soldier in Afghanistan has stirred up a national debate by asking a good question: why don’t we lower the flag to half-staff when a soldier dies at war?

When the men and women in the U.S. armed forces make the ultimate sacrifice for our country, we should honor their service. Please sign the petition to ask Congress to amend the U.S. Flag Code to fly the flag at half-staff for one day when an American service member dies in combat.