BOSTON – Boston Public Schools bus drivers renewed calls for their employer, Veolia, to reinstate the four fired leaders of their union, the United Steelworkers (USW) local 8751, in a rally at the Freeport bus yard in Dorchester on Monday.
Minimum Wage – Statehouse
Gov. Deval Patrick signed into law on Thursday an act that will gradually increase the state’s minimum wage to $11 an hour by 2017. The current state minimum wage is $8 an hour and the first increase will take place on January 1, 2015, when the minimum wage will rise to $9 an hour.
SEIU 888 – Malden
BOSTON – MBTA custodians and their hit out at the planned layoff of nearly 100 cleaning service workers from the public company later this year.
Around a thousand members and supporters of the Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ staged a march in protest of the cuts from the Transportation Building in Boston on Saturday, followed by a rally on Boston Common.
New Bedford, Mass. – The seafood processing company Sea Watch International has been fined just over $35,000 by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) following the death of a worker at a New Bedford plant in January.
Pride Parade, Boston
An estimated 25,000 people took part in Boston Pride parade on Saturday, the culmination of the Pride festival, which began on June 6. The parade was the 44th annual event to celebrate the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender community in Boston, and push for greater equality for the community. Boston City Mayor Marty and Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick led the parade as grand marshals.
BOSTON - Following the agreement reached in the Massachusetts House and Senate on Wednesday to raise the state’s minimum wage gradually to $11 an hour, union advocates continued calls for a minimum higher than that proposed by legislators.
Cambridge, MA – On Sunday’s “RADIO with a VIEW” program with Marc Stern and Dave Goodman, SEIU 1199 Vice president Enid Eckstein visited to discuss the upcoming Wage Action Events in Boston, Worcester, and Springfield, and economic inequality issues in general.
BOSTON/State House - Joined by several sympathetic legislators at a State House briefing on Thursday, the union representing custodians who clean MBTA stations and trains took another step in their campaign to stop what they are calling disruptive job cuts this fall. The Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ – who represent nearly twenty thousand service workers throughout New England - believe contractors are poised to lay off almost a third of the T janitors beginning September first.
Malden, Mass. – Before a meeting of the Malden City Council on Tuesday, the city’s public schools’ custodians held a rally outside city hall calling for their jobs not to be privatized.
Industrial Workers of the World/Student Labor Action Movement – Harvard
