March 19, 2013

By Jeffrey Militzer

Democratic Missouri senators filibustered legislation for eight hours last Tuesday.

The uproar from local unions and local Democrats was in response to Senate BIll 29, which would require authorization for certain labor unions to use dues and fees to make political contributions and requires consent for withholding earnings from paychecks.

The bill would apply to public labor unions, including city workers, municipal employees and state workers.

While this bill will not affect private unions, James Douglas, financial secretary for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local One, said he sees it as a “step in that direction.”

Douglas said the bill will require unions to use some of their resources to track and maintain paperwork. He said that would be highly unnecessary.

“We don’t use union dues for politics,” Douglas said. “We use our dues for paying union worker salaries, building utilities, employee retirement and benefits for deceased workers. We collect money for political purposes, but that is a voluntary donation by the worker and not a mandate by the union.”

This bill will also give employees the option to determine how much, if any, of their dues can be spent toward political purposes.

SB 29, sponsored by Sen. Dan Brown, R-Rolla, passed its third reading on the floor of the senate on Thursday. Brown said the legislation is aimed at providing employees paycheck protection.

“This bill will give (union) employees more say on where their union dues are spent,” Brown said.

According to the Labor Tribune, two bills aimed at removing the prevailing wage have been heard before the Missouri House this year.

“Prevailing wage is the pay rate that cities, counties and other governmental entities must, by law, pay for construction projects,” the Labor Tribune reported on Feb. 25.

Another bill, SB 30, which would remove the prevailing wage altogether, passed the Small Business, Insurance and Industry Committee on March 12.

“This whole string of legislation is designed to take away the resources of unions and essentially strip the collective bargaining rights of Missouri workers,” Douglas said.