National Legal and Policy Center -- Organized Labor Accountability Project
 
UNION CORRUPTION UPDATE
 
November 25, 2002 -- Vol. 5, Issue 24

For Influential Leaders & Important Decision Makers:
Information on America's most corrupt & aggressive unions

 
SERVICE EMPLOYEES (SEIU)
Were NYC Union Workers Forced to Work for Union-backed Candidate?
Manhattan D.A. Robert Morgenthau is investigating charges that N.Y.C. service union bosses pressured their staffers to work for mayoral candidate Mark Green on union time, and contributed to Green's campaign from members' regular dues, as opposed to political action committee money. The grand jury investigation comes more than a year after N.Y. union dissident Paul Pamias first filed his complaint with the D.A.

 Two frmr. officials of Local 32BJ of the Service Employees Intl. Union (SEIU) said that higher-ups in the Local threatened staffers with reprimands unless they volunteered to help the Green campaign in the Dem. primary in 2001, and that they did such work on union time, which is illegal under local election law. Contributing members' regular dues to Green could violate the U.S. Sup. Ct. decision, Communications Wrkrs. v. Beck. In that 1988 ruling, the High Ct. held that it was illegal for unions to spend forced dues for political activities with which the dues-payer disagreed.

Last summer, Dominick Bentivegna told a Congressional hearing, "the staff was forced to take personal days and vacation days to campaign for Mark Green. If they had no days left, they were forced to borrow against next year's." Bentivegna is one of two frmr. 32BJ officials who has been subpoenaed to appear before the grand jury. The other is frmr. bus. agent Grace Powell who has since been transferred to Ohio. [New York Times 11/16/02]

Union Corruption Update is made possible by the generous contributions from readers like you. NLPC, PO Box 6821, Falls Church, VA 22040. Thank you. Union Corruption Update is part of NLPC's Organized Labor Accountability Project which is investigating and exposing corruption in the Teamsters, LIUNA, AFL-CIO and many other union organizations. NLPC is a nonpartisan, nonprofit foundation promoting ethics and accountability in government through research, education and legal action.

In addition to the unions and organizations covered in this Union Corruption Update, readers can look forward to news and information on other corrupt and abusive unions in future editions.  All back issues of the Union Corruption Update can be viewed at NLPC's website (http://www.nlpc.org).  Also available is a union-by-union and state-by-state index of all Union Corruption Update articles. If you have story ideas or suggestions for future editions of Union Corruption Update, please email NLPC at nlpc@nlpc.org.  Thank you.
 
Looking for a LM-2, LM-3, or LM-4 Annual Financial Report from the Department of Labor? Visit http://www.dol-union-reports.gov.

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