Brattleboro, VT — On the evening of September 25th more than fifty Brattleboro residents came to St. Michaels Episcopal Church to participate in the first Human Rights Hearing on Healhcare. This was the first of a series of hearings to be held throughout the state as part of the Vermont Workers' Center's new Healthcare Is A Human Right Campaign. Since last May 1st, volunteers and allies of the Center have been on the streets of most the larger towns and on many job sites asking fellow Vermonters to fill out a survey about their experiences with the healthcare system. Our goal is to have over 1000 of these personal interviews done by December, and we will release a report on our findings on December 10th, which marks the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights issued by the United Nations in 1948.
The Brattleboro hearing was co-sponsored by Vermont the Citizens Campaign For Health (VCCH), the ALANA Community Organization and the Brattleboro Union High School student group Child Labor Education and Action. Testimony was heard by a community listening panel chaired by Shela Linton of ALANA and Richard Davis of VCCH, which also included Carol Whitaker, RN, a nurses' union leader at the Brattleboro Retreat; Kathleen Clark, RN, Vice President of the Brattleboro Federation of Nurses at the Brattleboro Memorial Hospital; Daniel Herlocker, RN, also a union member at the Brattleboro Memorial Hospital; the Reverend Lise Sparrow, minister at the Guilford Community Church; Rosa Palmeri of Child Labor Education & Action; and Dianne Champion, Brattleboro District Director of the Vermont Department of Health.
The first testimony came from Nancy Hodecker who told of the painful experience of losing her husband to tongue cancer. She said he was uninsured, and ignored the sore because of health costs until it was too late and he had developed class four cancer. Other testimony highlighted the relationship with healthcare to homelessness, racial discrimination in treatment sometimes received in the healthcare system, and a powerful report of a Brattleboro resident who said that she stayed in an abusive relationship for 22 years because her husband threatened to cut her and her children — one of whom had cancer — off from his insurance if she left him.
The event closed by passing around an "I'll Be There" sign-up sheet for the May 1, 2009 Healthcare Is A Human Right Rally at the State House in Montpelier. Almost every single person in attendance signed it. Other hearings are planned in Burlington on October 23rd, St. Albans November 13th and St. Johnsbury November 18th. More hearings are planned in other cities and towns throughout the state.
Healthcare System Put on Trial In Brattleboro
Main Street not Wall Street! Action October 1st
While attention has focused recently on the Wall Street financial crisis, working families in Vermont and across the country have been facing an economic crisis in recent years, including: unaffordable healthcare, the lack of livable-wage jobs, foreclosures and a general decline in spending power. The Vermont Workers' Center is part of a national labor-community-faith coalition called Jobs With Justice, which is organizing a national day of action on October 1st. Across the country, people will conduct rallies, street theater, bake sales and actions to tell Congress and Wall Street that people are fed up with corporate greed and demand action to address the economic crisis facing working people, not just Wall Street financiers.
Workers' Center members will be giving Vermonters an opportunity to make their voices heard about what priorities Congress should have in dealing with the economic crisis, through a Vermonters Speakout Survey. The Workers' Center will deliver the responses to Vermont's Congressional delegation.
Workers' Center members will be gathering at the corner of Main Street and Church Street in downtown Burlington at noon on Wednesday, October 1st.
More information:
The first bail-out "compromise" failed largely due to overwhelming opposition from working families, because it did not address the needs of Main Street and constituted yet another give-away to the wealthy. Jobs with Justice is telling Congress:
- Make the people that created and profited from the mess pay for the clean-up, now.
- Any infusion of capital must have specific, binding public ownership requirements.
- Restructure and rein in the reckless private financial institutions.
- Pass a real recovery plan, for Main Street as well as Wall Street, paid for with progressive taxation, that addresses the needs for good jobs, affordable housing, health care, pensions, infrastructure and 'green' economy.
"Where is the bail out for the 47 million uninsured Americans without healthcare and the many millions of others facing unaffordable increases in costs for basic healthcare. Isn't that a crisis? Where is the bail out for those communities impacted by plant closings that throw thousands out of work. Isn't that a crisis?," says Dawn Stanger, President of the Vermont Workers' Center - Jobs With Justice. "Why is it only a crisis in our country when it involves Wall Street banks, private equity firms, investment houses and the wealthy that control their shares? And why does Wall Street's crisis suddenly become all of our problem."
Congressmen Welch's statement on why he voted against the bailout
Economist Dean Baker's cut on why the bill was bad
A piece on how to pay for the progressive economic recovery plan we need
Tell Congress: No Wall Street Bail-out! We need you to STEP UP!
Watch Danny Schechter explaining how the bailout will preempt any new administration from following through on promises, then TAKE ACTION!
September 25: Brattleboro Human Rights Hearing
Human Rights Hearing: "Healthcare is a Human Right" to be held at St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Brattleboro, Thursday September 25 at 7:00 p.m.
Brattleboro - For months volunteers for the Vermont Workers' Center have been surveying Vermonters from all across the state, including many in the Brattleboro community. The results have been clear: Vermonters believe that healthcare should be a human right.
The state, however, has come up short on this issue. More than 11 percent of all Vermonters are without health insurance, including more than 11,000 children. Thousands more are woefully under-insured, and cannot afford their costly premiums and co-pays, which are only rising as the cost of healthcare soars.
The Vermont Workers' Center is currently undertaking its "Healthcare is a Human Right" campaign to help end this injustice. The goal of the campaign is to spread awareness and build a movement that can help reform the state's system so it will guarantee care to all Vermonters, regardless of income. On Thursday, September 25, this discussion is coming to Brattleboro at St. Michael's Episcopal Church. The event begins at 7:00 p.m. (refreshments will be available).
Community faith leaders and healthcare professionals and other community leaders will serve on a Community Listening Panel to hear testimony from residents. Speakers will address the failure of the state's healthcare system, the plight of those who try to navigate through it, and effective ways to bring about change. The event will give members of the community a chance to share stories highlighting how our flawed system has caused them suffering and hardship.
"We have learned that Vermonters really view healthcare as something that should be a human right — a value that we all share," said Ellen Schwartz, a Brattleboro resident and a volunteer for the Workers' Center. "We are also have found people who have experienced a great deal of suffering because we do not have this right. This hearing will be an opportunity to make some of these stories heard."
Similar "Human Rights Forums" will be held all across the state, in the coming months as the Workers' Center continues its effort to fight for a just healthcare system that values human lives over profit — an attainable goal, given Vermont's passionate and engaged citizenry.
All are welcome. For more information visit workerscenter.org/healthcare, or call Erika Simard at 802-316-7827.
Other sponsors for the events include: Vermont Citizens Campaign For Health (VCCH), ALANA Community Organization and CLEA.
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Northrup Grummon workers win contract in St. Albans!
Statement from the Northrup Grummon workers UE Local 208:
"On Friday Sept. 12th, UE Local 208 ratified its first Union contract. The contract contains a 9% wage increase over three years, an increase in benefits and other protections. The vote to accept the agreement marked the end of the struggle for a first contract over the past few months. UE Local 208 members at USCIS would like to thank the Vermont Workers' Center for all your support. You have been there for us every step of the way from forming our Union to winning our first contract. We know you will continue to support our struggle for justice at USCIS. We look forward to working with and giving our support to the Vermont Workers' Center in the future."
This is a great victory, here's how one of our members, Damon Hall with the Ironworkers Local 7, put it in a letter published by the St. Albans Messenger this week:
Good that you stood up for your rights
9/22/2008
I would like to congratulate all the workers employed by Northrop-Grumman who did not give up the battle for their rights as workers! It can be a long hard road when you are trying to organize and negotiate a contract, especially when faced with a brutal anti-union campaign that scares workers with lies. You all have stood up and shown others here in VT that it can be achieved if you stick together and work as one. With wages going down and fuel skyrocketing the job world out there can be pretty gruesome. Workers that organize can negotiate their wages & benefits instead of being forced to accept what is fed to them. My hat goes off to all of you and I hope others out there realize that you have to work hard and fight for the things you believe in because it is not going to be handed to you. The benefits in end far out way the battles along the way. E PLURIBUS UNUM (out of many, one.)
Damon Hall
Swanton
Vermont AFL-CIO Endorses Campaign
This resolution was approved unanimously September 14th at 2008 Vermont State Labor Council Convention:
REAFFIRM OUR SUPPORT FOR SINGLE PAYER UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE
Submitted by: Washington-Orange-Lamoille and Champlain Valley Central Labor Councils & UAW Local 1981
WHEREAS, workers, their families and their unions are waging an increasingly difficult struggle to win or to keep good health care coverage.
WHEREAS, almost every union at every contract deadline must battle and sacrifice merely to sustain health care benefits. The rising costs of health insurance are blocking workers' progress in wages and other areas. All of our unions face a healthcare crisis. But the crisis extends far beyond union members. Nearly 50 million people in the United States are currently without health insurance. More than 75 million went without health coverage for some length of time within the last two years, and millions more have inadequate coverage, or are at risk of losing coverage.
WHEREAS, while we in the United States spend approximately twice as much of our gross domestic product as other developed nations on health care, we remain the only industrialized country without universal coverage. Even though we spend far more per capita, we lag behind our international peers in terms of quality, health attainment, and over-all health system performance. We spend more and get less. Our problem worsens each year as insurance costs increase and gradual solutions have failed to make a dent in the problem.
WHEREAS, the U.S. health system continues to treat health care as a commodity distributed according to the ability to pay, rather than as a social service to be distributed according to human need. Insurance companies and HMOs compete not by increasing quality or lowering costs, but by avoiding covering those whose needs are greatest.
WHEREAS, people of color, immigrants and women are denied care at disproportionate rates, while the elderly and many others must choose between necessities and life sustaining drugs and care. Unorganized workers have either no coverage or inadequate coverage. The Institute of Medicine has found that each year more than 18,000 in the U.S. die because they had no health insurance.
WHEREAS, economic necessity and moral conscience compel us to seek a better way.
WHEREAS, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) (joined by 91 cosponsors, including Rep. Peter Welch) has introduced HR 676, the United States National Health Insurance Act, also called Expanded and Improved Medicare for All. This single-payer health care program proposes an effective mechanism for controlling skyrocketing health costs while covering all Americans. The bill also restores free choice of physicians to patients and provides comprehensive prescription drug coverage to seniors, as well as to younger people.
WHEREAS, HR 676 would cover every person in the U.S. for all necessary medical care including prescription drugs, hospital, surgical, outpatient services, primary and preventive care, emergency services, dental, mental health, home health, physical therapy, rehabilitation (including for substance abuse), vision care, chiropractic and long term care. HR 676 ends deductibles and co-payments. HR 676 would save billions annually by eliminating high overhead and profits of the private health insurance industry and HMOs. The transition to national health insurance would apply the savings from administration and profits to expanded and improved coverage for all.
WHEREAS, a single payer program as provided by HR 676 is the only affordable option for universal, comprehensive coverage.
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Vermont State Labor Council, AFL-CIO reaffirms our September 2006 Convention’s support for HR 676, "Expanded and Improved Medicare for All," a single payer health care program, as currently written.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Vermont State Labor Council, AFL-CIO will work with other Labor Organizations and community groups to build a groundswell of popular support and action for single payer universal health care until we make what is morally right into what is also politically possible.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Vermont State Labor Council, AFL-CIO will send a copy of this resolution to Congressman Conyers and to the AFL-CIO Executive Council.
BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that the Vermont State Labor Council, AFL-CIO will take other actions to mobilize our members and our community at the grassroots, including urging our affiliates to work with the Vermont Workers Center’s Healthcare is a Human Right campaign.
ST. ALBANS RALLY MONDAY
Support UE Local 208 on Monday, September 8th at 2:15 in a rally for a fair Union contract.