Low-Cost Aid Is Part of Effort to Attract Members : AFL-CIO Starts Legal Services Program
As part of its continuing effort to make a beleaguered union movement more attractive, the AFL-CIO this week launched a program of low-cost legal services covering 7 million workers.
The federation’s program is “very significant because in one swoop it will double the number of Americans covered” by such legal plans, said William Bolger, executive director of the National Resource Center for Consumers of Legal Services, a nonprofit organization based in Washington.
The legal plan represents the second phase of the AFL-CIO’s Union Privilege Benefit Program, which has been developed in the last two years. The first phase has been the marketing of credit cards with lower interest rates.
12.5% Interest on Cards
About 400,000 union members have signed up for credit cards that have no annual fee and for which the interest rate is 12.5%, contrasted with the 18.5% frequently charged. Ray Denison, director of the AFL-CIO’s benefits program, said the credit cards have saved union members $4 million in interest and fees so far.
“The new benefits programs extend the union movement from the workplace to the marketplace, and that’s a very significant development,” Denison said. “We can establish programs that aren’t subject to collective bargaining. We don’t have to extract them from employers inch by inch, pound by pound.”
In a report issued here, AFL-CIO President Lane Kirkland said that “the benefits which are now accruing to trade union members can form the basis of a new associate membership program to enlarge the ranks of the U.S. labor movement and enhance its political and economic effectiveness.”
Shrinking Ranks
The 12.8-million-member labor federation has been concerned about the steady shrinking of its ranks. In a landmark report issued here two years ago, the federation endorsed the concept of taking in so-called associate members, people at non-union workplaces who might not be prepared to vote for a union but are interested in gaining some of the benefits of membership.
The legal services package entitles members of participating unions to receive a free initial consultation at a participating law firm and a 30% discount for more complex matters, Denison said. There is no initial fee or annual enrollment charge. Law firms in virtually every state have contracted with the AFL-CIO to participate in the program, he said.
Some unions, including the United Auto Workers and the Sheet Metal Workers, already have legal plans. The new program will supplement those.
Joel Hyatt, founder of Kansas City-based Hyatt Legal Services, one of the nation’s largest moderately priced legal services programs, praised the AFL-CIO program but said the federation should go further.
