Union Officials Put Politics High on 2000 Agenda

Flush with success from the biggest union organizing drive since the 1930s, Los Angeles’ labor leaders are setting ambitious political goals for the new year, including winning local, state and national electoral races, securing top-dollar contracts for unprecedented numbers of workers, and adding even more low-wage employees to their ranks.

“I would say that the next 24 months will shape the next 20 years in Los Angeles,” said Miguel Contreras, executive secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County AFL/CIO. The next municipal election in “April 2001 looms bigger than huge. It is about the heart and soul of Los Angeles.”

Los Angeles unions added nearly 91,000 workers in 1999 alone, a figure unheard of since auto workers unionized about 65 years ago. The bulk of Los Angeles’ new union members are county home-care workers.

Perhaps more than anywhere else, Los Angeles’ labor leaders have enthusiastically endorsed AFL/CIO President John J. Sweeney’s push for sophisticated, national union organizing.

As its numbers increase, labor’s political influence rises as well. It is no coincidence, for example, that the AFL/CIO’s national convention was held in Los Angeles in the fall and that local labor leaders probably will be delegates and hold other key roles in the Democratic National Convention here this summer.

Perhaps as a sign that labor leaders know their coveted endorsements are crucial to local politicians--particularly in districts with high numbers of union households--the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor is toughening its political standards.

No longer will candidates win labor’s backing just because they are incumbents. Candidates won’t be supported based on their ethnicity or that of the voters in the district they hope to represent. Gone, too, are the days when labor endorsed candidates based on their personal union relationships.

“We’re rewriting what it takes to be labor’s friend,” said Contreras, whose umbrella group represents 345 local unions with a total of nearly 800,000 members. “We don’t want voters, we want warriors. We have a working-family agenda for California and Los Angeles. . . . It’s about who is most committed to be the best for our working families.”

Labor’s new political standards already can be seen in the recent endorsements the unions made in several key races. Labor leaders hope to send several city council members from across the area to Sacramento in March, including Jackie Goldberg from Los Angeles, Paul Koretz from West Hollywood and Jerome Horton from Inglewood. Additionally, organized labor will target the congressional primary race of incumbent Rep. Matthew G. Martinez (D-Monterey Park), hoping to win the seat for state Sen. Hilda Solis (D-La Puente), a longtime friend to labor.

“We have some strong people with great labor records,” Contreras said. “How can we say that we’re sorry, but we’re not going to endorse Jackie [Goldberg] because she’s Anglo and we have to support another candidate? It’s not about racial politics for us.”

The candidates themselves say union backing will help boost campaign coffers with contributions, but it also will ensure an army of foot soldiers who will walk neighborhoods, work phone banks and stuff envelopes.

“What I will get more from them [than money] are people who will come out and walk a precinct in an area that has a lot of union members who live there,” Goldberg said.

In last spring’s Los Angeles City Council elections, labor played a key role in the election of Alex Padilla. Adding more than $100,000 to his campaign war chest, unions also helped with ground-level campaign support.

The AFL/CIO this year also is expected to play important roles in Al Gore’s presidential campaign, beginning early in the year and continuing through the convention in August.

But perhaps even more important to the local unions, labor will focus attention on the city’s political races of 2001, when Los Angeles voters will select a new mayor and six new City Council members.

Labor leaders already have told the declared mayoral candidates, James K. Hahn, Steve Soboroff, Antonio Villaraigosa and Joel Wachs, and the undeclared, Kathleen Connell and Zev Yaroslavsky, that they have one year to prove just how friendly they are to unions.

In the City Council elections, labor leaders believe they can run and win candidates in four of the six races, and be influential in the remaining two, where the districts have fewer union households.

But some political consultants and others say organized labor should take a closer look at last spring’s council elections before they become too sure of themselves. Of the two open council seats, only one of the labor-backed candidates won. Padilla, who was heavily backed by local unions, trounced his opponent, while Nick Pacheco won his Eastside race without labor’s help.

When he arrived in City Hall over the summer, Pacheco says he was greeted with surprise and told repeatedly by council aides and lobbyists that they expected him to lose.

“Did labor overextend themselves or did they overplay their hand?” Pacheco said. “They are a force in City Hall, but they don’t always get everything they want.”

To be sure, labor has stumbled this past year in other ways, as well.

A union split over a United Airlines cargo facility at Los Angeles International Airport troubled labor leaders, but also put their most trusted council friends in a tight spot. The powerful Service Employees International Union, which has been engaged in a bitter fight over union representation with one of United’s subcontractors, opposed the cargo facility. The machinists and aerospace workers supported it. United ultimately won its facility, but politicians and some union organizers say they were less than satisfied with the dispute and labor’s tactics.

Before that, labor took a position on the controversial renewal of the Greek Theatre contract, leaving many political observers shaking their heads in disbelief. The current operator of the Greek won union support by promising to give employees a retroactive raise to meet the city’s living wage law and to use union workers for improvements, among other things.

But to some, it appeared that labor jumped too quickly to support the current operator since the contract was widely viewed in City Hall as a political deal for Council President John Ferraro and his friends, the Nederlanders. The main competitor, House of Blues Concerts, has sued the city and is running a referendum drive to force either a reconsideration by the council or a vote of city residents.

Still, that situation illustrates another growing phenomenon reflecting labor’s power in City Hall: The private sector is increasingly seeking labor backing before attempting to win political support. Aside from the Greek, this phenomenon could be seen at Staples Center, which opened in October with union support since all workers, even those not represented by a union, were promised a living wage.

“This is certainly the most labor-driven City Council that I’ve seen in many years,” said Rick Taylor, a political consultant and City Hall lobbyist. “I want labor on my side. If I’m representing a developer, I want them to build with labor and I want union workers inside.”

Steve Afriat, another political consultant and lobbyist, agreed but said he doesn’t believe labor calls all the shots in City Hall. “You want to encourage your clients to be labor-sensitive . . . but their influence can vary.”

Others say the unions’ growing dominance in the City Council and ultimately in the county too could have long-lasting negative effects.

“The issue for companies in Los Angeles is whether they want to be union or not,” said George Mihlsten, an attorney and lobbyist. “If they choose not to be union, it will be very difficult for them to do business in the city of Los Angeles in the future.”

For now, though, labor leaders are looking beyond City Hall to the County Hall of Administration, where eight major unions will negotiate new contracts in the coming months. The school district unions also will be bargaining, and the 8,000-member Justice for Janitors have contracts up for renewal too. All told, unions will be negotiating on behalf of about 230,000 workers this year.

As AFL/CIO political director Fabian Nunez put it: “Organizing the workers is half the battle. Now we have to get them good contracts.”