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OAPSE Member’s Twins Make Their Mark in the Pool

OAPSE Local 591 Member Trent Hunt and his wife, Stephanie, have encouraged their sons to be active and healthy since they were small children. That enthusiasm for fitness led twins Kingston and Solomon to jump in the pool at an early age to take swimming lessons.

Miles and miles and laps and laps later, the 15-year-olds at Eastmoor Academy, have made history as part of a district-qualifying 200-Yard Medley Relay team. Solomon and Kingston joined their teammates as one of only two African American relay teams to qualify for the district tournament. They turned in a time of  2:08.98 at the sectional meet to earn their place among the elite swimmers of Central Ohio.

The twins are interested in pursuing swimming in college, where they want to study marine biology. For now, they are making history in the pool and making their parents proud.

Trent works in preventative maintenance. His local union represents the Columbus City Electric and Boiler workers. Channel 10 in Columbus recently highlighted Trent’s twins as part of their Black History Month coverage, and you can see that story by clicking here.

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Don’t Forget: March 1 Deadline for OAPSE Scholarships

The deadline to turn in all your materials for this year’s OAPSE/AFSCME Memorial Scholarship is March 1. Don’t miss your opportunity to be eligible for a $2,500 scholarship. Get your materials together today and get them in to the state office!

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College is expensive. But OAPSE members and their children/guardians can get some financial help in the form of a $2,500 OAPSE/AFSCME Memorial Scholarship.

The OAPSE/AFSCME Memorial Scholarship Program is available to children whose parent or legal guardian is a member in good standing of the Ohio Association of Public School Employees (OAPSE/AFSCME Local 4/AFL-CIO). Under the program, scholarships of $2,500 each are awarded to at least one winner from each of the ten (10) OAPSE Districts selected from the applicants who meet the eligibility requirements.

Any graduating high school senior who is a daughter or son of an active OAPSE/AFSCME member or whose legal guardian is an active OAPSE/AFSCME member and who intends to enroll in a full-time degree program in any two (2) or four (4) year accredited university, college, business or technical school is eligible to apply for a scholarship. The scholarships may be used for any field of study.

To be eligible, all information or supportive documentation requested in the application must be received by the committee by March 1 each year.

To get more information, click here to go to the MyOAPSE section of the website and log in.

Click on My Benefits and then Scholarships to download the 2019 application.

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OAPSE Members Observe Black History Month

February is Black History Month, and OAPSE members are marking it with creative and inspirational artwork to inspire students. Shanee’ Barnes, a childcare assistant at Beechcroft High School in Columbus and a member of Local 529, created tributes to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) at her school to educate students about opportunities at the prestigious institutions of “knowledge and growth.” Barnes has also painted inspirational messages to encourage kindness, effort and destiny throughout the first floor of Beechcroft. Next year, she plans to upgrade the second floor!

Barnes is part of a union that has played a significant role in championing the fundamental truth that all of us are created equal – and should be treated equally. Since 1936, AFSCME has been the vehicle to move thousands of public workers of all classes, colors and creeds from poverty to the middle class.

Last year, AFSCME marked the 50th Anniversary of the “I Am A Man” sanitation strike in Memphis. After years of low pay and dangerous conditions that resulted in the deaths of two coworkers, thirteen hundred black sanitation workers went on strike, demanding to be recognized as a union and demanding an end to unsafe working conditions and discrimination in the workplace. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. traveled to Memphis to support the strike, and was assassinated on April 4, 1968. Only after Dr. King’s murder did the city agree to recognize AFSCME Local 1733, which still represents Memphis city workers.

Dr. King’s visit to Memphis was not the only time he spoke about the relationship between civil rights and labor rights. He saw the civil rights movement and the union movement as natural allies.

Below are quotes from Dr. King compiled for the AFL-CIO by Berry Craig:

“As I have said many times, and believe with all my heart, the coalition that can have the greatest impact in the struggle for human dignity here in America is that of the Negro and the forces of labor, because their fortunes are so closely intertwined,” he said.

Dr. King warned that enemies of racial justice were also enemies of unions: “The labor-hater and labor-baiter is virtually always a twin-headed creature spewing anti-Negro epithets from one mouth and anti-labor propaganda from the other mouth.”

He denounced “right to work” laws as a scam: “In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as ‘right to work.’ It is a law to rob us of our civil rights and job rights.

“Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining by which unions have improved wages and working conditions of everyone.…Wherever these laws have been passed, wages are lower, job opportunities are fewer, and there are no civil rights. We do not intend to let them do this to us. We demand this fraud be stopped. Our weapon is our vote.”

The relationship between civil rights and labor rights remains strong today. In fact, just this month, the president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Derrick Johnson told a group of AFSCME leaders that, “We must understand our role and our relationship to labor. We cannot separate what we are and what we do.”

People wonder why the NAACP gets involved in union-organizing campaigns like the one at the Nissan plant in Canton, Mississippi, in 2017, Johnson said.

“Well, it’s because this has everything to do with civil rights,” he added. “There is no difference between worker rights and civil rights.”

 

 

 

 

 

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50 Years and Counting!

OAPSE Member Has 50 Years as Bus Driver

50 years ago, he took a job as a bus driver for Kettering City Schools to make extra money while his wife was pregnant. Now, OAPSE Local 573 member Terry Lloyd is marking five decades driving students to and from school in this Southwest District school system.

Since 1968, Lloyd has driven school routes and on field trips and is considered “a great asset” to the business services/transportation department.

You can read all about Terry below. His story appeared in the Dayton Daily News.

KETTERING —A Kettering school bus driver said he took the job to earn some extra money when his wife was pregnant. This week, he celebrated 50 years behind the wheel and getting students to class.

On Dec. 9, Terry Lloyd celebrated his 50th anniversary as a bus driver for the school district.

Since 1968, Terry has transported Kettering children to and from school and on field trips, has had good attendance and is considered to be a “great employee,” according to Business Services Director Ken Lackey.

That praise is echoed by Lloyd’s supervisor, Todd Silverthorn, who oversees transportation for the schools.

“He’s a great asset to the department,” Silverthorn said of the longest-serving bus driver on his staff. “Anytime we’ve had questions about how things were done in the past, we’ve had some conversations with him about how things have improved.”

Of course when you have longevity like Lloyd, teaching things to younger drivers doesn’t exactly mean they are young at all.

“He is a big role model to the drivers who have been here 38 years or less,” Silverthorn said with a laugh. “Everybody else has some pretty big shoes to fill when it comes to learning the business like Terry.”

Lloyd, 71, sifted through photos of the good old days that were on Silverthorn’s desk, and he recounted how he went from dutiful GM employee to day-to-day bus driver.

“My wife was pregnant with our first child, and I came here to work to get extra money,” he said.

Lloyd retired from GM in 1998 with 32 years of service.

He said he has witnessed many changes over the years behind the wheel.

“There has been a lot of improvement, and the buses are a lot better,” he said. “Better equipment, power steering, air brakes, automatics. Two-way radios. We didn’t have them when I started out. If you broke down, then you had to go and knock on somebody’s door at six in the morning, and they weren’t very happy about that.”

When asked if the attitudes of students have improved over the years, Lloyd took a breath, let out a laugh and said, “No. Probably have got a little worse.”

His wife Loretta is also a driver for the district and has been at the helm for 30 years. The couple has two children, 7 grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Lloyd said he plan’s to keep on driving the bus for now.

“Depends on how healthy I am,” he said. “If I say healthy, I will keep driving, and I’m healthy right now.”

His words of advice for parents after 50 years of dealing with students is pretty straightforward.

“Just make sure they go to school and learn, and be with them whether its activities or schooling,” he said.

 

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Right to Work is STILL Wrong

Your union will keep you updated about HB 53 and how it impacts your work. Keep checking our website for critical information and how you can help stop HB 53 from becoming Ohio law.

OAPSE members remember the Senate Bill 5 fight like it was yesterday — but in fact it was seven years ago. Republicans in the state legislature passed right to work legislation that would have gutted our collective bargaining bill and destroyed our ability to negotiate with employers for our wages, benefits and working conditions.

What followed was one of the most epic ballot fights in the history of Ohio, as OAPSE and all of organized labor joined together to defeat right to work (Issue 2) by a margin of 62-38.

You would think those lawmakers would learn their lesson — but NO!

State Rep. John Becker introduced HB 53, which brings Right to Work back to the statehouse. The bill will have a hearing Tuesday, November 13 at 1 p.m. in Committee Room 313.

OAPSE members will be there to make it clear to legislators that:

Right to work is wrong. Wrong for working families, wrong for Ohio, wrong for us all. We can’t trust it.

State Rep. Becker’s legislation is dangerous and destructive.

Right to work is complicated and controversial and we don’t need it in our state.

In right to work is wrong states, workers are paid less on average $728 a month less than in free bargaining states like Ohio. What would you do if you had to cut $728 a month from your household budget right now? That’s Rep. Becker’s plan.

In right to work is wrong states, workers are less safe. The death rate on the job is 58 percent higher. If state Rep. John Becker has his way, more people will die on the job in Ohio.

State Rep. Becker’s plan will make all of us poorer and less safe.

Right to work is wrong because it doesn’t create jobs.

Workers don’t want this. Rep. Becker is carrying water for the Koch Brothers who want to make us all work for lower wages and with less safety on the job.

Rep. Becker is working for the same people who tried to take away our collective bargaining rights with Senate Bill 5 and Ohio voters said no to that idea by a 62-38 percent vote.