Who Needs a Union?

In this section we will bring you articles, videos and pictures that make it obvious who needs a union – we all do. When employees have the right to sit down in a group and bargain with their employers over pay, benefits and working conditions, they do better and that’s a fact. Our goal is to make sure law enforcement associations who have the right to collectively bargain keep that right. But we are also committed to making sure every law enforcement officer everywhere gets the right to be represented by a union. If you have a story, photo or video that will help us accomplish this goal, post it in the comment section below.

An OIS cannot be explained in 140 characters
The officer involved shooting (OIS) that occurred in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9th has set off another coast-to-coast media frenzy. We have all grown used to this over the years. It is even expected. The reporters and the pundits and the politicians can seemingly never get enough….

OPPA website is a how-to
PubSecAlliance is proud to have the Ontario Provincial Police Association (OPPA) on board as founding member. This forward thinking organization has one hell of an impressive website. Generally speaking, websites aren’t necessarily something that police associations would spend a lot of time and resources on but a really good site…

Great Speech from 1980
“It is fitting that on Labor Day, we meet beside the waters of New York harbor, with the eyes of Miss Liberty on our gathering and in the words of the poet whose lines are inscribed at her feet, “The air bridged harbor that twin cities frame…

Too hot for TV
The San Antonio Police Officers Association released a video on Facebook Thursday blasting City Manager Sheryl Sculley and city council for the negotiations with the city in the on-going collective bargaining fight.

Do not release!
The Chicago FOP is asking a judge to delay the release of lists that name officers accused of misconduct. The Fraternal Order of Police, which filed the injunction Monday in Cook County Circuit Court, claims there is reason to believe the lists are inaccurate and could “unfairly and vexatiously harm…

Association helping wounded officer
In Canada, The Ontario Provincial Police Association (OPPA) has set-up a trust fund to help Constable Peter Tucker and his family. Tucker is a motorcycle officer who was seriously injured just over a week ago when he was escorting a motorcade. He was part of a training exercise and hit a goose and crashed. received thousands of calls from people wanting to help and that’s why it has set up the account.

Government employee unions expand
Unions representing government workers are expanding while organized labor has been shedding private sector members over the past half-century. A majority of union members today now have ties to a government entity, at the federal, state or local levels. Roughly 1-in-3 public sector workers is a union member…

 What’s in a name? Defeat
Well the forces of labor dodged a major bullet on Monday when the Supreme Court decided that busting unions and eliminating freedom of religion on the same day was a bit much. But the union busters are already working…

Here’s what we’re up against
One of the things we try and do here is keep our members posted about how the forces stacked against them are winning hearts and minds with low-information voters by producing anti-union propaganda like this YouTube video…

Association calls for local politico to resign
The Toledo Police Patrolman’s Association is demanding that a local lawmaker that accused local cops of racially profiling him to resign. Councilman Larry Sykes claimed that he was racially profiled after an officer stopped him for obscured tags..

Newest union to join PubSec:
Detectives Investigators Association of New York City
by John Fleming, I am proud to announce that the Detectives Investigators Association of New York City has joined with a group of 50 police unions throughout the country to form an alliance to protect and preserve the collective bargaining benefits…

Shocker – college players union idea met with resistance!
Here’s the thing about college sports that make money- the last thing that matters is a kid getting an education. But that’s a great talking point when you’re trying to keep people from coming together to lobby for common interests.

Alec is gunning for you
Laws on your pensions, health care, pay and even your job. The only way they can get what they want – which is to privatize your job and get their hands on your pension funds, and destroy your collective bargaining rights is to change the laws. It’s easier to fight back…

Pension slashers gain in Florida
Last week, the House of Representatives in the Florida legislature voted along straight party lines to close the Florida Retirement System to elected officials and top state managers Friday, despite impassioned arguments that Republicans are letting…

Chicago FOP elects new president
Dean Angelo Sr., a detective with the Chicago Police Department has been elected president of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police. Dean beat the acting president of the union, Bill Dougherty, by a vote of 5,021 to 4,548…

The good news and the bad news
A dedicated Teamsters union worker was attending a convention in Las Vegas and decided to check out the local brothels. When he got to the first one, he asked the Madam, “Is this a union house?” “No,” she replied, “I’m sorry it isn’t.”…

We got you covered; but it’s not a firearm, it’s an app
We all know that any time police officers draw their weapons in the line of duty they not only put their lives on the line, they put their careers at risk. To provide a better layer of protection for their members…

Unions lose round in fight over forced breathalyzer tests
In New York City a lawsuit filed by the Sergeants and Patrol Officers unions charging that mandatory Breathalyzer tests for officers who had used their guns violated collective bargaining agreements has been tossed out. The policy was adopted in 2008 after the Sean Bell shooting in Queens where one detective…

A model pension fund
If all the major state worker retirement plans were run like the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund, would a massive public pension overhaul be needed? It’s a question that can never be fully answered. But one fact is clear: IMRF is the state’s most financially…

On board for the pension fight
The adage that there’s power in numbers is proving true in Alberta (Canada) where a large group of unions has joined together to stop the effort to cut pensions. Dubbed…

Judge rules pensions can’t be cut but pay can. San Jose POA vows to keep on fighting!
In a landmark ruling out of California, a judge invalidated key parts of San Jose’s voter-approved pension cuts but says the city can cut employees’ salaries to offset its increasing pension costs. The ruling was a mixed bag for the San Jose POA which…

Who decides what gets in the paper?
Ever wonder who decides what is newsworthy, what will be the front page headline or the top story on the five o’clock news? Given all that has been in the news about the Seattle Police Dept. over the past several years, wouldn’t it be newsworthy…

Get your info off the Internet. Now!
Recently here at the Long Beach P.D. in California, we had a high profile use of force incident that made the national news. This situation showed once again that it is imperative for law enforcement officers to remove all their personal information from the Internet. Our association worked closely with the officers involved…

Post Office on the chopping block
You may think when Canada’s postal service announced it would cease home delivery over the next five years while dramatically raising rates has nothing to do with you. Well, you would be wrong. The people behind the well funded, aggressive effort to privatize law enforcement jobs everywhere…

Retiree healthcare in trouble
Pensions are just part of the problem. Health care is another dark cloud circling.
As state and local governments focus on how to fix their pension problems, a recent report demonstrates the dramatic measures large American cities will have to take to address another issue: woefully underfunded retiree health-care liabilities…

Defending the good guys: 
Some take the insults quietly, fuming inside. Others get pissed and speak out. And that’s exactly what Jim Christie, president of the Ontario Provincial Police Association did when a local reporter criticized a salary increase for his members despite the fact that they worked without a raise for two years. Here’s what he had to say, loud and clear…

Robots a threat to your future
Think you don’t need a union to protect your pay and benefits? Guess again. Your association leaders have been busy fighting off the people who want to privatize your job and turn you into a minimum wage security guard. Now there’s a new threat to your job – robots – and your union leaders will be hard at work fighting this battle too….

Private prison debacle
Corrections Corporation of America has been charged with “criminally understaffing their jails.” This would not be happening if the prison was run by a government agency and the employees were represented by a union or association. So who needs a union? The employees of CCA do…

Burnout: The real danger of police work
Helping cops suffering from “burnout” is becoming a concern for police associations and unions. Officers experiencing burnout are emotionally exhausted, cynical, detached from other people, overcome with extreme negativity….

The San Francisco POA: Founding member of PubSecAlliance
The San Francisco POA represents 2100 active-duty members up to captain, and another 1000 retired officers. Currently San Francisco officers are among the highest paid in the country with a starting pay of close to $90,000 and a 90% pension at age 55. Marty Halloran, the president, assumed the corner office this past spring after…

Ruling could deliver blow to unions
Yesterday the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case that could deal a major if not fatal blow to labor unions. While the case comes from the private sector (company is a Florida-based casino company Mardi Gras Gaming) the Supreme Court’s ruling in the case will impact all unions – public and private sector….

Money laundering Koch Brothers fined $16 million
We all need a union and now thanks to the state of California, the chances have improved we may be able to hold on to our collective bargaining rights. A strongly worded editorial – A Victory Against Dark Money – was published in Sunday’s New York Times, supporting California’s decision…

Who needs a union? Boston cops that’s who!
In late September, following an arbitration hearing that went on for 17 days, the panel ruled that Boston patrol officers deserve a 25.4 percent raise over six years. Tom Nee, president of the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association (BPPA), called the 17 day ordeal “unprecedented.”  “There were 17 days of hearings and …

Won’t get fooled again? Wanna bet?
Only working with your union or association are you going to fight this train wreck coming at us. Billionaires have been taking your retirement money and now they want more. Much more –  like all of it. Thankfully Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi has not been assassinated or muzzled. Taibbi is…

The right stuff
If you want to understand better why you need the clout of your union, read Carl Gibson’s excellent article, “How the ALEC Agenda Forced Chicago’s School Closings.”  ALEC – an organization of corporate lobbyists and mostly Republican state legislators – meets behind closed doors to write…

Non-union workers sinking Boeing
It’s the going to be the same story when local communities to save money disband their unionized, professional police force and replace it with a private security company.  A report …

Together we won it all!
The tactic worked. When the votes were tallied in Ohio on election day in November 2011, the results were astonishing. Voters turned out in record numbers and….

Cops in unions earn more
In January 2013 the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the research arm of the U.S. Dept. of Labor, released a comprehensive report on union membership in the U.S. The shocking news…