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You Shouldn’t Need to Run a $10,000 Ad to Get Quality Internet Access This week at a congressional hearing, CWA President Chris Shelton testified on the failure of telecom companies to upgrade their networks and called on Congress to take action to expand broadband access. "We are living in an America where if you have ten thousand dollars to spend on an ad in the Wall Street Journal, you can get quality internet access at home," Shelton said, referring to 90-year-old Aaron Epstein's successful effort to get AT&T to install high speed fiber internet service at his home in North Hollywood, Calif. "But if you’re a single mom struggling to pay the bills, your children have to sit in a McDonald’s parking lot using the free wifi to do their homework." He urged Congress to pass an infrastructure bill that will expand broadband access and create and protect good jobs, as President Biden has laid out in his plan to build back better, and called for Congress to strengthen the Lifeline program and protect the millions of low-income consumers who rely on it by modernizing Lifeline's funding mechanism to ensure the sustainability of the program. Watch President Shelton's testimony here. — Feb 18
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Organizing Update The Desert Sun On Wednesday, journalists at the Gannett-owned newspaper, The Desert Sun, in Palm Springs, voted overwhelmingly to join Media Guild of the West, TNG-CWA Local 39213, through mail-in balloting that was supervised by the National Labor Relations Board. "This win is big because it reaffirms what I already know: our reporters, photographers, and producers are united behind our steps to better the newsroom," photographer and videographer Vickie Connor said. "I'm excited because I know we will bring this winning energy to the bargaining table to fight for the changes we want and need." ### The Second City Comedy educators at The Second City in Hollywood, Calif.; Chicago, Ill.; and Toronto, Ontario, have filed for union certification as the Association of International Comedy Educators (AICE). Educators in Hollywood will be represented by CWA Local 9400 and those in Toronto by CWA Canada. Chicagoans will be represented by Illinois Federation of Teachers. The Second City was recently acquired by private equity company ZMC. The Second City has been a training ground for generations of Canadian and American humorists. Alumni include Stephen Colbert, Tina Fey, Tim Meadows, Rick Moranis, Joan Rivers, and Amber Ruffin. The organizing campaign focused on anti-racism and intersectional justice. In the AICE mission statement, organizers said they were creating a union "to guarantee equitable and just working conditions for all The Second City teachers and facilitators in Chicago, Hollywood, and Toronto." CWA Canada President Martin O'Hanlon voiced strong support for the new members, saying "The best way to improve quality, morale, and diversity is to give workers a stronger voice and the power to negotiate." — Feb 18
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Connecticut CWAers Fight to Save Call Center Jobs Two years ago, AT&T moved 100 call center jobs out of Meriden, Conn., presenting workers with an impossible decision: uproot their lives and move to Georgia or Tennessee, or lose their jobs. CWA Local 1298 members are fighting to prevent it from happening again. On February 9, CWA Local 1298 leadership testified before the Connecticut Labor and Public Employees Committee to advocate for An Act Concerning Call Centers and Notice of Closure (H.B.6383) which would stop companies from sending jobs out of state by requiring companies that intend to relocate 30% or more of their annual call volume out of Connecticut to notify the Labor Commissioner; ending grants, loans, and tax benefits for companies that move at least 30% of calls out of state; and requiring all state agencies to ensure that all business-related call center work is performed by companies located in Connecticut. "One call center closing can devastate an entire community," CWA Local 1298's Jim Case testified. "The core of this bill is simple: no State taxpayer money should be used for companies that ship our jobs out of the state." — Feb 18
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We Are Building an Army of CWA Trainers for Our Fight Against Runaway Inequality Twenty-five CWA activists from across the country participated in a training session last week to learn how to run CWA's "Reversing Runaway Inequality" workshops that focus on the growing gap between the super-rich and ordinary workers, how the 1% uses race to divide working people, and how we can fight back against inequality and level the economic playing field. The new trainers join a cohort of 50 experienced Reversing Runaway Inequality trainers who will be leading workshops to educate and mobilize members to pass the PRO Act and state legislative bills to help reverse runaway inequality. — Feb 18
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You Shouldn’t Need to Run a $10,000 Ad to Get Quality Internet Access Washington, D.C. -- Today, at the U.S. House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology (Committee on Energy and Commerce) Connecting America: Broadband Solutions to Pandemic Problems hearing, Chris Shelton, president of the Communications Workers of America (CWA), highlighted the failure of telecom companies to upgrade their networks and called on Congress to take action to expand broadband access. “We are living in an America where if you have ten thousand dollars to spend on an ad in the Wall Street Journal, you can get quality internet access at home,” Shelton said, referring to 90-year-old Aaron Epstein’s successful effort to get AT&T to install high speed fiber internet service at his home in North Hollywood, Calif. “But if you’re a single mom struggling to pay the bills, your children have to sit in a McDonald’s parking lot using the free wifi to do their homework.” In his written testimony, Shelton said that decades of deregulation have led to a deterioration of the telecommunications network and under-investment in broadband buildout. He cited a report published last year by CWA and the National Digital Inclusion Alliance. The report revealed that AT&T, once the leader in universal service, has made fiber-to-the-home available for fewer than one-third of the households in its 21-state network. Shelton called for an approach to broadband policy that “that accounts for the shortcomings of the recent decades of industry-driven deregulation and charts a new path with accountability and oversight as watchwords, and with frontline telecom workers as stakeholders whose jobs and voices matter, since they do the hard work of connecting all Americans.” He applauded Congressional efforts such as the Emergency Broadband Benefit included in the pandemic relief bill and E-rate funding for remote learning in the forthcoming COVID-19 budget reconciliation measure. He urged Congress to pass an infrastructure bill that will expand broadband access and create and protect good jobs, as President Biden has laid out in his plan to build back better. Shelton recommended $80 billion in funding for broadband deployment and that Congress establish standards to create and protect good jobs, including making sure that workers are able to exercise their collective bargaining rights free from employer coercion and intimidation and prohibiting the outsourcing of work to contractors in order to circumvent a collective bargaining agreement. These protections are essential because of the growing trend of major broadband companies contracting and subcontracting work, which fragments and disempowers their workforce. In the broadband sector, most construction contractors are non-union and undercut the wages, benefits and quality of work that union members fought for and won over decades. They also present risks to public safety and quality of service, which CWA has documented in a recent report. Shelton also called for Congress to strengthen the Lifeline program and protect the millions of low-income consumers who rely on it by modernizing Lifeline’s funding mechanism to ensure the sustainability of the program. According to the Federal Communication Commission’s most recent Internet Access Services report, 44 million households do not have a broadband connection that meets the FCC speed benchmark. Broadband access is stratified by race and income, and the digital divide remains deep, both because of inadequate access and because broadband service is unaffordable for many. CWA has long been a strong advocate for universal broadband. In 2006, the union launched the Speed Matters campaign, calling for better broadband maps at the FCC, faster broadband speeds, a strong Lifeline subsidy program to connect low-income households, and robust public investment to spur broadband deployment. While the Speed Matters coalition won some victories, such as the increase in the broadband speed benchmark in 2015 and the modernization of the Lifeline program to include broadband service, the promise of universal broadband has been stymied by industry intransigence and legislative inaction. “CWA members who build, maintain, and service our telecom networks know better than anyone how broadband policy can help address the struggles our nation faces. We are grateful that the Biden Administration and Congressional Democrats have begun to take the necessary steps to address these glaring digital inequities that the pandemic has exposed,” Shelton said.An archive video of the hearing is available at https://youtu.be/F1bexiwkjHs?t=3131. — Feb 18