Portland Canvassers Accuse Progressive Group of Union Busting

Portland Mercury:

For years, Portland canvassers have tried to organize for better conditions. With a half dozen canvassing organizations in Portland and unemployment fueling a ready stable of willing workers, they've always failed. But in 2011, phone bankers in the Fund for Public Interest Research's telephone outreach project actually managed to form a union. Workers at the Fund now complain that having a union is doing little good, because the progressive nonprofit will not negotiate with them in good faith and has systematically fired the main union organizers.

After the last of the initial Fund union organizers was fired this month—right before negotiations with leaders of the national organization last week—the fledgling union staged a walkout that drew over 100 supporters to a protest rally outside the nonprofit's local office in SE Morrison and Grand last Wednesday, November 14.

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