Voting information will be sent to your FCPS Outlook email address today from BallotPoint.
The question on the ballot we all receive will be:
or
We get to choose! The best thing for us to do at this point is vote for NO REPRESENTATION. If we do this, we show that the Operational Unit does not want the teachers union to represent us, and LiUNA will be able to come back and campaign. We ask you to VOTE NO and be patient; if we win this election, we can start campaigning with LiUNA again and hold an election next school year to have LiUNA as our exclusive representative of our bargaining unit for an appropriate contract.
Signed in Solidarity,
The Organizing Committee
I am writing to you today with unfortunate news regarding our campaign for recognition of our union, LiUNA Local 571. On April 30, our local LiUNA office was notified by the national LiUNA office that our organizers must stop campaigning immediately. LiUNA staff met with me and the rest of the organizing committee that evening to inform us of this news. Understandably, we were sad and angry. We believe in this campaign and our ideal of giving staff like us a voice, of standing together for ourselves
The national office was not able to provide a detailed explanation of why LiUNA must stop campaigning, however we know part of the reason is because FEU filed Article XXI charges against LiUNA with the AFL-CIO. In basic terms, unions that belong to the AFL-CIO cannot compete against each other in a union campaign, and FEU filed a complaint saying that they had already organized our Operational Unit, therefore LiUNA must back off. Despite our Collective Bargaining Resolution allowing ALL unions to have equal access, FEU decided to force LiUNA to drop out of the race.
However, this is not the end. Our campaign may have started late but we built something wonderful together. For the first time, support staff from all over FCPS worked together towards being recognized on our own. We made connections that no one can take away from us. In less than 3 weeks, we collected over 700 signatures for LiUNA. YOUR signatures, for YOUR choice. That is truly amazing. No one can silence us now, no matter how much they wish us to be silent. We will speak up together, louder than before. We must remain connected toward the goal of bargaining together in the future!
Next month, when you receive your union election ballot, you will see only two choices: ~FEU - Fairfax Education Unions~ or ~No Representation~. Our goal is to vote ~No Representation~, and we only need a simple majority to win. When we win this vote by choosing ~No Representation~, we prove that FEU DID NOT organize this unit. We will prove that we belong to no one but ourselves. We will prove that we should be allowed a choice in who represents us, not just one union option on the ballot. Per the Collective Bargaining Resolution, we can hold another election one year after the first election. We will resume our campaign to organize with LiUNA as soon as possible, and we will petition for election next June.
We realize that voting ~No Representation~ now means a delay in getting a contract. Continuing to work without a contract is not ideal, but voting for the teachers union means that we would not have the best union to represent us, which also means we could end up stuck with a poor contract for years: FEU actually recently informed our Support Services Council (SSEAC) that they intend to speed our contract through the bargaining process, so they can focus attention on the contract for teachers instead, claiming they would get us a good contract next time. We believe it is in our best interest to VOTE NO for that and wait one more year instead. We will campaign to get LiUNA on the ballot, win the vote, and bargain for ourselves to get the best contract possible.
So, for now, we thank you for your support and ask that you practice patience, vote ~No Representation~ when the time comes, and spread the word. We need more votes for ~No Representation~ than votes for FEU (so not voting will not be enough, you must choose ~NO!~), and we need as many Operational staff as possible to help keep the campaign going for LiUNA.
