By Steve Wishnia

In February 2022, President Joseph Biden directed the Department of Health and Human Services to develop minimum staffing standards for nursing homes, to remedy the most chronic problem workers and patient advocates have with the quality of care. The federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has not yet released its proposed regulations, which were expected this spring — but the nursing-home industry is already opposing them.

Work-Bites Network

On this episode of Labor This Week with host Mark Harrison, we travel to the nation’s capital with New York City municipal retirees fighting to strengthen traditional Medicare nationwide, while struggling to fend off Mayor Eric Adams’ privatization efforts here at home.

By Joe Maniscalco

Ninety-year-old New York City municipal retiree Evie Jones Rich stood on the pavement outside the Manhattan offices of U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand in 90-plus degree heat on Friday afternoon, and spoke for nearly six minutes straight about the need to save Medicare from increasing privatization.

By Bob Hennelly

The New York City Organization of Public Service Retirees [NYCOPSR] were given a hero’s welcome at a ‘save Medicare’ rally in front of the U.S. Capitol on July 27. Roughly 70 members shared the spotlight with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and several other members of the House of Representatives who blasted for-profit Medicare Advantage insurance companies for delaying and denying health care treatment to seniors which they said resulted in an estimated 10,000 deaths a year.

By Steve Wishnia

The Teamsters Union has reached a tentative contract deal with UPS it is calling “overwhelmingly lucrative” and “the most historic tentative agreement for workers in the history of UPS” — and it’s crediting intensive rank-and-file organizing and readiness to strike for the victory.

By Bob Hennelly

On this episode of the Labor Radio Hour, NYC Central Labor Council President Vincent Alvarez talks about Strike Summer 2023 — and the possible implications of a national Teamsters strike against UPS happening at the same time members of SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild of America are striking against the AMPTP. Locally, the New York Nurses Association went on strike at some private non-profit hospitals. Did COVID give workers new leverage?

By Joe Maniscalco

To SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher:

Before launching Work-Bites last fall, I covered the Labor Movement for more than a decade, delivering countless stories on wage theft, worker safety, pay parity, the Fight for $15, you name it.

Work-Bites Network

On this episode of Labor This Week with Host Mark Harrison, former healthcare industry insider turned traditional Medicare advocate Wendell Potter, talks about how “Wall Street’s greed” is now determining “whether or not we get the care our doctors say we need” — or “even the power to see the doctors of our choice.”

By Bob Hennelly

On this episode of the Stuck Nation Labor Radio Hour, we visit with noted labor historian and author Joshua Freeman, a distinguished professor emeritus at CUNY’s Queens College, to discuss the significant increase in union organizing and strike activity across the country. We ask with all of this union activity why is union density actually going down?

By Joe Maniscalco

Unbeknownst to most New Yorkers, the next time they call for help, the EMTs and Paramedics showing up to their rescue might’ve just spent a sleepless night in their cars wondering how they’re gonna cover an unexpected bill.

By Bob Hennelly

Representatives of Mayor Eric Adams’ administration told a New York City Council panel investigating its response to last month’s hazardous air days created by 400 wildfires in Canada, that it was “very proud of the city’s response within the constraints of the forecasting and information” it had at the time.

By Joe Maniscalco

Parks Dept. retiree Michael Sirotta spent nearly a quarter century building up a free arts program for New York City kids. It used to be located on Staten Island. Famous Alumi of the now defunct program include recording artist and actor Ingrid Michaelson who joined the program when she was nine.

By Bob Hennelly

Courtesy of InsiderNJ

Six days after the line of duty deaths of Newark firefighters Augusto Acabou, 45, and Wayne Brooks Jr., 49, the fire aboard the Grande Costa D’Avorio docked in Port Newark is finally out but basic questions about the response continue to proliferate and officials are deflecting with the standard “It’s under investigation.”

By Robert Ovetz

Courtesy of The Chief

At a recent worker organizing conference I heard a talk by a PSC-CUNY member who called for repealing the Taylor Law. During the break, while we talked about how to do that, they dismissed using “illegal” strikes. The reason was, they said, PSC would be unable to do one-on-one meetings with all the faculty to collect their dues once automatic dues deduction is suspended as punishment for striking.  

By Bob Hennelly

On this episode of the Stuck Nation Labor Radio Hour, we’re delving further into the Newark Port fire that took the lives of two New Jersey firefighters, and raises serious workplace and public health questions — plus more!

By Bob Hennelly

Courtesy of InsiderNJ.com

Forty-eight hours after fire first broke out on the massive Grande Costa D’Avorio vehicle carrier ship docked in Port Newark, firefighters were still trying to extinguish the blaze that claimed the lives of two beloved Newark firefighters, Augusto Acabou, 45, and Wayne Brooks Jr., 49.

Officials say the fire could continue to burn into the weekend.

Work-Bites.com

New York City Organization of Public Service Retirees President Marianne Pizzitola talks to Labor This Week host Mark Harrison about today’s injunction against the City of New York’s plans to strip municipal retirees of their traditional Medicare health insurance coverage and push them into a profit-driven Medicare Advantage program — a move that NYS Supreme Court Justice Lyle Frank said, would result in “irreparable harm.”

By Steve Wishnia

State Supreme Court Judge Lyle E. Frank has blocked the city from switching its retired employees’ health coverage to Medicare Advantage. A preliminary injunction issued this morning scotches its Monday deadline for retirees who want to keep traditional Medicare to opt out of the for-profit Aetna Medicare Advantage plan.

By Steven Wishnia

Dozens of retired city workers overflowed a Manhattan courtroom on July 6, as State Supreme Court Judge Lyle E. Frank heard oral arguments on whether he should issue a temporary restraining order to prevent the City of New York from switching their health coverage from Medicare to a private Medicare Advantage plan on Monday, July 10.

The judge said he expected to issue a ruling on Friday, July 7.

By Bob Hennelly

On this Independence Day edition of the Stuck Nation Labor Radio Hour, we find Canada continuing to battle hundreds of forest fires in what is that nation’s worst wildfire season on record with 250 blazes still out of control consuming close to 20 million acres — the near equivalent of two thirds of New York State’s landmass.