Library of Congress Grilled on Union Harassment

The simmering union struggle in the quiet halls of the Library of Congress boiled over in a March 22 House appropriation subcommittee hearing when Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D- FL), grilled Library of Congress (LOC) Chief Operating Officer Jo Ann Jenkins about the ongoing dispute over “official time for representational activities,” questioning whether the LOC is really threatening to dock the pay of some union leaders at the Library of Congress. The Library has been flooded over the last month with hundreds of letters protesting unionbusting tactics by Library of Congress management against members of AFSCME Local 2910. In a related development, “The union just won an important health and safety arbitration about smoke detectors on elevators,” reports Local 2910 President Saul Schniderman. “This is part of the whole problem,” Schniderman tells UNION CITY, “because management forced us to arbitration on a case that could have been handled with a 10-minute meeting. This is part of their strategy to force relatively simple issues to litigation to try to bleed the union. Even though they lost the case and have to pay virtually all of the arbitration costs, we still have our own legal fees to pay.” In another sign of the struggle’s growing support, the AFL-CIO’s Department of Professional Employees recently took up the LOC letter-writing campaign.