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Protesters enter Capitol with Michigan on brink of right-to-work legislation

List of 3 items

By Chad Livengood

The Detroit News

 

Lansing — All eyes are on Michigan Tuesday as a historic showdown between Republican lawmakers and organized labor comes to fruition over right-to-work

legislation.

 

Union members turned out early in the morning, dead set on protesting the controversial legislation, which is expected to pass through the Legislature later

today, heading to a pen-ready Gov. Rick Snyder.

 

At 5 a.m. Tuesday, Michigan Laborers started to unload their supplies for the day. The union came prepared with tents and hand warmers to withstand the

chilly 22-degree weather.

 

One of their members, Chris Taylor of Local 1098 in Saginaw, said unions have been treated unfairly with limited access to the Capitol.

 

"It's pretty disgusting when one party controls the whole state," Taylor said.

 

Michigan State Police said the public will be allowed to enter the Capitol from the east side at 7:30 a.m. as authorities have stepped up restrictions on

entrance into the building to avoid situations similar to Thursday when tempers flared and eight protesters were pepper-sprayed after trying to rush past

troopers into an unauthorized entrance of the Capitol, Capt. Herold Love said Tuesday.

 

"We have heard reports of anywhere from 7,000 to 10,000," Love said of crowd expectations. "Either way, we'll be prepped for the max."

 

Scores of state troopers from throughout Michigan will be on hand Tuesday as crowds swarm the grounds of the state Capitol in the biggest political clash

in Lansing in recent memory.

 

Lansing police are estimating the protests could attract up to 30,000 union members from across the Midwest and right-to-work advocates mobilized by the

state Republican Party.

 

"Our game plan is to allow everyone to express their constitutional rights safely and orderly," said Inspector Gene Adamczyk of the Michigan State Police,

whose agency was criticized for blocking entrance to the Capitol on Thursday during the first day of union protests against the right-to-work bills.

 

The three-bill package was introduced in Lansing on Thursday and the state House and Senate voted on the bills the same day. Both chambers are expected

to vote on the legislation Tuesday, and Snyder has said he'd sign the bill.

 

The right-to-work legislation would prohibit requiring employees to join a union or to pay fees comparable to union dues to be employed. Supporters say

right to work provides freedom of association for workers and a better business climate, and they're continuing to lobby lawmakers for final passage.

 

Don Peterson, 73, of Williamston, was among a handful of people who started the line to get into the Capitol just after 5 a.m.

 

The retired writer says right-to-work is "morally right" to allow workers to decide whether oto financially support labor unions that negotiate contracts

in the workplace."Why should a person be a slave to unions because he or she wants to work," Peterson asked. "People should have the right to work without

having to pay union dues."

 

Heading to Lansing

 

In the darkened predawn hours Tuesday morning, a caravan of buses idled outside the AFSCME Council 25's headquarters on Lafayette Avenue in Detroit, waiting

to transport hundreds of union supporters to Lansing.

 

Among them was Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano.

 

"I think that passing right to work is wrong; I've always been opposed to it," Ficano said. "It destroys a culture that is Michigan. There have always been

disagreements between labor and management over the years, but they've always been worked out."

 

Detroiter Paul Felton, a member of the American Postal Workers Union, sees it as a matter of fairness.

 

"We live with a situation, which is equivalent to RTW," Felton said. "It's really the right to freeload. Those who don't pay dues still get the benefits.

Our union negotiates a living wage for us, and then they choose not to join but get the same wages we do."

 

Shunya Cleveland is a long-time union supporter.

 

"I've supported the Detroit Federation of Teachers, UAW, Uniroyal and now AFSCME," said Cleveland of Sumpter Township. "This is just wrong. Isn't that our

building up there in Lansing? Don't we support it with our tax dollars? We are going to throw barricades around that building.

 

"I'm going to jail today!"

 

President weighs in

 

On Monday, President Barack Obama was a vocal critic of the legislation that has been praised by business leaders hoping to change the state's national

image as a union stronghold.

 

Obama used a visit Monday to tout a $120 million investment at Detroit Diesel in Redford Township to rail against right to work, saying the legislation

is about politics and not economics.

 

"What we shouldn't be doing is trying to take away your rights to bargain for better wages and working conditions," Obama told the crowd of about 1,600

on the Detroit Diesel shop floor Monday afternoon.

 

"What they're really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money."

 

Real estate mogul Ron Weiser, a GOP fundraiser leading a campaign to make Michigan the 24th right-to-work state, said the bills Snyder vows to sign will

make Michigan more attractive to businesses "afraid to come here" because of the state's powerful labor unions.

 

"It's not meant to take away the ability of unions to collectively bargain or organize," Weiser told The Detroit News.

 

Several workers at Detroit Diesel said they hoped Obama's comments would help pressure Republican lawmakers to back off making it illegal to require workers

to pay union fees if they choose not to join the union.

 

"It was really good to have that support," said Leisa Peyton, a worker who met Obama before the address and demonstrated how to install a piston on an engine

block. "I just can't even imagine working next to someone who isn't paying dues but is benefiting," she said.

 

"The whole core of a union is unity."

 

Obama's comments Monday about the right-to-work legislation were met with loud applause at the United Auto Workers-represented engine plant and came a day

before lawmakers plan to take final votes on the three-bill package.

 

Police to close streets

 

Anticipating traffic congestion this morning, Lansing police closed most streets near the Capitol by 6 a.m. — a security move Democrats said was an attempt

to stifle protests against right-to-work and abortion clinic regulation bills.

 

Planned Parenthood Advocates of Michigan said it expects hundreds of abortion rights advocates to descend on the capital to lobby against bills in the Senate.

 

"It's offensive," said Bob McCann, spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer, D-East Lansing. "They're willing to go to these extreme measures

to lock down not only the Capitol but the streets around it."

 

Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero, a Democrat, did not return messages seeking comment on the street closures. Robert Merritt, the public information officer for

the Lansing Police Department, said law enforcement estimates as many as 30,000 people are expected today.

 

"About 80 buses will arrive at 8 a.m., unloading at the Lansing Center (about two blocks from the Capitol)," Merritt said. Thousands of union members, some

from across the Midwest, are expected to show up to rally against final passage of right-to-work legislation that passed its first hurdles in the Legislature

on Thursday.

 

Scores of State Police troopers from across the state equipped with batons and tear gas guns flooded the Capitol on Monday touring the House and Senate

chambers and other areas of the Victorian-era building completed in 1879.

 

"It's all feeding into this story line of union thugs and violence," Whitmer said, "and it's really sad to see our governor trying to intimidate people

from coming down to our Capitol."

 

Memo sent to state workers

 

Besides the police presence, Democrats also were upset by a memo that was sent to state workers explaining Snyder's position on right to work and urging

safety precautions during protests at the Capitol.

 

The memo, obtained by The Detroit News, was sent to thousands of state employees just as Snyder and Republican legislative leaders last Thursday announced

their support for the legislation that makes it optional for workers to pay union fees.

 

The memo plugged the benefits of right to work and warned state employees, some of whom are unionized, to keep their cellphones charged, avoid walking alone

and follow other safety practices.

 

Ray Holman, legislative liaison for UAW Local 6000, which represents 17,000 state employees objected state-owned equipment was used to send what he called

a political message.

 

"It talked about the virtues of the right-to-work legislation, and the undercurrent is that union people are going to be engaging in criminal activities,"

he said.

 

Demonstrators speak out

 

A group of Michigan nurses stood on the Capitol steps Monday morning with duct tape over their mouths in protest of the Republican-controlled Legislature's

plans to pass the legislation.

 

And in southwest Detroit, dozens of people gathered Monday night outside the El Nacimiento restaurant, awaiting Snyder's appearance at a banquet.

 

Demonstrators with AFSCME and other unions and labor groups marched, chanted and carried signs bearing messages such as "Don't hurt working families" and

"Snyder is not a friend of workers."

 

"We're going to send Gov. Snyder a message," said the Rev. Charles Williams II, president of the state chapter of the National Action Network.

 

"We do not want right-to-work laws in the state."

 

Detroit News staff writers Tony Briscoe, Karen Bouffard, Christine MacDonald and Mark Hicks contributed.

 

clivengood at detroitnews.com

 

(517) 371-3660

 

 

Source:

 

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20121211/POLITICS02/212110362/Protesters-organize-around-Capitol-Michigan-brink-right-work-legislation?odyssey=tab%7Ctopnews%7Ctext%7CFRONTPAGE