What caused SEIU UHW-W to be placed under trusteeship?
The top UHW-W leadership has been found to have violated their duties to their membership, engaged in serious financial wrongdoing, attempted to subvert the democratic processes of our union, and failed to safeguard collective bargaining relationships.
This is ironic, since UHW-W (Rosselli) accusations that SEIU is moving to top down leadership excluding members from having a democratic control over their unions.
Prior to trusteeship, UHW-W had been in battle with SEIU over removing 65,000 long-term care workers from their union to merge with other unions to form a single state-wide long-term union local. UHW-W had collected petitions of over 125,000 union members protesting this split and had held demonstrations.
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Corruption Scandal Hits
ReplyDeleteDeputy Trustees’ Local Union
Hal Ruddick and Lisa Gude, two of the Deputy Trustees appointed by Andy Stern to run SEIU-UHW, are high-ranking officials at SEIU Healthcare Illinois-Indiana, a local headquartered in Chicago with 85,000 members.
On Monday, SEIU Healthcare Illinois-Indiana’s second highest officer, Executive Vice President Byron Hobbs, was forced to resign after it was discovered that he stole thousands of dollars from union members for his personal use.
Hal Ruddick is directly responsible for the finances of SEIU Healthcare Illinois-Indiana. He was appointed by Stern to serve as the local’s Secretary-Treasurer, the top official responsible for safeguarding members’ dues money. If thousands of dollars were stolen on his watch, Hal Ruddick should be held responsible.
This latest corruption scandal raises other serious issues:
Why are officials from a corrupt Chicago local now in charge of SEIU-UHW as Deputy Trustees?
How can Ruddick and Gude lead the negotiations for some of SEIU-UHW’s biggest contracts, including Catholic Healthcare West and Windsor Healthcare?
Shouldn’t Ruddick and Gude go back to Illinois to clean up their mess?
We deserve proven, effective leaders who are democratically elected and accountable to us.