Feb 1, 2002

With less than six weeks until the kickoff of AT&T bargaining, CWA is ramping up an unprecedented mobilization campaign for a contract that will provide both job security and improved wages and benefits.

"The CWA Executive Board has pledged its unanimous support for our efforts," said Ralph Maly, CWA vice president for Communications and Technologies. "We will have the full resources of this union behind our effort to secure a fair contract."

As the CWA News went to press, about 100 local leaders and staff were set to leaflet Feb. 2 at the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. The eight-day, televised golf classic paired well-known professionals with celebrities Michael Bolton, Samuel L. Jackson, Clint Eastwood and many others.

Their leaflet applauded the tournament's contribution of a large portion of proceeds to a national center for the study of renowned American author John Steinbeck, but lamented AT&T leadership's lack of understanding of the ideals Steinbeck upheld in his famous novel, "The Grapes of Wrath," about a grassroots struggle for survival.

"We just wish AT&T's leadership had understood the book," the leaflet proclaims. "We are in the fight of our lives. As AT&T gets sold off in pieces, we see that CEO C. Michael Armstrong will have a job in the newly merged AT&T Comcast."

And if you saw T-shirts on television emblazoned with "CWA, the backbone of AT&T," they were worn by celebrity members of the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists who support CWA.

The Ad Hoc Committee of presidents from strategic locals around the country provides ideas for a much broader mobilization, said Bill Bates, CWA representative and mobilization coordinator for Com Tech. Working with Bates are Hetty Scofield, director of mobilization for the executive vice president's office, and Local 1150 President Laura Unger, co-chair of the committee. One or more coordinators have been appointed for each CWA district.

Training on bargaining issues and mobilization techniques for stewards and mobilizers in all AT&T locals began last July.