SEIU Member Organizers in Milledgeville GA
Marvin Harrell, Jr.

We seldom are afforded the opportunity to see how life is for our brothers and sisters in other parts of the country. Rarely do we even care. SEIU is unique in that it cares about workers all over this country and the world.  I was chosen by my peers at Local 715 to participate in an organizing campaign that is being conducted in the state of Georgia. The target area we worked in was in the small town of Milledgeville, a town one hundred miles south of Atlanta, which at one time was the capital of Georgia. With a population of 18,657 Milledgeville is home to five state prisons and one mental hospital, these facilities employ 6,000 mostly unorganized workers.

That is where the fun started and the education process took root. Member Organizers from all over the country converged on this town in what is the beginning of a blitz type of organizing campaign. From Chicago, to California, to states above and between we came with one purpose, organize the unorganized. After a strategy meeting held by Pat Thomas, Larry McNeely, Tim Reid and other members of Local 1985's staff, we were divided into teams. These teams averaged in sizes of five or six Member Organizers usually equally men and women. Each team consisted of MO's and one other more experienced organizer from either the Local or the International. The team I was on was headed by a young man from the International named Channing. Our target site was the Mental Hospital on the first day. Our strategy was to arrive early enough in the morning to catch the morning shift getting off of work and the day shift arriving to start their day.  We were successful in arriving on time and that is when I started my education. I had never tried to organize in the south. Although I had lived in Atlanta for four years and I had lived in Texas for a year as a child, I knew very little of the psyche of the real southerner.  Fear, apathy, and for lack of a better word, ignorance prevailed in the attitudes of the workers we encountered. By ignorance I do not mean in the sense of book smarts, but rather as it relates to Unions and what they are all about.

The thought of having to pay $25.00 a month for the union dues seemed like a large amount to folks who only make an average of $8.00 an hour and most must work two jobs in order to make ends meet. Milledgeville is a place not far from where the Civil Rights Movement began hearkens back to the days of slavery. When we were talking about organizing it was as if we were talking freedom one hundred and fifty years ago. When we talked about higher wages and better working conditions, we are uttering the "unheard of", and the unattainable. When we talked about obtaining dignity and respect in the workplace, we were talking about stealing from the master.  I say this not in jest nor in any disrespect to my brothers and sisters of the South, I say this in sincere sadness and with the realization that the battle that SEIU is waging is going to be one on the grand scale, one which will require the resources the brainpower and occasional strategic changes in order to be won. A battle that we will have to recruit workers
from with in the workplace in order to win and one which we must follow through on all of the promises made to the workers that we are able to recruit.

As an example of the fear factor; I was talking to one worker about the advantages of working in an organized workplace, when her co-worker who had been walking with her but continued on, called out, "Benita I am going to tell Miss Watkins you were out here talking to the Union Man". That experience more than any other drove home the "talking freedom" mentality that is so prevalent.

Our task as Member Organizers was to talk to as many workers as possible, and convince them to join the Union. If they claimed to be members already it was our task to get their contact information so that the local could contact them and make sure they were in fact members. We did meet many folks who did make such claims, and we also met those that claimed to have been members, but dropped their membership due to inaction on behalf of the local. We also attempted to get their contact information in order for local to try to reel them back in.

We also did some organizing at the Youth Prison where we met with some major resistance. The workers there make a little more than those at the  Hospital, therefore their motivation to change is even lower.  We also had some resistance from management when they told us we were not allowed on the property. Rather than resisting, we left and caused no trouble. In these types of campaigns our image is as important as our tactics.

Our team was able to sign up twenty new members and get contact information form approximately one hundred or more former or interested members; SEIU has its work cut out for it. SEIU Local 1985 is pulling together in this effort and all of the locals will eventually get their chance to help with this campaign. I will gladly help in the capacity as a member organizer or any other type of organizer when asked by my local or the international. I believe that is one the most important jobs of the union.

I do not believe the good people of Milledgeville are beyond organizing, quite the opposite I think it is a campaign that can be won. It is one that will require the local to live up to its potential and educate the citizens of Milledgeville to the fact that an organized workforce within their city limits can only benefit the entire city. Their efforts must be supported by the citizenry and the International. Their efforts also must be honest and forthright with the understanding that even if we lose one battle we have not lost the war. The way people view the unions in the south is not something that was done over night, we must realize that. We also must realize that changing their perspective about the union in a positive light is something that cannot be done over night.

e-mail:  mmayo@stanford.edu
       mikem@bonair.stanford.edu
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