During the campaign, Sweeney pledged to create a new organizing department and to quintuple funding for this work. Funding for the federation's Organizing Institute, which trains organizers and sends them out to unions around the country, will also increase dramatically. Most activists welcome the heightened commitment to organizing. But Gordon, who attended the convention on behalf of her local central labor council, doesn't like the emphasis on getting college students and recent graduates to do the organizing. I don't blame the college students, they come in very idealistic, and their hearts are in the right place.
Stories travel and people have long memories.
And there's been a whole history down here where people come in, they begin to realize how hard it is, they lose the union election, and then they leave, and the workers who supported the union are left holding the bag. And so unions have gotten a really bad name. They have to make a long-term commitment, they have to know it's not going to happen overnight, that they're going to lose elections. But they really have to plan on staying and backing up those people inside the plant who are really putting their jobs on the line to bring the union in. And they need to hire those people to do the organizing.