From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
International leaders of the union representing thousands of county government workers have arrived in San Diego to help sort out a dispute over management of the local group.
Andrew Stern, the international president of Service Employees International Union, appointed two personal representatives to investigate whether the local chapter wrongly paid former president Sharon-Frances Moore a six-figure severance and hired her as a consultant.
Local union officials said they welcome the investigation and help finding a new president. Moore cited personal reasons in resigning this month as president of SEIU Local 221.
Last week, the local’s executive board named three members to manage the union on a day-to-day basis until a successor can be named, but some union members complained that the action violated the organization’s rules.
In a Jan. 22 letter to local union officials from his Washington, D.C., headquarters, Stern said he was looking into the complaints and advised them to withhold any payments to Moore.
“I have directed my representatives to report to me within 30 days on the situation in Local 221,” he wrote. “In the meantime, I counsel the Local 221 officers and executive board not to execute or implement the challenged payments or contract at this time.”
Local 221 spokeswoman Melinda Battenberg said decisions regarding the severance and consulting agreement are internal union business that she cannot discuss publicly.
Specifically, rank-and-file members complained about a $107,000 severance package awarded to Moore and objected that she will keep working for the union as a consultant. Several people wrote to Stern to demand an investigation.
Read the rest here:
For more on the SEIU, go here, here, here and here.
We're pre-emptively tagging this for the Union Corruption Corner (just in case).
Posts
