On October 10, 2024, Local Progress’ Colorado chapter hosted a webinar with CWA Local 7 and Economic Analysis and Research Network (EARN) on the benefits of Collective Bargaining for municipal workers. This workshop was directly related to the November ballot initiative in Denver County, a long fought issue for LPCO members on the Denver City Council. This ballot measure will give voters the chance to allow municipal workers to collectively bargain for the first time in history, joining dozens of other municipal workers across the country in the ability to form a union. LPCO was happy to hosted members and communities from across the state in hopes that the lessons learned from this webinar would inspire additional efforts throughout Colorado. The conversation was facilitated by CWA Director of Organizing, Katie Romich, EARN Partner Jen Sherer, and two Denver City Council members, Councilmembers Shontel Lewis and Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez.
Local Progress was thrilled to be joined by several partners and nearly 33 community members – including 3 LPCO Members & 1 LPCO Alum, and partners from IATSE 7, Teamsters Local 455, Working Families Party Colorado, How Sh*t Gets Done in Denver, Coloradans for the Common Good, Sheet Metal Workers SMART 9, and Denver Public Library Workers United.
LPCO Members CM Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez and CM Shontel Lewis provided critical insight on the benefits of Collective Bargaining for municipal workers and the importance of strike rights. Jen Sherer from EARN added important context with a presentation on the larger Labor movement of municipal workers across the country and Colorado’s deficits and strengths in our approach to rights for public workers. They also made a point to speak to Colorado’s background with preemption and how the state has created undue burdens on municipalities when it comes to baseline rights for our public workers. Katie Romich from CWA covered the importance of collective bargaining rights for workers which allows them the ability to fight for contracts with thriving wages and strike rights.
Through this workshop, we learned that Colorado’s public sector turnover rate is among the worst in the nation, with 1 in 4 workers leaving their jobs each year. This brain drain means that means that valuable public establishments lose institutional knowledge and experience because workers lack the ability to collectively advocate for better working conditions. Without a union, Denver public workers are disadvantaged when advocating for pay increases and negotiating for better working conditions as they are forced to advocate individually rather than as a unit. Across the board, experts estimate that public workers in Denver lose up to $1 million over their lifetime due to lack of union representation, with those numbers even higher for women and public workers of color.
Our members are proud to support efforts to give public workers in Denver their rights to collectively bargain and will be eager awaiting the results of the November ballot initiative!
