Change To Win votes 10-cent assessment for politics

CHICAGO (PAI)--The seven-union Change to Win federation has set future plans for strategic organizing campaigns and approved a 10-cent-per-capita assessment for politics for the 2007-2008 election cycle, CTW Chair Anna Burger said.
In a press conference here September 25 after the federation’s day-and-a-half convention closed, Burger also said CTW’s Strategic Organizing Center would step up its services to the member unions, training organizers, coordinating campaigns and marshaling financial resources, among other things.
The political assessment was a new move, given CTW’s prior emphasis on organizing rather than politics--the point which led the seven unions to split from the AFL-CIO in 2005. The seven felt the older labor federation put too much emphasis, relatively, on politics.
The new emphasis means in some states, CTW is setting up its own statewide political/organizing operations, while in others its unions’ locals signed “Solidarity Charters” with AFL-CIO state federations and central labor councils for joint operations.