Artesia's Employee Union Says They're Goo-Goos (Yes, You Read That Right)
How can a union be a steward of 'good government'? That's what Eye On Pioneer is exploring.
Artesia, California - Artesia's employee union is full of a bunch of goo-goos! What, pray tell, is a "goo-goo"?!?
Hello Artesia residents, I'm Andrew Perry, a philosophy nerd and a purveyor of corny jokes and one liners. Sit back, relax, and in the words of Ross Geller from Friends, 'Get a load of this.' A goo-goo is an advocate for good government, and after Artesia employees' experiences last year, we've really come to embrace the ideas of the good government movement. In many ways, that was our guiding light.
The term 'goo-goo' is a derivative of the original phrase "good government guys", which was a movement to reform municipal government and to find ways to reduce corruption, inefficiency, and assure honesty, transparency, and positive results for the constituents that a City is supposed to serve. Goo-goo was actually coined by their critics, who were presumably the advocates of "bad" government, or the old school ways of allowing monied interests to control government. In the early 1900s, local government had gained a reputation of corruption, and the "Good Government" movement started to counter this corrupting influence.
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| 600 members of the Good Government Movement in Los Angeles, 1909. |
So, we've heard about bad union bosses from the previous century. How can you trust me, since I'm basically a 'union boss'? And most importantly, how can a union be a steward of 'good government'? That's what Eye On Pioneer is looking to explore. That's exactly why I started this blog.
Framework Of A City
1. There's a group of people that live in a community, and they recognize that it needs to have some sort of government to handle things like infrastructure, parks, records, utilities, planning, zoning, etc.
2. These people elect among themselves certain individuals to be policy makers. These elected residents are the City Council.
3. The City Council, as representatives of the people, create policy, ordinances, and resolutions.
4. A City's staff executes the will of the Council. Aside from an election, the city's staff are the direct conduit between the City Council's directives and the residents themselves.
So, if the City Council wants expanded parks programs, the City staff make it happen. If the City Council wants houses to follow some sort of color scheme for houses, the staff make it happen. The city staff takes the direction from the City Council, and makes their directives happen as best as they can within the restraints of the law.
This is a simplified explanation of how good government works. Government effectively works for the voters, the constituents, who live within its boundaries.
There are of course other vested parties that make up a City. Businesses and city employees themselves are vested members of the community, meaning that their livelihoods are dependent on the success of the City. However, business owners and city employees are not necessarily voting members (unless they also happen to be residents).
What is Bad Government?
If a good government has something to do with it working effectively to serve its constituents, what is a bad government?
A bad government can either be one that is incompetent at serving its constituents, or it can be one that is serving anything other than its constituents. One is unintentional, and the other is intentional.
An intentionally bad government might serve some other stakeholder other than its constituents. For example, what if a City Councilmember in the City of Cerritos takes in a lot of money from the organization representing all the automobile dealerships in Cerritos? Look at that person's voting record, and maybe you'll see that this money is more of an investment than a donation. If they're giving special deals to the dealerships, they're not serving their constituents. They're serving their donors.
My goal as union president is to assure that the employee union serves as a check against corrupting forces, monied interests, and basically anything that doesn't serve Artesia's constituents.
Why Unions Can Be Stewards of Good Government
Economic Analyst Asha Banerjee said, "We know unions promote economic equity and build worker power, helping workers to win increases in pay, better benefits, and safer working conditions, but that's not all union do. Unions also have a powerful effect on lives outside of work."
According to Banerjee and her associates, unions are good for democracy generally, precisely because its members feel like they have ownership over their jobs. By being able to participate in workplace democracy carries out into the population in general.
For example:
- Restrictive voting laws are rare in the 17 states with the highest union density.
- 70 percent of states with the fewest unions have passed at least one voter suppression law between 2011 and 2019
- Unions raise salaries for all workers in society, not just for those in unions. And the more unions there are, the more that salaries increase overall.
- Unions are shown to increase civic engagement, while states with 'right-to-work' legislation have lower voter turnout, and fewer working class candidates serving in state legislatures
- Union members feel like they own a part of their job, rather than simply being cogs in the machine
Examples of Unions Preserving Good Government
My own experiences with my union have proven to me that unions regularly uncover corruption, fight against illegal activities, or help transition incompetence into competence.
In 2019, while helping Nevada state employees organize with AFSCME, one of the prison wardens was busted by AFSCME union members for using prisoners to operate a chop shop. Prior to their unionizing, employees were apparently scared for their jobs about reporting it. After they unionized, they weren't afraid anymore and reported it.
Even in Artesia, the employee union has shown itself to be a strong check against the power of the City's management. In 2021, Local 1520 made several bold and public moves, outing the previous City Manager for several improprieties, including election rigging, of which there is still an ongoing investigation. This all happened because the managers and supervisors decided to unionize, and were appalled at what they viewed as gross violations of Good Government ethics.
It's a similar story to the Nevada chop shop. The managers and supervisors were afraid for their jobs, and were hesitant about reporting the previous City Manager's decadent activities. But after they petitioned to unionize, they realized that if they act in concert with the existing union, the City Manager couldn't do anything. More importantly, we employees could check the City Manager's power.
And while the City is still in recovery mode from the prior years' poor management, I'm happy to say that the City is running much better today because of the employee union's efforts last year, and because of the current leadership of the City's interim management.
A Pledge to Artesians
I guess that was just a long way of saying is that together, we got this. As a union, we will continue to be vocal and proactive, especially if things get out of hand, like how we did last year. Finally, if you want to participate and be engaged in all the civic fun (i.e. volunteerism, political action, etc), hit us up at artesialocal1520@gmail.com.
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