The Voice

UUP Albany Chapter member Patrick Romain distributes Obama campaign literature to a fellow union member in New Hampshire. Romain was one of hundreds of AFT's affiliate members to campaign in battleground states.

Barack Obama made an indelible mark on American history, riding a wave of profound change as he swept to victory to become the nation’s first African-American president.

Posting what amounted to a lopsided electoral college win, Obama defeated Republican Sen. John McCain Nov. 4 with straightforward promises to reduce taxes for the middle class, create a nationwide health care system, improve education, repair the economy and remove troops from Iraq by early 2010.

Here in New York, President-elect Obama won 62 percent of the popular vote, propelled in part by UUPers and members of its state affiliate, NYSUT, who volunteered to get out the vote by campaigning with the AFT in battleground states and participating in statewide union- sponsored phone banks.

“It was your hard work that helped America make history on Election Day and gave New York Democrats a real opportunity to break the gridlock that has hampered Albany for decades,” said UUP President Phillip Smith. “Dozens of UUPers worked tirelessly to elect Barack Obama and other candidates who have a strong understanding of the importance of education and who support working families and organized labor.”

From education and health care to jobs and the economy, the issues that truly matter to working families are front and center in the upcoming national and state elections.

With Democrats and Republicans pushing their visions of change for the next four years, the candidates who walk away winners will profoundly impact working-family issues for years to come.

That hasn’t gone unnoticed by UUPers, who have stepped up by the dozens to promote pro-education and pro-labor candidates. With so much at stake in the Nov. 4 election, UUPers have joined thousands of AFL-CIO, AFT and NYSUT members in an array of initiatives to get people to the voting booth and to cast their ballots for union-backed candidates.

Activists have been aggressive on SUNY campuses statewide, signing up thousands of new college-aged voters through a get-out-the-vote registration drive sponsored by UUP, NYSUT, the New York State Public Interest Research Group, the SUNY Student Assembly, and Rock the Vote.

Members have urged friends and family to vote, and wore out shoe leather knocking on doors to spread the word about the candidates they support.

Tappen

UUP’s Upstate Medical University Chapter provided its members with an opportunity to size up three candidates running for the 25th Congressional District seat during a candidates’ forum Sept. 16.

More than three dozen UUP members and retirees attended the 75-minute public forum, which featured discussion and debate between Democrat Dan Maffei, Republican Dale Sweetland and Green Populist Party candidate Howie Hawkins. Former Upstate Chapter president Ray Colton moderated the UUP-sponsored event, held at Upstate’s Weiskotten Hall.

Maffei, Sweetland and Hawkins are running to replace U.S. Rep. James Walsh (R-Onondaga), who is retiring after 20 years in Congress.

“It went very well,” Upstate’s Brian Tappen, a UUP delegate, said of the forum. “The candidates discussed issues relating to higher education, health care and women’s rights. Health care was what they primarily talked about.”

On health care, Maffei likened his vision of a health care system to a “public-private partnership,” where the government would provide coverage similar to Medicare for those without health insurance, according to a published report in the Syracuse Post-Standard.

Sweetland expressed doubt that a public health program for coverage for everyone could work. He said such a system would be rife with waste and fraud. Hawkins said he supported a single-payer national program for public health coverage that would be funded via payroll taxes and increasing income taxes on the rich, the paper cited.

Lawmakers understand that a NYSUT endorsement not only means extra bucks in their political coffers, but an all-out effort to get out the vote for candidates who are pro-labor, pro-family and pro-public education.

Such was the case in September, when NYSUT phone banks, informational materials and grassroots campaigns helped to elect 20 of 27 endorsed candidates in primary races for seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and in the New York state Senate and Assembly.

NYSUT Executive Vice President Alan Lubin, who heads up the NYSUT’s legislative efforts, reported that there were a few upsets in the primaries. The most notable was Democrat Alice Kryzan in the 26th U.S. Congressional District, who came from under the radar to defeat both the NYSUT- and AFT-endorsed Jon Powers and millionaire Jack Davis. The NYSUT Board of Directors voted in late September to endorse Kryzan in the Nov. 4 General Election.

UUP has again joined forces with other advocacy organizations to “get out the vote” on SUNY campuses.

Collaborating with the New York State Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG), the SUNY Student Assembly and Rock the Vote, UUP members around the state are taking part in efforts to register students to vote in next month’s general election — regardless of the party chosen.

“Activating first-time voters is the No. 1 goal of the coalition,” said UUP President Phillip Smith. “I’m proud UUP is a part of this grassroots effort.”

The highlight of the campaign is the SUNY Voter Empowerment Challenge, in which each of the state university’s 64 campuses competes to register the most voters, based on percentage of campus enrollment.

A celebratory event will be held on the winning campus.

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Delegates to the 2008 Spring Delegate Assembly, set for May 2-3 at The Desmond in Albany, will elect eight statewide union leaders. Elections will be held for the offices of vice president for academics, vice president for professionals and treasurer, as well as five Executive Board seats.

If the membership ratio of academics to professionals remains the same as the present ratio, of the eight people to be elected, three must be academics and five must be professionals from any chapter type. If the ratio changes, elections will be adjusted accordingly.

In accordance with union policy, candidates running for statewide elective position are entitled to have statements and a photograph printed in The Voice, which is distributed to all bargaining unit members.

Statements longer than 500 words were set in smaller type to ensure fairness for all candidates. The statements are printed as received, with minor editing for consistency of style. The following pages contain the statements and photographs of those union candidates who chose to submit them.