Unions must link to member rights info

Unions have to notify members of their democratic rights under Section 105 of the LMRDA. This requirement has long been honored in the breach, as they say. But we at AUD have had some success enforcing the rule in recent years. We also petitioned the Department of Labor to apply the same rule to federal employee unions which fall under an analogous law, the Civil Service Reform Act (CSRA).

This spring we succeeded: the DOL issued a new rule requiring federal employee unions to notify members of their rights.

The new DOL rule specifically includes the internet:

d) If a labor organization has a Web site, the site must contain a conspicuous link to Union Member Rights and Officer Responsibilities under the Civil Service Reform Act

The next step is to enforce the rule, a task that falls to union members. Still, it is good to see an element of democratic unionism online shored up.

In the recent Longshore workers case, the judge cited the new DOL rule in her decision, saying "we find the DOL's reasoning persuasive" even though the rule was crafted for unions under the CSRA. So, go forth and notify. The DOL link to post is:

Union Member Rights and Officer Responsibilities under the Civil Service Reform Act (http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/olms/CSRAFactSheet.pdf for the pdf version and http:// www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/olms/CSRAFactSheet.htm for the html version)