In San Jose the 26,000-member United Food and Commercial Workers Local 5 has signed up a new classification of workers with a eye toward more. This is a major step for the unions and may well help push the Ca. legalization ballot measure farther into the realm of acceptable Green Jobs.
"Union bud tender," said Carl Anderson, executive director of AMCD, an Oakland nonprofit medical cannabis dispensary that is going through the city's permitting process. The dispensary has 15 freshly minted union employees as it readies for an expected opening in December. "With full union health benefits and a pension," Anderson said. San Jose union begins organizing pot workers
While many police in Ca. are continuing to waste their time and money making life miserable for Medical Marijuana Users and Dispensaries I can envision a time when the Policemens Unions make a call to their members to support their fellow union brothers and sisters. Could this be the only way to force law enforcement to back off ? The article did not mention this thought but it did talk about making the growing marijuana industry more respectable.
"It does help further legitimize the notion of legalizing and taxing cannabis," said Ken Jacobs, chair of the UC Berkeley Labor Center, which conducts research and education on labor issues.
"Local 5 is a very large and highly respected union. This reflects a change about attitudes about cannabis in this state - and the recognition of the economic realities that California is facing," Jacobs said.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/...
As a cardholding mmj patient who is still forced to drive over a hundred miles to the nearest dispenary I see this as a way to make the small town I live in accept the fact that their overly controlling ban on any dispenary near by is useless, not to mention they could use the tax moneys.
Unions and Progressives have been working together for years and this is another reason why we have such a fruitful relationship. Hail Local 5 !