Evergreen Reporter

The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Janus v. AFSCME on June 27, 2018, dealt unions a big blow. Less than two years after the decision that said mandatory union dues for public employees was unconstitutional, the state of Washington Public Employees Association has seen a reduction of union dues by 25.2 percent (out of 2,234 state workers represented by the union).

The Freedom Foundation notes that in May 2018, nearly all of the 2212 WPEA-represented employees of state agencies had union dues or fees pulled out of their wages.  That’s one in four employees who did not want the union taking their money.

On the day the Supreme Court decided Janus, the Washington Public Employees Association/UFCW Local 365 president Kent Stanford called the decision an “attack on public employees’ freedom.” 

Since then the organization has used members dues to file litigation against the Freedom Foundation, which is continuing to reach out to union members to make sure they know they don’t have to have those fees deducted from their pay.

The WPEA is also trying to keep members from resigning by putting information in their membership forms that limits the cancelation of dues deductions between 20 and 10 days prior to the annual anniversary of the signing. There is concern that new public employees are asked to sign without being told that they don’t have to join or pay those dues. And that they may have trouble canceling the membership.

The union also cheered House Bill 1575, which they call a “Janus cleanup bill” that puts current practices for signing up union members, union recognition and dues deduction into law.