A recap of the NUHW’s 2016 Leadership Conference
California Pacific Medical Center
Nearly 300 stewards from throughout California gathered in Oakland in October for NUHW’s fourth annual Leadership Conference.
We reviewed our progress over the past year, including winning 23 contracts 11 union elections, (see the 2016 highlight video here) and set goals for the coming year. We discussed the importance of organizing new members into our union (see the organizing video here). And we debated and voted to adopt a resolution outlining our organizing goals for 2017.
See photos from the Leadership Conference here.
Members took part in a plenary session and participated in eight workshops during the day, from steward trainings to strategic organizing sessions.
On Sunday we gathered again to discuss our resolution. Stewards discussed it in groups and reported back to the assembly to suggest further refinements for the resolution, after which the it was unanimously adopted.
We also took the opportunity to honor and express our gratitude to a number of people who were instrumental in NUHW’s success since its inception in 2009. We honored former staff and volunteers who donated their energy and time — sometimes at great personal expense — to our union in its early days, and those who worked for us in the years that followed.
We also gave our NUHW Solidarity Award to a dozen individuals without whom our union could not have won: John Burton, Clint Reilly, Rick Jacobs, Gary Allen, Ellen David Friedman, Steve Early, Cal Winslow, Dolores Huerta, Howard Levine, Mike Casey, John Wilhelm, Mark Dimondstein, and CNA nurses Karen McNair and Kerry Sweeney.
We also had visits from two candidates for California governor, John Chiang (currently state treasurer) and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.