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Category: Editorials Editorials
Published: 21 February 2014 21 February 2014
It was reported in the Grant County Beat’s report on the February 18 municipal candidates forum that District 2 town councilor candidate Rebecca Spann answered as follows to the question, "What is your position on the right to organize and have bargaining rights?":
 
"I think private employees should have the right to unionize," Spann said. "I was a card-carrying member of the Communications Workers.  But I do not think public employees should have the right to strike."
 
That’s not how I recalled Ms. Spann’s answer, so I went to the CATS studio today and purchased a copy of the video recording to confirm exactly what she said.
 
First, the written question was (I am the person who submitted it):
 
“A key purpose of New Mexico’s Public Employee Bargaining Act is to guarantee public employees the right to organize and bargain collectively with their employers. What is your position with respect to this right of public employees to organize and bargain collectively with their employers?”
 
In response, Ms. Spann did say that she thought private employees should have the right to unionize and that public employees should not be able to go on strike, but her exact quote about the right of public employees to organize and bargain collectively with their employer was:
 
“I got my Gold Card from the Communications Workers of America and having that experience I do not believe that public employees should have the right to be union.” (And when you listen to the CATS recording, Ms. Spann emphasized the word "not".)
 
The question then becomes for me, and I suspect for the union-represented Town of Silver City public employees, should Ms. Spann get elected as a town councilor, how will her beliefs that public employees should not have the right to be union play out during the collective bargaining negotiations between the Town and their union-represented public employees?
 
Walter “Ski” Szymanski
Silver City