Does SEIU Need an Ethics Commission or Not?

by Paul Garver

What is more surprising? That SEIU would announce that it was setting up an ethics commisssion led by an outsider, that would consult anticorruption groups including the Association for Union Democracy (AUD) and the Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU)? Or that Herman Benson for the AUD and Ken Paff for TDU would so strongly criticize this overture in their first comments to the media? Both Benson and Paff said that, although they had not been informed beforehand of SEIU’s initiative they would of course be willing to be consulted by the SEIU, but went on to make such ringing denunciations of the SEIU leadership as to make their offers poisoned pills.

Benson said that all the ethics code SEIU needed was already contained in the Ten Commandments, and less flippantly and more to the point that the real issue in SEIU was a bureaucratic system of organization that has created an atmosphere of authoritarianism that “obviously” spawns corruption. The remedy is more union democracy, backed by a public review board capable of overruling decisions of the president and executive board in circumstances in which the democratic rights of union members “could” be endangered.

Paff opined that the national union should have “long ago” known about Tyrone Freeman’s corrupt spending habits in Los Angeles, and acted earlier. Both Paff and Benson also expressed the concern that Pres. Stern was using the corruptions scandals to “give himself cover” for the political effort to suppress internal political opposition led by United Health Care Workers West and its president Sal Rosselli.

Many will agree with these concerns expressed by Benson and Paff, who deserve great credit for their long-standing contributions to building union democracy. But in this case I wonder whether the AUD and TDU are in fact choosing the most effective path to pursue greater union democracy within SEIU. Stern responded to their criticisms by repeating the offer to “seek opinions from a diverse group of people, including those who do not always agree with us, so that we can make the best decisions for our rank-and-file members.” (There is a concept of “guided democracy” lurking in that phrase, but one that reflects how decisions are actually made in large organizations).

What don’t we accept Andy Stern’s offer by express our opinions in an open and constructive way? Let’s do it in the spirit of giving this process a genuine test. As a person who spent 15 years of his life building SEIU, and knowing many others no longer associated with SEIU who do not believe that SEIU has already passed over to the “dark side, I propose that we regard the idea of creating an Ethics Commission for the SEIU as a “half full” and not a “half empty” glass. I will start with a few historical observations from my own experience within SEIU.

1. There has always been tensions within SEIU between rank-and-file members, officers and local and national staff. When these were resolved creatively, the organization grew and prospered. When they were not dealt with properly, locals imploded. Some of the resulting realignments worked well for members, others did not.

2. Within less than a generation, SEIU grew from a small and relatively stagnant collection of building service locals ruled by feudal lords to a large, diverse and dynamic organization. Many of the “feudal lords” were eventually removed from office through trusteeships because of nepotism, corruption and/or general incompetence. Some, not all, of these trusteeships resulted in better and more representative local leadership. Trusteeship also became a tool for merging and amalgamating smaller locals into larger organizations, presumed to be more effective or efficient. (I acted as a Deputy Trustee in this capacity in the late 1980s).

3. Rapid SEIU growth came partially through merging and accreting previously existing organizations, especially in the public sector, bringing their own strengths and weaknesses. Dynamic organizing campaigns in the health sector and Justice for Janitors brought many new members from the most vulnerable groups in society. Some recent membership growth has come from controversial neutrality deals with large service sector employers.

4. This rapid membership growth and organizational restructuring is associated with many internal tensions and problems within SEIU. Local members and officers who were comfortable with more routine styles of representation were alienated and demoralized as decision-making became more bureaucratic and centralized, and resources were shifted to organizing.

5. While organizers and externally hired technical staff have long had influence in SEIU (whether or not they were eventually elected to officer positions), it seems that the process of senior staff influence accelerated in the last decade. (I have no direct experience to draw on here). Precisely because of the rapid growth and organizational reshuffling, even a greatly enlarged cadre of people working for the national union in one capacity or another seems over-stretched (When I joined SEIU in 1974 the national staff was some twoscore in size, and even organizers were formally hired at the local level to break the union formed by the national organizers). There seems to be little doubt that as a result persons of limited talent and character have been promoted rapidly and moved about the country to fill local and regional positions like trusteeships deemed vital to the national leadership.

Based on my understanding of SEIU, serious cases of personal financial corruption such as those alleged in California are still more rare than they were as late as the 1980s. The broom wielded by Andy Stern and others at national level to weed out corrupt and incompetent local leaders was fairly thorough. Such matters can be dealt with through normal channels. The real problems are institutional and structural. Given the history and current practices of SEIU, how can members of SEIU’s administrative cadre (whether formally working out of DC or at the local or state level) be held accountable for their actions? The temptations of organizational power are enormous and intoxicating. This is particularly true when serving a large dynamic organization with a great mission can seem to justify ruthless and self-aggrandizing behavior. This is especially dangerous in a trusteeship setting. After all members’ “democratic rights” have been suspended for the duration. Or following a forced “merger” when the normal rules of elections are suspended.

So I come back to the “terms of reference” for the ethics commission. Rejiggling and re-specifying rules against self-serving financial dealings, nepotism, and other forms of personal corruption is a useful exercise. Making sure the rules apply not only to locals but to national officers and staff is essential. Oversight by independent outsiders instills greater confidence, etc.

But a union’s code of ethics must go beyond this to be useful and credible. Accountability goes over and beyond keeping the union’s treasury out of your own pockets. It must include a responsibility to create an institutional atmosphere in which the differing views of members of such a diverse union as the SEIU can be reflected in its organizational practice.

Which beings me to my final point. I have carefully read the indictment against UHW-W’s leadership which presents the case for trusteeship. This is not a case of financial corruption like the others. There can be differing opinions about the legal correctness of the way that the local leadership tried to protect financial assets it felt essential for defense against the imposition of a trusteeship, but its motivation was transparent and not corrupt. It seems to me just a little too clever for national SEIU to base its case for trusteeship on the very measures the local leadership took to try to defend itself. And I am a bit uncomfortable with Stephen Lerner being one of the auditors appointed to oversee financial transactions, a month after he informed all of us that the national SEIU leadership had absolutely no intention to invoke trusteeship on UHW-W.

I firmly believe that by establishing an ethics commission with broadly conceived “terms of reference,” SEIU could restore its credibility as an agent of reform. For this reason I urge national SEIU leadership to try to reach a political settlement with UHW-W not based on the threat of trusteeship. Conmingling a political step against UHW-W with cleaning up corruption within SEIU will itself corrupt and spoil the credibility of the whole ethics process.

Paul Garver worked as an organizer, field representative and staff director from 1974 to 1989 for SEIU Local 585 in Pittsburgh. He is semi-retired from the International Union of Foodworkers (IUF), where he coordinated global trade union organizing in the food and drink sectors.