In a breakthrough agreement, the Hyatt Regency Maui will be the first employer to partner with the ILWU and provide employee medical and dental benefits through a negotiated Union/Company trust fund. The changeover is scheduled to take place on January 1, 2005. On that date, instead of paying HMSA or Kaiser directly, the Hyatt Maui will put the money into a trust fund. The trust fund will then pay the medical and dental bills or the Kaiser premiums.

That is why the ILWU International and our Longshore Division have emphasized education over the last several years. The 1994 International Convention and the 1997 Longshore Caucus put programs in place that have proven popular and effective, and both the ILWU International Convention and the Longshore Caucus budgeted funds in 2003 to expand them.

HONOLULU—Before Hawaii Local 142 did its training, Alex Torres thought organizing was for professionals. “I always thought it was only the organizing department that does organizing,” said Torres, who works at the Dole Plantation Store on Oahu and helped bring it into Local 142. “Here I learned that it’s about everyone getting involved,” he said.

The 2004 Legislature passed a number of good bills that bring real and substantial benefit to working families. However, a look at the voting records on eight issues supported by the ILWU reveals a big difference in how Republicans and Democrats in the State Legislature look at these worker friendly programs.

The voting record on these eight issues shows a clear difference between Democrats and Republicans on issues important to working people.

Presently, ILWU contracts require each hotel to provide medical and dental plans for qualified full-time and part-time employees and their dependents. This means that each hotel must purchase these plans from HMSA, Kaiser, or one of the other insurance providers.

Recently, a beverage worker at an ILWU hotel on the Big Island was denied a bank after the hotel received a bad credit report on that employee. The hotel said it was corporate policy to run credit checks on all employees applying for jobs which required handling money. Workers who fail the credit check don’t get hired or risk losing their current jobs.