The conservative Freedom Foundation of Minnesota is reporting that Gov. Mark Dayton is close to calling a vote of child care providers in the state to determine if they want to join a union.
The governor met with opponents of the plan Thursday night, and the foundation, quoting some of those who attended the meeting, says the word is that Dayton “is on the verge of issuing an executive order calling for a vote on the controversial plan.”
The opponents said they are worried that the vote will involve only the 25 percent of providers who care for children who receive public subsidies, but the issues involved could affect all of the state’s 11,000 licensed providers.
Supporters, backed by AFSCME and the SEIU unions, say unionization will provide health care providers with “better access to training, more say on rules and regulations, system improvements for fairness and consistency across the state, access to affordable health care, business services, improving subsidy reimbursement programs, increasing overall professionalism for our field and supporting our ability to provide high quality child care.”
In some other states, governors have issued executive orders recognizing unions as bargaining agents; Dayton has said he won’t do that, but has said he would consider authorizing the vote, the Star Tribune said.
Pardon my cynocism, but why is the governor involved in attempting to unionize small business owners so that they can collectively bargain with the State of Minnesota? What am I missing here, besides the logic?
BTW, Joe: I believe you wanted to say childcare providers, not healthcare, in your fourth paragraph.
Do childcare workers work for the state of MN(Govenor) or do they work for the parents of the children they are caring for?
It appears to be somewhat difficult to invision contract negotiations between all the parents and all the chidcare providers, or does the Governor plan on replacing the parents, in all respects.
I think Governor Dayton might be bought and payed for by some union bosses!