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After over 28 years of dedicated service, community and union activist Lee Henderson will say good-bye to her job as an Economic Support Specialist for Milwaukee County this month.
Not to worry – you won’t find Henderson fanning herself and sipping lemonade under a shade tree. As anyone who knows Henderson will tell you – that’s not her style. As a retiree, Henderson is more likely to be under that shade tree shaking the leaves free of their branches. Henderson’s plan is to stir up the retirement community by convincing retirees to become more involved with the political process. “I called my Aunt who is a former retiree of the County and said to her, enough of the leisure, just because you’ve put 30 years in County Government, that’s not the end of it,” she said. “People don’t need outside entities like the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel or Citizens for Responsible Government telling them they should be mad about something. People need to be educated on how the government functions so they can make informed decisions,” Henderson said. She’s already organized a small group of retired friends (including her Aunt) who are interested in organizing such a group. “What I plan to do is get the agenda for different committees, learn what’s important, and then I’m going to take these people to these committee meetings,” Henderson said. One example of the type of issue she would like to see the group involved in is economic development, such as the Park East expansion and what it could mean to the community economically. Henderson would like to see businesses come into the area and hire people from within the community. She would also like to be part of the discussion about attracting affordable housing to the area. “If people start attending these meetings and listening to the discussion and how Labor wants to make sure that there are living wage jobs attached to this project, and accountability, we’d have more support from the public and people would understand that it’s not just a Union issue, it’s a people issue – period.” Local government’s attempts at privatization are also a concern of Henderson. “Public Service employees are the ones who do it best because that is where the checks and balances are,” she said. “If you have a complaint it is the Public Employees who are directly connected to the political power and will be held accountable for that complaint. With a Private Company, you call them and they tell you to jump in a lake because they know they already have the contract and they don’t care.” When the County hired Henderson in 1974 she worked as a Nursing Assistant in the Cardio Thoracic Unit. She was a member of Local 1055, but was working towards earning a degree in Retail Management/Fashion Merchandising from UWM. Henderson was an aspiring artist with a passion for sewing and design. She earned her degree, but her talents had to be placed on the back burner once she became active in the union in 1985. In college, Henderson had taken several Economics courses covering Labor Studies; then one day her instructor showed the class a documentary that still resonates with her today. The film chronicled the 1930’s plight of the New York Ladies Garment Workers Union. She doesn’t remember the documentary’s title, but she does remember that an elderly African American and Jewish female told the story as they remembered it. “I saw how the companies owned all the homes that workers lived in and when the people went on strike, they put them out of their homes. It crossed all racial lines and showed how the people really stuck together.” The film peaked Henderson’s curiosity and prompted her to go to her first Local 1055 Union meeting that year. “I figured I was paying union dues and I didn’t even know what my Union was doing,” she said. Rosemarie McDowell was the Chief Steward of the Local at that time and eventually talked Lee into becoming a line steward. Henderson fondly remembers the many lessons she learned from McDowell. One of the most important lessons McDowell passed on to her was to read and understand her contract. Once Henderson called McDowell to ask her advise about a grievance she needed to write. McDowell asked her, “Why are you always coming to me to ask if somebody can do something when you have your bible right there? That’s why the Local paid for you to have a contract book so you can learn what your rights are on your own and stop depending on someone else to tell you what they are.” “Rose has always been true to her commitment to Labor,” said Henderson. Once in the mid 1980’s Henderson received a huge packet of information through inter office mail. Overwhelmed by the size, she called McDowell and asked her, “What the hell am I supposed to do with this?” “Read it,” McDowell replied. “I thought she must be out of her damned mind,” Henderson laughs. She reluctantly read the material and learned about the privatization battles being fought by waste management workers in New York and New Jersey. “This is the same battle we’re fighting today,” she said. “I learned if you don’t monitor this stuff it will sneak up on you.” Henderson became a member of Local 594 in 1989 when she was hired as an Economic Support Specialist for the County. This was a position that put her at the heart of people’s ability to sustain themselves because it became her responsibility to help determine eligibility for medical aid and food stamps for families in need of assistance. The new job helped to fuel her interest in the political process. She served as Chief Steward of Local 594 for nearly five years and was elected President of the Local in 1999. She has also served as a member of District Council 48’s Executive Board and numerous committees and organizations.
Henderson said her Union activism has been rewarding. She has seen the power that organized Labor can possess on the National and Local levels. As a Local 594 delegate at the AFSCME International Conventions, she has seen City Government’s bow to the pressure of throngs of Union conventioneers, backed by millions of dollars, demanding rights of workers being infringed upon. She has also been inspired by speakers such as Bill Clinton and Jesse Jackson to continue fighting for people’s rights. She was also pleasantly surprised by the actions of County Executive Scott Walker. Henderson recalls the day Walker came to interview before the AFSCME PEOPLE Committee while running for the County Executive office. “He said he didn’t expect AFSCME to support him, but he came to the interview to let us know that he was willing to work with us even though he knew he would not be our chosen candidate,” she said. She credits Walker for taking a leadership role and offering an olive branch to the Labor community. “He is opening up the door of opportunity for Labor to actually play a big role in the decision making process of how we’re going to continue as a government entity and provide the necessary services to our community. Henderson is a firm believer that if you do not learn from history’s past mistakes, you’re bound to repeat them. She encourages Union members to find the wealth within their social circles to get Labor’s message across. She also practices what she preaches. Recently, Henderson participated in Milwaukee’s Labor Council’s Labor in the Pulpit Program. She used a book called Labor's Untold Story by Richard O. Boyer and Herbert M Morais, and related it to scripture. “I didn’t want to make it boring so I knew I had to put scripture and actual history into it so people could really see where things came from and it’s importance,” she said. Henderson explained to the congregation that the Labor movement in the United States had strong roots to the Civil War. “We had a group of organized Labor entities in the North that were really struggling because of the free labor that was happening in the South. The thought was, if the South would free up the folks on the plantations, the North would be better able to organize the workers and compete – because they couldn’t compete with free labor.” She related that story to a passage in scripture that tells masters to treat their slaves or servants properly and then they will receive all their riches. “I try to get people to understand that when you’re working for an entity, they are your master in the sense that they are the ones who lay out what type of work you should do and how you’re going to get paid for doing it,” she said. She went on to relate recent corporate scandals as an example of a greedy master who is not “right”, and expounded on the consequences that eventually evolve out of that. “If people would take the time to read about the Molly Maguires, A. Phillip Randolf, the Coal Minors and Ladies Garment Workers Unions, they would be more motivated in what they’re doing today because people don’t understand that people lost their lives for them to have the freedom that they have right now – and that’s the voice in the workplace.” When asked if she had thought of a name for the group of retirees she and her friends are organizing, Henderson replied. “The name isn’t important right now. We’re just citizens doing what we should have been doing all along”. |
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