SACRAMENTO-
Fifteen years worth of the fight for workers’ rights is crammed into Bill Camp’s Ford Escape, now that leader of the Sacramento Central Labor Council has been fired.
“Once you start conceding to blackmailers they don’t quit. We know that about them and that’s illustrated here. They lost the vote and then go fire Bill,” Camp told FOX40.
The vote he’s talking about happened August 19, and was a contentious battle to reverse the labor council’s long-time opposition to the strong mayor proposal Kevin Johnson’s been pushing since he was first elected.
The delegates in his AFL-CIO affiliated group who back what some call Johnson’s power grab, lost one vote and then a second per-capita vote.
That’s based on the number of each union’s dues-paying members.
Camp says the pro-strong mayor forces refused to accept that their motion failed given the council’s own voting rules for such a policy change.
“The booklet says on page 29 section ‘g’ or ‘h,’ if you’re gonna encodrse a ballot initiative you have to have a two-thirds vote.”
Shortly after that, Camp was fired.
So how does he think all of this came together and led up to his firing?
“I believe in the president of SEIU 1000 went and met with the mayor about two weeks ago. I don’t know what they said. I don’t know what they did, but it was about two weeks ago on her birthday,” Camp said.
The SEIU president he’s talking about is Yvonne Walker.
Camp claims after that gathering, the mayor was suddenly at a Labor Council meeting brought in by council chairman Leno Pedras.
“What Leno said…Local 1000, SEIU 1000, UFCW Local 8 and Sacramento Area Firefighter Local 522 said to him…. you do what we tell you or we’ll withdraw our dues,” said Camp.
The supposed threat there, that the council couldn’t survive without one third of its almost $700,000 budget brought in by those unions.
Camp’s firing is a fact, but the AFL-CIO has issued a letter stating that it happened without due process and shouldn’t stand.
Camp – a man who had an execution order issued for him in the segregated south because of his commitment to equality – says whatever happens he’ll keep up the fight.
“I believe in the struggle for justice,” he said.
When questioned about Camp’s version of event, a spokesman for SEIU 1000 said the group had ‘no comment’ about this story.
FOX40 reached out to the other unions Camp called out along with the mayor’s office but received no response.
Representatives from the regional AFL-CIO office are slated to attend an August 29th Labor Council meeting and address Camp’s firing.
He’s hopeful he’ll get his job back.
