Local 328’s First Annual Report

--guest post by TJ Acena, Local 328 DEI chair—

Before I joined the executive board of our union, I had no idea what the board actually did. As a steward, I thought I knew how our union worked, but representational work is just a small part of it. I was appointed as Local 328’s community liaison in 2019 (this was one of the few seats that no one ran for in the last election) and got a crash course in our leadership structure.

The board can be a puzzling organization. Many of the positions oversee their own budgets and programming, and there is a lot of freedom in how they pursue their individual goals. But the board also has to work as a cohesive unit to make complex decisions about how Local 328 runs. We sign off on letters of agreement with OHSU (such as the COVID LOAs), decide which grievances to send to arbitration, approve new work classifications and much more.  

The longer I was on the board, the more I realized how little I, and many other members, knew about our union’s leadership. So I decided to produce an annual report. I wanted to create a document that was short, concise and gave our represented employees a general idea of what the executive board and its members did during the previous year. 

The board is elected by the membership to make decisions on their behalf and decide how dues dollars are spent. I think our union is stronger when members understand how their leadership is structured and what the board does. This makes members feel more confident voting in elections and, hopefully, running for a board seat in the future. And it helps provide transparency. The Local 328 executive board is not a mysterious organization — it’s a group of your coworkers, elected to serve.

I hope you’ll take some time to read about all the accomplishments our union made last year. If there’s information you’d like to see in future reports let us know in the comments.