We’ve all seen the story time and time again of the kid picked on by the neighborhood bully who, after taking a self-defense class, fights back and wins.

With the biggest neighborhood bully of all sitting in the White House, SEIU Local 721 is putting together self-defense classes of our own for workers. One kind is the all-day Unity Summit we’re organizing for July 22nd at Saint Sophia Cathedral in Central L.A. Another is our union’s Representational Excellence Program. What the Representational Excellence Program does is ensure that member leaders and stewards have a working knowledge of members’ union and contractual rights and know how to work seamlessly with worksite organizers, Member Connection organizers, and other union staff to protect them.

It’s clear that, under the Trump administration, we can’t depend on the Department of Labor to watch out for workers and protect them from abusive employers. This month, Labor Secretary Alex Acosta took the first steps to dismantle new overtime pay guarantees that will affect millions of workers. In this environment, it’s critical that stewards understand basic contract language and how to enforce it, standard procedures for discipline and grievances and group issues and key union rights under state and federal law.

This is a key reason SEIU 721 has worked hard to ensure that all workers covered under contracts bargained by our local understand the protections and privileges provided by full membership in our union. Two key examples are Weingarten and Skelly rights.

Named after the 1975 Supreme Court case that upheld the National Labor Relations Board decision that created them, Weingarten rights say employees have a right to union representation at investigatory interviews. The court also ruled the employer must either delay questioning until a union representative arrives and the representative has a chance to consult privately with the employee or end the interview.

Skelly rights, named after the 1975 California Supreme Court case Skelly v. State Personnel Board that upheld them, guarantee public employees in California the right to due process in disciplinary hearings that could result in the loss of a job or a suspension. The Skelly decision and other California case law requires employers to notify an employee about a pending disciplinary action, provide a copy of the charges and supporting materials on which the action is based and give the employee the opportunity to respond orally or in writing to the charges.

The Representational Excellence program also teaches stewards how to resolve everything from minor workplace grievances to major contract violations. Understanding our rights under our contracts and knowing how to use the resources of our union to enforce them — our attorneys, advocates, communicators, etc. – can make a huge difference in the lives of our members. Like Kenneth Milton, a Ventura County General Services worker who took on the tile-laying job of an injured co-worker in addition to his own and won six weeks of back pay after he advocated with the help of our union. Or the Children’s Social Workers at the L.A. County Department of Children and Family Services who received retroactive raises after members discovered a computer glitch had improperly delayed scheduled promotions.

Providing excellent representation to our members takes preparation and a focus on the nuts and bolts of contracts and labor law. It isn’t as flashy as a huge street action, but it makes a difference in the lives of our members. Now that the biggest bully of all is living in the White House, workers need to know how to defend themselves.

Bob Schoonover, President