After enactment of state budget, Council 31 Executive Director Roberta Lynch sent a letter to Gov. Rauner calling on him “to immediately direct your agencies to prepare vouchers for the full amount of back wages owed to employees both active and retired.”

HB 4290, the bill providing funding for wages owed to state employees since 2011, passed out of the Illinois House of Representatives with a veto-proof majority on May 24 and out of the Senate with unanimous support on May 30.

More than 1,000 state employee AFSCME members flooded the state Capitol, pressing legislators to pay state government’s oldest unpaid bill for back wages owed since July 2011.

Once again Bruce Rauner is doing everything possible to circumvent state law and block state employees from being paid what they are owed. AFSCME will continue to do battle in every available legal venue to compel fair treatment for employees.

On May 25, Senate Bill 3075—workplace safety legislation—passed the Illinois House by a vote of 105-0-0. It passed the Senate on April 23 by a vote of 45-0-0. The bill now returns to the Senate for concurrence.

“Illinois needs a leader like JB who will bring people together and who cares about working families,” AFSCME Council 31 Executive Director Roberta Lynch said.

On April 2-4, AFSCME, COGIC, and civil, human and workers’ rights leaders gathered in Memphis for a series of events to honor Dr. Martin Luther King’s legacy and the courage and sacrifice of Memphis sanitation workers who went on strike in 1968.

AFSCME has won another round in the battle for payment of step increases that Gov. Rauner has illegally frozen since July 1, 2015.

In the March 20 Illinois Primary Election, voters chose candidates best able to carry forward the fight in defense of workers’ rights in the November General Election. Union members made a big difference in these critical races!

A sergeant at Pontiac Correctional Center, a member of AFSCME Local 494, was attacked on Feb. 21 in what appears to be a coordinated assault by inmates in an administrative detention cell house.