News

In Memoriam: Lawrence “Larry” Amendola, 1934-2024

Council 4 mourns the loss of Lawrence “Larry” Amendola, former President and founding member of AFSCME Local 3144, New Haven Management and Professional Employees.

State Employees’ Reopener, Recruitment and Retention Agreement Overwhelmingly Passes General Assembly

State Employees’ Reopener, Recruitment and Retention Agreement Overwhelmingly Passes General Assembly

Agreement supports protection and expan

State Employees' Reopener, Recruitment and Retention Agreement Approved by Appropriations Committee

State Employees' Reopener, Recruitment and Retention Agreement Approved by Appropriations Committee

Agreement will continue efforts to protect and expand our communitie

We Carry on Dr. King’s Fight

MLK Memorial 2019 I AM | Be The Change | AFSCME Video

Fifty-one years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. traveled to Memphis to help rally the community around 1,300 AFSCME sanitation workers who had gone on strike.

AFSCME Members Power The Bethel Public Library

The way in which a public library benefits its community is always worth celebrating, especially on National Library Workers Day, which falls on April 9, 2019.

In Bethel, the 14 members of Local 1303-481 of Council 4, representing full- and part-time staff at the Bethel Public Library, appreciate the civic importance of their institution.

“We are the central gathering place for our community,” Library Assistant and Union President Linda Kral said.

To Close the Gender Pay Gap, First a Voice on the Job

In the 1980s, I was living and going to school in Minnesota when women who worked for state government won a big victory. They got the state to increase the pay of women in “female dominated jobs” by passing a pay equity bill. In other words, they put a dent in the gender pay gap. As a student, I researched and wrote about the process of crafting, passing and implementing that legislation. And I learned something that I have never forgotten: the union made it happen. And not just any union. Our union: AFSCME. 

The Numbers Are In: AFSCME Members Are Sticking with Their Union

Our union gained more than 9,000 dues-paying members and nearly 19,000 dues-paying retirees in the last year, suggesting that billionaires and corporations are failing in their effort to “defund and defang” public service unions.

Training Our Members To Be Union Advocates

Training union members to be strong advocates for their co-workers and defenders of their contractual rights and freedoms is a critical part of the AFSCME mission.

“Our union is only as strong as our activist core,” said Council 4 Education Coordinator Joe Aresimowicz. “That’s why we’re dedicated to providing training that meets the needs of our union members.”

Judicial Members: Standing For Justice, Fighting Outsourcing

“Integrity does matter.”

That’s the message AFSCME-represented court recording monitors are delivering to the public and to lawmakers as they press the fight to stop their employer, the Connecticut Judicial Branch, from outsourcing their transcription work to a private company.

State Public Defenders Got Their Union. Now They Have a Contract.

Two years after forming a union through AFSCME to gain a voice in their workplace, Connecticut’s public defenders now have a collective bargaining agreement to cap their organizing efforts.

Council 4 Officer Election Results

The election of Council 4 AFSCME officers took place on March 15, 2019 at our union headquarters in New Britain, CT.

The results are as follows:

Executive Director
Jody Barr, 17,725 votes
Charles DellaRocco, 3,735

President
Bernie Bombardier, 17,544 votes
Ian Shackleton, 3,169 votes

Judicial Vice President Seat
Dana Beecham-Brown, 17,120 votes
Sotonye Otunba-Payne, 2,625 votes
Charles Marino, 983 votes