2012 protest against SB 469 drew the biggest protests by Georgia labor in over a decade.
The minions of ALEC and the Georgia Chamber of Commerce are once again trying double down on "Right to work for less" laws in Georgia by introducing "the son of SB 469" dubbed House Bill 361. If passed, this explicitly anti-union bill will be the first of it's kind by attacking private sector union members right to remain union members, forcing them to rejoin the union every year.
HB 361 will be the pinnacle of a legislative session marked by legislation to begin privatizing metro Atlanta's transit system MARTA and weaken the union that represents it's employees ATU Local 732 and concerted attacks on the overwhelmingly majority Democratic Fulton County's government and County employees in a bold post-redistricting power grab.
One clue that the authors of the bill learned from their defeat last year is the lack of language that restricts picketing. SB 469 contained a clearly unconstitutional ban on some forms of picketing. They did however continue in their quest to increase penalties for "criminal trespass" and "conspiracy to commit" trespass by making the combination of the two a high, aggravated misdemeanor.
What they clearly have forgotten in the fate of the authors and main advocates of SB 469. State Senator Don Balfour was forced to resign from his powerful Rules Committee chairmanship in disgrace after an ethics scandal that is likely to result in his indictment. Senate Majority leader and ALEC Treasurer Chip Rogers was "encouraged" to resign from the Senate after be exposed as a conspiratorial nutcase to take a coincidentally newly created position at Georgia public broadcasting.
The authors of HB 361 should take heed and realize that spotlight is on them now and in the age of flipcams and Youtube that may not be such a good thing.
