Michael1942's Blog

For many decades the Springfield Urban League has been a bulwark in the Eastside area of Springfield, Il. Recent events culminating in the termination of 30 plus employees in an attempt to break the back of a legally elected Union. The Union would not have been necessary had the Urban League in the administration of it’s Head Start Programs followed its mission statement! This is a pattern of behavior that has plagued the SUL for the past 20 years at one level or another. The current manifestation has nepotism as a secondary (or primary) cause along with the overall causes of greed and egotism. Upper management has taken the position of “How dare you Unionize” without our permission? This has caused management to seek out out and try to eliminate the strongest elements of the Unionized workers, who incidentally are among the best (long time) workers. The tactic appears to be a delay of
the collective bargaining while diluting the active Union members and causing fear among the not so active members. I have come to believe that the local papers do not think so much of these events as they are not covering it. These actions by SUL (Springfield Urban League) affect all of the Head Start parents and their children (in many cases their Grandparents). The National arms of the Urban League and the Head Start associations do not appear to be concerned about these developments but possibly because they are not aware of them. There was a time years ago when people aspired to work for the Springfield Urban League and it’s Head Start program but now those names have a decidedly bad connotation in this town.