Announcing the AccessMatters Union
Announcing the AccessMatters Union: Support and Solidarity for Sexual and Reproductive Health Nonprofit Workers
For Immediate Release: Dec. 7, 2020
Philadelphia, PA- The staff of AccessMatters are proud to announce that we are unionizing with The NewsGuild-Communications Workers of America.
AccessMatters is a regional nonprofit with national reach located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As a leader in sexual and reproductive health care delivery and advocacy, AccessMatters works to eliminate disparities in access and care outcomes for communities living at the intersection of poverty, racism (white supremacy), sexism (patriarchy), homophobia and transphobia, and ableism. We, the staff of AccessMatters, have chosen this work because of our personal commitments to social justice and health equity, and we believe that the struggle for justice begins at home — and in the office. We are unionizing in order to improve and equalize working conditions across our office to benefit our employees, management, and clients alike.
We believe that all clients who receive services through AccessMatters deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, and we know that when staff are not treated equitably, our clients are the ones who suffer first. High turnover, low morale, and chronic inequity in pay and benefits are not just problems for our staff -- they directly impact our ability to provide consistent, high-quality, trauma-informed care to the tens of thousands of people throughout Pennsylvania who are served through AccessMatters’ programs. While we look forward to improved working conditions, including higher and more equitable pay, transparency in organizational decision-making, and increased job security, we are most energized by this opportunity to improve the care that we provide to our clients throughout the region and beyond.
Hil O’Connell, a member of the AccessMatters Union (AMU) Organizing Committee (OC) and Senior Research Analyst at AccessMatters said, “as a queer, trans, chronically ill person, I believe wholeheartedly in the disability justice rallying cry: ‘Nothing about us without us!’ The same applies to labor justice! The AMU gives us a guaranteed seat at the table of high-level organizational decision-making—a seat we know we need.”
Andrea McCord, OC member and the Program Manager for Mature Adult Services, added that the AMU allows us to “develop a contract with staff input that helps to address the inequities Black staff face because of racism and anti-Blackness,” inequities that we continue to see in other nonprofit and for-profit organizations across Philadelphia.
We invite you to join in our fight for solidarity and support, for all sexual and reproductive health workers and for our clients! As we await recognition from management, we are asking that our community members show support by signing our open letter to management, emailing AccessMatters management directly, and boosting our social media. Please visit our website to sign the open letter and send an email to management: accessmattersunion.org. You can follow and support our union on Instagram (@accessmattersunion), Twitter (@accessmattersunion), and Facebook (AccessMatters Union).
About the AccessMatters Union
The mission of the AccessMatters Union (AMU) is to build collective power, shared understanding, and a strong sense of community among all staff employed at AccessMatters. By exercising our fundamental right to collectively bargain for a contract, the AMU aims to improve and equalize working conditions across our office to the benefit of employees, management, and clients. The AccessMatters Union is part of The NewsGuild of Greater Philadelphia, TNG-CWA Local 38010. For more information, visit our website (accessmattersunion.org) and social media, or email us at accessmattersunion@gmail.com.
About The NewsGuild-CWA
The NewsGuild’s members include journalists, interpreters and translators, workers at organizations dedicated to fighting for social justice, and the staff of nonprofit organizations. The NewsGuild is a sector of the Communications Workers of America (CWA), which represents 700,000 workers in telecommunications and information technology, the airline industry, health care, public service and education, manufacturing, the nonprofit sector, and other fields.
Contact: Aurora Muñoz, AccessMatters Union Organizing Committee, accessmattersunion@gmail.com
