Wisconsin State AFL-CIO Blog

2024 Take Kids Fishing Day

Get ready to kick off the summer with the 2024 union-sponsored Take Kids Fishing Day on Saturday, June 1 and Sunday, June 2.  Free events where children can learn to fish under the guidance of union member volunteers will take place in Beloit, La Crosse and Madison.

View details and RSVP to reserve your spot today.

2024 Take Kids Fishing Day Events

Beloit:  Sunday, June 2, from 9:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. at Riverside Park, Midlawn Shelter, 1160 Riverside Drive Beloit, WI, 53511. RSVP here.

La Crosse:  Saturday, June 1, from 9:00 am to 12:00 p.m. at Chad Erickson Memorial Park,  3601 Park Lane Drive La Crosse, WI, 54601. RSVP here.

Madison:  Saturday, June 1, 9:00 am to 11:30 am, Vilas Park, 1400 Vilas Park Drive, Madison. RSVP here.

This fun-filled community event introduces kids to the joys of fishing while showing the next generation how to safely enjoy and care for Wisconsin’s outdoors.

Take Kids Fishing Day events are free and open to the public. All participants must be accompanied by a parent, guardian or chaperon. After fishing, a union-sponsored picnic-style lunch will be provided.

Take Kids Fishing Day is sponsored by the Southern Building and Construction Trades Council of Wisconsin, the Building and Construction Trades Council of South Central Wisconsin, the Western Wisconsin Building and Construction Trades Council, the Rock County Central Labor Council, the Western Wisconsin AFL-CIO, the South Central Federation of Labor, and the Union Sportsmen Alliance.

It is the hard work and volunteer hours of union members that make this annual family-friendly community event possible.

Investing in America – Microsoft in Racine

President Joe Biden was in Wisconsin this week to announce the establishment of a new Microsoft datacenter in Racine County. The $3.3 billion project is expected to create over 2,000 union construction jobs. When completed, the datacenter is designed to provide training on the adoption and use of AI for a planned 100,000 workers.

Following President Joe Biden’s announcement, UA Local 118 Plumbers and Steamfitters Business Manager Josh Birong hosted National AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler and Microsoft vice chair and President Brad Smith at the UA Local 118 training facility in Sturtevant. The visit showcased how union members and our apprenticeship programs are training the next generation of workers.

The site of the new Microsoft facility in Mount Pleasant is the same area in which Foxconn previously promised to create a manufacturing center that would support 13,000 jobs, a project that never came to fruition. The new datacenter is an example of how the Biden Administration’s commitment to investing in America is paying off for Wisconsin workers.  

This week’s visit by President Biden, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler and Microsoft President Brad Smith highlighted the critical role union apprenticeships and training will play in growing Wisconsin’s 21st century economy.

May Day Solidarity

Every year on May 1, we celebrate International Workers’ Day to commemorate workers securing an eight-hour workday. While Labor Day has become a more prominent holiday in the United States, May Day has deep meaning going back to 1886 after the resistance of Black, white and immigrant workers in Haymarket Square in Chicago.

The labor movement has a lot to celebrate this May Day. Whether it’s autoworkers in Chattanooga, Tennessee, film crews in Hollywood, hotel workers in Las Vegas or baristas at the local coffee shop, workers are standing together in historic ways to improve our jobs, change our lives, and build worker power.

We’re also celebrating the victories that come from having the most pro-union president in U.S. history. The Biden administration has shown a historic commitment to creating good union jobs in the clean energy economy and protecting the rights of all workers, regardless of immigration status. Just this past week, the Biden administration restored and extended overtime eligibility protections for millions of workers, banned noncompete agreements that trap workers into bad jobs, and required retirement advisers to put their customers’ interests first.

The president is on our side—and America’s people are on our side.

But we still have work to do this May Day.

Around the world, workers’ lives, livelihoods and rights are under attack. Climate disasters and conflicts are displacing more and more people from their homes, and are increasing risks for workers.

Temporary protected status (TPS) is a key tool to support our fight for worker justice at home and abroad. New and renewed TPS status for all unsafe countries will bolster our efforts to build worker power and hold employers accountable for egregious violations of our labor and employment laws.

Despite increasing evidence of our nation’s reliance on immigrant workers to help fuel our economy, despicable efforts to villainize and dehumanize immigrants continue to escalate. Working people know better than to fall for those divide-and-conquer tactics.

Immigrants aren’t blocking us from having good jobs—greedy and abusive bosses are. And the only way we win the good jobs workers expect and deserve is through unity.

Click here to sign our petition calling on Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to protect immigrant workers who come from countries destabilized by climate disasters or conflict, and continue to expand TPS designations for all eligible countries.

Globally, we are part of a shared worker struggle. To push back against the forces seeking to exploit our land and our labor, we must stand united across borders.

On May Day, we renew our call for worker justice, climate justice and migrant justice—all of which are deeply connected.

Sign the Card! Thank you, Governor Evers

Sign the thank you card to Governor Tony Evers for vetoing Senate Bill 436 to protect children and stop the rollback of child labor law in Wisconsin.

Click here to say thank you to Governor Evers for using his veto pen to protect a parent’s right to sign off on their child’s work permits, ensure that our child labor enforcement system will continue to protect young teens at work, and stop the roll back of child labor laws in Wisconsin.

Wisconsin’s child labor permit process:

• Gives parents the necessary information about the work that their 14- and 15-year-old child may undertake as well as the right to set necessary priorities for and ensure the safety of their children.
• Provides the Department of Workforce Development (DWD) enforcement office with critical information such as how many 14- and 15-year-olds are working, where they are working, what job tasks they are performing, and the hours of work. All of this data is essential to ensuring that DWD’s limited child labor enforcement funds are targeted to where kids are actually working.
• Through a small $10 fee per permit, reimbursed by the employer, the permit process gives the DWD the funding for child labor enforcement.

Wisconsin developed a child labor permit system to ensure that employers could not take advantage of children. Wisconsin’s child work permit process has evolved over the years; gone are the days of a piece paper shuttled between school, home, and to the job. Now, parents and guardians create an account on the State Department of Workforce Development website and enter in the details of the job – such as days, hours, the type of work expected, as well as their child’s school – and then approve the employment digitally.

This latest attempt at rolling back child labor protections in Wisconsin comes at a time when child labor violations are on the rise across the country and more kids are working in Wisconsin.

At least 29 states have introduced or passed bills to weaken child labor protections since 2021. Since 2011, Wisconsin Republican politicians have attempted and sometimes succeeded in weakening or rolling back our child labor laws. In 2017, former Governor Scott Walker and the Republican-led Legislature abolished the right of parents to sign off on work for their 16- and 17-year-old children. Last session, Republican legislators attempted to pass a bill to expand the work hours kids could work into the night. Fortunately, Governor Tony Evers vetoed that bill (SB 332) in 2022 and it did not become law.

Time and time again, Governor Tony Evers has used his veto pen to stop the rollback of child labor law in Wisconsin.

In this 2023-24 legislative session, State Sen. Cory Tomczyk (R-Mosinee) and Rep. Clint Moses (R- Menomonie) introduced Senate Bill 436 to abolish child labor work permits for 14- and 15-year-old children and completely eliminated a parent’s right to sign off on work for their child. Less than one month after the bill was introduced, the Republican-led State Senate overwhelming passed the bill, with all Democrats voting in opposition. The bill then passed the Assembly on February 13, 2024, with all Republicans voting for passage and Democrats voting to oppose the bill.

Governor Tony Evers formally issued his veto of Senate Bill 436 at the Wisconsin State Council of Machinists (IAM) District 10 2024 Spring Conference in Madison.

Sign our thank you card. Together, let’s thank Governor Tony Evers for vetoing SB 436 to stop the roll back of child labor law. By vetoing SB 436, Governor Evers preserved the rights of parents to sign off on their 14- and 15-year-old child’s work permit, ensured that DWD has a strong child labor enforcement system, and protected all of Wisconsin’s children.