Labor Day has meant different things to me as I’ve gone through life.

When I was a kid, Labor Day meant the end of summer. It might not have been the calendar end of summer but it was the very last free weekday before school started. For a kid, that meant the end of summer.

I never learned the history behind Labor Day until after I graduated from college. For that matter, I was never told that the Labor in Labor Day meant the people who actually did the work for companies.

Sad, really, I was taught about the history and reason for President’s Day, Columbus Day, Veteran’s Day, Memorial Day, even Mother’s Day, but no one, not even my history teachers in high school bothered to teach me about Labor Day.

Now I’m a teacher but I no longer teach students. Instead I work with teachers to help them teach all their students. When I did teach my own class I did teach my students that Labor Day was a day to honor all those people who work for a living. I taught elementary students with learning disabilities. The history of Labor Day should be taught in high school. My students only needed to know what the holiday celebrated.

So what am I doing to celebrate Labor and those who work to make corporations, schools, etc successful? I’m taking an on-line course (two actually). If it’s not raining this evening, I’ll be putting new numbers up on my house.

As a union member and now knowing the history behind the holiday, I feel like I should be doing something more. But I also feel that the holiday doesn’t mean much any more. At least not in the way of celebrating Labor and what Labor has done for this country. No, I don’t mean the unions, by the way. I mean the workers. The people who do the Labor that keeps this country going.

If it weren’t a federal holiday most people wouldn’t have today off. Many people don’t have today off even though it is a federal holiday. The country has gone too far to the side of what is best for the corporations, forgetting the people who helped the corporations succeed. Just look at the economy. Corporate profits are up but wages haven’t increased in line with corporate profits. Plus what labor can buy with their wages has diminished due to increases in costs for just about everything (gas, medicine, housing, food, etc).

The following two cartoons illustrate the current situation well.

Personally, I don’t want to live in a condo. The idea that I’m at the mercy of the management company and the board isn’t something I think I could happily endure. Not from what I’ve heard from friends.

One friend wanted to withhold fees to the management group over repairs that had never been made on her unit. She couldn’t, though, without fear of losing her home. Why? The management group has the right to evict people over non-payment of fees. So even if you’re paying your mortgage you could still lose your home.

In south Florida, one particular management company has been making life difficult for their workers and for the people who live in their condos. That company is Continental Group.

For the workers, Continental Group pays very poorly. Not even a livable wage. Their pay is even worse when you consider that they do not give their workers health benefits.

When workers try to unionize, Continental Group fires them or moves them to other locations.

A group called CleanCondos has been created by SEIU Local 11 to

…give a voice to both condo residents and workers seeking to make Miami Beach condominium communities a better place to live and a better place to work through legislation.

I was sent this “flash” cartoon and asked to share this with my readers. If you read my post consistently you know that I was surprised that someone sent me something to share with my readers. I won’t say it had never happened before, but all the other occasions were from people who left comments in response to something I wrote. This was sent to me without being connected to something I wrote. I threw me for a bit.

Now, if you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you should know that I check things out. I don’t willy nilly believe anything someone sends me. I’ll admit it, I’m a suspicious person.

So I watched the “flash” cartoon and did some searching to see if I could find news stories that would back the information up. I did find them, mostly in the Miami Herald. I also found some that mentioned problems with condo residents and their management companies in other papers. Posting the links to all of them would be redundant.

The flash cartoon is funny. It also gives you a quick education on the situation with Continental Group.

You can see the cartoon at Screwthiscondo.org. To learn more about CleanCondos go to CleanCondos.org.

I recommend that everyone check both sites out.

I didn’t do it the way I wanted. I had wanted to do it in person but I didn’t want to talk to the president alone. I was hoping to get the president and the executive director. The president would have brought up the election and that had nothing to do with my decision so I didn’t feel like going there.

Instead of talking to him in person I sent him an e-mail. I copied it to the executive director. I guess I’ll find out his response tomorrow.

It was soooo hot! I realize they schedule these so that the candidates can mingle before the primary but August in Central Florida is miserable. The coming hurricane is too far away to effect the weather yet and the tropical depression is too far away as well.

These things are attended predominately by Republicans. To paraphrase someone near me when they announced the results of the straw poll, “it’s not my crowd.” So why did I go? Well, I kinda have to. You see I’m the chair of the PAC committee for the teacher’s union. I had to go as the chair AND I went to show support and to talk to the people we’ve endorsed. Particularly our school board candidates.

I’m also glad it’s over now. I’m begining to get a major headache. Charley’s coming.

We’ll see.