Workers at L & M Hospital Take Contract Fight to the Streets

Lawrence & Memorial Hos­pital health­care work­ers in New London have been trying to negotiate a fair contract since their existing contract expired in October, 2025.

Last week they took to the streets for an all-day informational picket in an effort to press the administration to restart contract negotiations. They are demanding fair staff­ing and living wage pay increases.

Despite being understaffed and overworked, the 900 healthcare workers at L&M go above and beyond every day to provide their patients and the community with the best patient care they can.

Extending man­dat­ory on- call schedul­ing for tech­no­lo­gists and para­med­ics is a key issue. Short staffing has led to missed lunch breaks and frequent overtime shifts. Pay increases and better health coverage are also on the table.

AFT Connecticut represents three local unions at Lawrence & Memorial Hospital, now owned by Yale New Haven Health Systems. They include L&M Registered Nurses Local 5049, L&M LPN/Techs Local 5051 and L&M Healthcare Workers Union Local 5123.

Members of Local 5123, talking as they walked, made the case that nurses and members of the other two unions at L&M hospital are underpaid, working conditions are terrible, there’s great turnover leaving more work for the remaining staff, and the hospital requires the workers urgently to come in when it is understaffed.

L&M was unionized at the time it was purchased by Yale Health, which is notoriously anti-union. Contract negotiations are not going well from the union’s point of view. The hospital administration is offering a few cents an hour that wouldn’t even buy a cup of coffee. 

CT AFL-CIO President Ed Hawthorne brought solidarity from organized labor to the information picket.  

Attorney General William Tong drove two hours from his home in Stamford to support these healthcare workers in New London.

Deputy State Senate majority leader Martha Marx told the crowd that she had worked decades as a nurse and well understood what the nurses and other healthcare workers at L&M were going through. In no uncertain terms she offered to help the workers win a good contract. 

Faculty, Students and Community tell Yale: Say No to Trump

 

Cross Campus was filled with a spirited teach-in and rally of faculty, students, staff and alimni at Yale as the academic year began, offering clear demands to the Yale Corporation and Officers to stop negotiating with the Trump administration over admissions and diversity policies, and instead preserve academic rights.

The point was made repeatedly that the actions Yale University takes will impact universities across the country.

The unprecedented “Democratize Yale” coalition of American Association of University Professors, the Yale College Council, the Yale Endowment Justice Collective, and the Stand Up for Yale alimni group joined together with four specific demands.

“Yale is cracking down on student free speech, negotiation with the DOJ over a baseless admissions investigation and refusing to codify academic freedom, all under the governance of an undemocratic Board of Trustees,” said the coalition in a message to new students. “Right now, you don’t have the same rights that generations of Yalies have enjoyed!”

The first demand is Shared Governance to Democratize Yale.

“Yale must eliminate the successor trustee system, reinstate the alumni petition process for the selection of all future trustees, and open voting to all members of the Yale community: students, staff, faculty, and alumni. Trustee meeting agendas must be published online one week prior to each board meeting, minutes must be made publicly available before the next scheduled meeting, and board meetings must be open to the public, livestreamed online, and include time for public comment.”

The second demand is Free Speech and Assembly to Let Students Speak

“Yale must adopt a new free expression policy presuming noninterference with non-violent direct action, including rallies, sit-ins, teach-ins, protests, and demonstrations. There must be neither requirement of prior registration nor administrative approval for such activities. Yale may intervene in expressive activity only to address an imminent safety threat, material obstruction of access, substantial interference with the actual conduct of classes or other essential University functions, or material prevention of another person or group exercising their free speech rights, in accordance with the Woodward Report; any such restriction must be content- and viewpoint-neutral, narrowly tailored to the specific harm, and no more restrictive than necessary. All time, place, and manner restrictions inconsistent with these principles must be repealed.”

The third demand is Academic Freedom

“Yale must codify a legally binding commitment to academic freedom within the faculty handbook, covering all Yale faculty regardless of rank. This must include freedom of research and publication, teaching, participation in internal governance, and public speech as citizens and public intellectuals. The University must clarify that faculty contracts are with Yale University, not individual departments or programs, and protect schools, departments, and programs from closure or defunding without robust and meaningful faculty consultation. Yale must also empower a committee elected by faculty to hear and decide complaints under the academic freedom policy, and it must guarantee faculty participation in all future Handbook revisions through representative faculty bodies.”

The fourth demand is Yale-DOJ Settlement: Don't Cave. Defend Diversity.

“Yale must exit settlement negotiations with the DOJ and publicly commit to defending its admissions policies in court should the need arise, because those policies are lawful and because recruiting an outstandingly well-qualified student body necessarily includes Black and Latine students.”

Prior to the rally New Haven Rising director Rev. Scott Marks issued a similar demand. “It is from our orientation towards partnership that we join many across the region, country, and world in expression our disappointment with the University’s unwillingness to stand up to the Trump administration. Yale is currently negotiating with this administration, and since Yale is a global leader in higher education, its deal may have implications that span far beyond New Haven and Connecticut.”

“The University still has the opportunity to make the right decision,” said Marks. “The right decision is protecting its own autonomy from this federal attack and refusing to negotiate with Trump. The right decision is also to negotiate fair and just deals with campus workers and the New Haven community that begin to address this history and move us collectively forward together toward real partnership.”

A month earlier Mayor Justin Elicker and US Sen Richard Blumenthal along with other elected officials who are Yale alumni delivered the same message to the University, including a warning that if Yale gives in to Trump and no longer serves the public interest their tax exempt status could be in danger.

The Democratize Yale campaign is developing plans for continuing actions aimed at reversing the actions of the Yale Corporation and Board of Trustees.

Danbury and CT Unite Against ICE Terror

This week in Danbury, as families prepared for the special back to school days, the Department of Homeland Security decided to terrorize the community with massive ICE raids. Parents were taken in front of their children, at school buses and child care centers. The entire community was horrified, calling for an end to the terror, an investigation, transparency and help to those being hurt including traumatized children.

Immediately Danbury United for Immigrants coalesced, reached out to allies and city, state and federal elected officials, held a press conference and organized a Day Without Immigrants on September 2. The call was put out to not go to work or school, not shop, and attend a state-wide march and rally at the Danbury Public Library with a goal of organizing over 1,000 supporters. Local businesses declared a “DAY WITHOUT AN IMMIGRANT” and closed their doors to show the power of immigrant communities and those who support them in Connecticut.

The purpose was to offer a powerful, peaceful, collective protest and clearly communicate shared values and refusal to be silent and accept this as “normal”.

Husky 4 Immigrants was among the groups that joined in, saying “Danbury’s immigrant community is essential to the city and to our entire state. When immigrants are targeted and racially profiled, the whole community is harmed. Agents have beat up and tased people, broken windows, and arrested parents in front of their own children. We need to make clear that WE ARE NOT OK with the authoritarian takeover of any Connecticut city. CT stands with Danbury. ICE OUT OF CT! Danbury is a city where all of our neighbors are welcome, whose strength comes from our diversity. We’re coming together to keep Danbury a welcoming city for all! “

At least 65 families in Danbury have been torn apart by ICE’s abduction. On Monday 16 neighbors were abducted, on Tuesday 10 neighbors were abducted, on Wednesday 22 neighbors were abducted, and on Thursday 14 neighbors were abducted — while up to a dozen ICE vehicles patrolled the city each day.

Neighbors were abducted in front of a day care, in a grocery store parking lot, driving to work, in front of their houses, and when dropping off their kids at a school bus stop. On the first day of school as kids and parents were heading out to the bus stop or walking to school, they saw ICE vehicles lying in wait, they saw cars left on the side of the road with lights still blinking as their drivers were violently ripped from their communities.

There were a total of 100 arrests in Connecticut with some in Bridgeport, Hartford, Redding and Stamford.

“Over the last year, there have been mostly targeted arrests,” Tabitha Sookdeo, executive director of Connecticut Students for a Dream, told the Connecticut Mirror on Tuesday. “Yesterday was out of trend with anything observed.”

“If you can sort of imagine how one would design a system intended to terrorize a community — not intended to keep the community safe — you would design what they’re doing in Danbury right now," U.S. Senator Chris Murphy told the media.

Danbury school teachers are members of the Connecticut Education Association. President Kate Diaz responded angrily, “The start of the school year, a time of excitement and possibility for Connecticut students as they return to their teachers, friends, and familiar routines, is instead turning into the worst nightmare in many of our communities.

“Educators have spent their summer preparing to welcome students into classrooms where they can learn and grow. But in these first few days of school, that joyful return is being overshadowed by fear. A surge in ICE detentions, including those involving legal residents, is taking place at school dropoffs, bus stops, and other places where children are left to witness a parent or loved one being taken away. 

“Already the consequences are reaching far beyond the individuals detained. Entire communities are living under a cloud of terror, with families keeping their children home for fear of what may happen on the way to school or back. Children are losing access not only to education but also, critically, to friendships, trusted adults, meals, healthcare, and other supports they receive at their neighborhood schools. Communities are scrambling to provide safe passage to and from school, as well as meals and other essentials. 

“This is not what back-to-school should look like in Connecticut—or anywhere. Our schools should be places of safety, stability, and belonging. Teachers are opening their classroom doors ready to build relationships and help their students thrive. But children cannot be expected to learn when they are anxious that a parent may disappear while they are in class—or when their families are too afraid to send them to school at all.

“With the 2025 expansion of the Trust Act, Connecticut stands as a leader in the fight for human rights, immigrant justice, and schools as safe spaces. Across the country, educators are leading the fight as well. Earlier this year, the National Education Association filed an emergency motion to stop ICE from indiscriminately operating in and around schools. We must continue to reject the cruelty of policies and practices that inflict such trauma on our youngest, our most vulnerable, and the communities they call home.”

Among those who stepped up was SEIU local1973 Congress of Community Colleges, which circulated a message; “Why as a union do we advocate for the undocumented community?”

“When ICE comes to a community, the impact follows students into our classrooms,” they said telling. the story of Edel Hernandez Cervantes, a Danbury resident and CT State Community College student studying to become a physical therapist.

“Edel was getting ready for school when his father called. His uncle had been detained during an ICE operation and, after an encounter in which an agent used a Taser, was taken to the hospital. Instead of being able to focus on classes and his future, Edel spent the day trying to find his uncle, get information from the hospital and locate medical records that might help his family. By 11 p.m., he had barely eaten.

“Edel was born in the United States. His story is an important reminder that immigration enforcement does not affect only the person who is detained. It reaches their children, nieces and nephews, spouses, coworkers—and our students.”

The union explained that “Community college students already balance classes with jobs, caregiving, transportation, finances and countless other responsibilities. Now some are also wondering whether a parent will be there when they get home, whether a family member is safe, whether they should go to work, or what will happen to their family tomorrow.

“Faculty and staff cannot separate students from the lives they bring through our doors. Our students deserve to be able to come to campus focused on learning, building careers and creating better futures, not carrying the fear that their families could be torn apart while they are sitting in class. This is happening in the communities we serve. And that makes it a community college issue, too.”