To Dave Mott - Hello from an old WV comrade

Perez recieved this letter to Dave Mott via email...

Hi Dave,

I was an organizer at West Virginia AFSCME when you were an organizer with 1199. As a green, twenty something year old organizer I was really awed by the work that you and Tom Woodruff did, and often found myself wishing that AFSCME's leadership was as committed as you guys were to building power for workers in West Virginia.

In 2005 I joined the staff of SEIU Local 775. I joined the staff at SEIU for two reasons. One because of the commitment that SEIU had made to growing the labor movement, and two because of the respect that I had always had for the work that was done by 1199 in West Virginia. 775 sent me to the WAVE training that year and I got to see you again. At the time, it was really meaningful to me to have the opportunity to attend the training program that you directed.

Six months later, I joined the staff at SEIU Local 1199NW and stayed there until shortly after the Union Disunity article ran in the SF Weekly. I was so appalled by what I read that I literally cried. I couldn't believe that SEIU (and my former local, 775) would sell out their own members in shameless sweetheart deals. Even more disturbing was the fact that SEIU was willing to declare open season on fragile and helpless elders by discouraging reporting of staff shortages and then promising to lobby for tort reform on behalf of the nursing home industry.

In March of last year, I joined the staff at CNA. Rob McCauley, who you might remember was the lobbyist for West Virginia AFSCME, moved to California a few months later to take a job as a regional political organizer with UHW 250. Rob and I frequently talked about what was going on inside SEIU and wondered where you and Tom stood. Rob always maintained that that you and Tom were probably on the right side of the struggle. I didn't believe that was true. I didn't make sense to me that you would still choose to be employed with SEIU if you were on the right side of this fight.

Tonight I saw the video and blog on PerezStern titled New Song from Dave Mott which confirmed that I was right. I can't say that I was surprised, but I am saddened. You had tremendous talent. It's a shame that you apparently no longer have a soul.

It's funny, in a creepy sort of way, but your work still inspires me. Only now, the commitment is to do anything I can to end the nightmare that SEIU has become. Your members deserved better than this from you Dave.

Lisa Harlow