Kevin Scanlon

One union has already come out swinging against a new plan from former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan to privatize future pension investments.

Last night, former Mayor Richard Riordan told the L.A. Weekly that he was about submit papers to start gathering signatures for a charter amendment that would completely overhaul how pensions are doled out to city employees. (The papers will be submitted Monday morning.)

The SEIU -- which represents about 10,000 city employees -- is already fighting back.

"Contrary to what Richard Riordan says, his pension plan wouldn't save L.A., it would wreck it," union president Bob Schoonover said in a statement. "The plan is wrong-headed, lacks factual support and just plain mean."

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Spike TV

One of the 1,000 Ways to Die.

Former employees and union groups have set up a picket line outside the Burbank headquarters of Original Productions, the company behind the shows 'Deadliest Catch,' 'Ice Road Truckers,' and 'Storage Wars.'

The picket comes after the production company dismissed the entire crew of the show '1,000 Ways to Die' for attempting to unionize last Thursday, Feb. 23.

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Via LA Biz Observed, Steven Greenhouse, labor reporter for The New York Times, writes up the unlikely effort to organize L.A. carwash workers.

Many of the estimated 10,000 workers in the business here are illegal immigrants, who are too scared to speak out or give their bosses any excuse to fire them.

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A Muslim woman who works as a hostess at a Disneyland restaurant filed a federal discrimination complaint Wednesday against her employer: It alleges she was prohibited from wearing her "hijab" head covering at work, a sister blog OC Weekly reports.

Imane Boudlal who has been working at the Grand Californian Hotel's Storytellers Restaurant for more than two years recently wore her head covering and was sent home without pay -- three times, according to our sister publication.

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Though clerical workers at Los Angeles and Long Beach ports went on strike Thursday against several shipping terminals, daily operations were not disturbed, according to the Associated Press.

Only about 30 people from the ports' 900-member Office Clerical Unit of the International Longshore Warehouse Union (ILWU) were picketing after their contract expired at midnight, according to the report.

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Mali Mish via Flickr

Nine hundred clerical workers at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have threatened to strike unless companies make concessions. Though no walkout date has been set, the union voted unanimously on Tuesday night after shipping companies failed to reach an agreement before the July 1 contract expiration date. According to the Long Beach Press-Telegram, the union and a collation of international shipping companies have been meeting in an attempt agree on contract terms since April 19.

According to John Fageaux, president of the Office Clerical Unit of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union's Local 63, workers are looking to prevent employers from outsouring jobs.

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This depressing (or at least recessing) economy has inspired many local and state governments to reconsider the deals they struck with unions representing public workers. In good times, raises, health care and pension benefits were sweet. Now everyone has to watch their wallets.

The New York Times over the weekend noted a backlash among some leaders who were former union supporters, and it mentions Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's recent demand for union concessions as an example of a changing tide when it comes to union support.

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Union members amassed outside Dodger Stadium over the weekend during a game with the Arizona Diamondbacks to protest the Dodgers' use of an Arizona-based spring-training facility.

About 150 people showed up to deliver the message to team management that they're unhappy with Arizona over its passage of a tough new immigration law. They want the team to abandon its Glendale, Arizona spring-training facilities as a statement against the law.

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Medical marijuana workers affiliated with a pot-business school Oaksterdam University, which has a Los Angeles outpost, and employees at several other Bay Area-based cannabis businesses have voted to join the UFCW Local 5. It appears to be a first for California's medical marijuana industry.

The unionization of the workers will be formally announced at a press conference at the Oakland campus of Oaksterdam University Friday afternoon. Union "card-check verifications" have taken place at Oaksterdam's Oakland, L.A. and Sebastopol campuses, and at Oakland's Patient ID Center, Blue Sky Coffee Shop, Bulldog Cafe, Oaksterdam Gift Shop, and AMCD, Inc., according to a statement from the Drug Policy Alliance. Another business, Agri-Med, is in the process of being verified, according tot he DPA.

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Unite Here

A hunger strike outside Disney headquarters in Burbank earlier this year.

A labor union representing hotel workers involved in a bitter dispute with Disney's Anaheim hotels warned organizers of Comic-Con that if they moved the popular summer convention from San Diego to Orange County that it would likely be affected by labor actions.

"If you chose to" move to Anaheim "you could find your future events caught in the middle of a bitter labor dispute that could jeopardize their success," Tom Walsh, president of Unite Here Local 11, wrote to Comic-Con International. Comic-Con has been flirting with the idea of moving the convention because it says it has outgrown its popular San Diego digs.

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CBS2

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power General Manager Austin Beutner announced Wednesday that termination proceedings against two employees caught drinking on the job in a recent CBS2 investigation have begun. The two, who have not been identified, can appeal the decision in a process that will take about two weeks, according to the DWP.

Six workers had been suspended after the report -- which showed at least one employee allegedly drinking and driving and others attending a strip club during work hours -- aired on April 29. The DWP states that its investigation, run by a former Los Angeles Police Department captain, was still ongoing.

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Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Tuesday decried layoffs at the Los Angeles Unified School District because, he argued, they often end up leaving the most vulnerable schools with the newer, less-experienced teachers.

At a press conference scheduled Tuesday afternoon the mayor was expected to "call on the courts, state legislature and the Los Angeles school community to change the teacher layoff system and start putting students first," according to a statement from his office.

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