01:00 AM EDT on Wednesday, June 15, 2005

IF THE WRITER of The Journal's June 11 editorial "Spank babysitters' union" had taken the time to read the cover story of the paper's own business section, "Contractors are suing FedEx," your attack on the child-care providers might have had a different tone -- although, given your fundamental anti-union bias, maybe not.

First, providers under this legislation would not be public employees or be entitled to a state pension and other benefits by statute. Second, as far as nursing-home workers' wanting to join the union next: The Journal editorial board's anti-union tirade is a bit late. Nursing-home workers have been part of our union for 25 years. They have taken an active role in trying to improve long-term-care funding and services.

Other workers in our union -- hospital workers and community-based mental-retardation and developmental-disability support staff -- have also regularly advocated for increased funding for the neediest members of our society. These workers are private-sector employees governed by the National Labor Relations Act. The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) local that is leading the organizing of child-care providers, District 1199, does not represent public employees in Rhode Island.

The typical employee-employer relationship of factory or office workers is disappearing fast. This is something you would recognize if your business page focused more on work from the bottom up, as opposed to corporate affairs, scandals and stock prices. It is nearly the exact same set of circumstances described in the article on FedEx workers or "independent contractors" that has caused the child-care providers to seek a legislative solution.

As part of the redesign and reform of welfare, the state created a separate class of workers, who have fewer rights than the hourly-wage workers, who are covered by federal and state labor standards. Since it was necessary and a prerequisite for parents going to work for more child-care slots to be created, the state encouraged providers to take advantage of this, by opening home-based child care. The state then retained control, through regulation, of all aspects of their work life, and, in some instances, their non-working life.

The state requires private-sector employers to pay employees weekly, yet it pays its own workers bi-weekly and, worse still, pays home-child-care providers monthly (if on time). Few, if any, employers would try to regulate the non-work activity of their employees, particularly as it relates to other employment; home-based child-care workers are prohibited by the state from working other jobs within 12 hours of operating their child-care service. There are numerous other examples.

All of these regulations have at their core protecting children in home-based child care. This is a goal that providers share. But by submitting to this level of scrutiny and control, the providers are entitled to a voice in the system.

Our union, SEIU, has made it our mission to reorient the priorities of this nation to reward work. We have undertaken organizing campaigns to improve the lives of low-wage and marginalized workers, regardless of their employment location: public sector, private sector, or a hybrid.

Our members do the work everyone wants done but no one wants to do: home-health-care attendants, nurses, janitors, nursing-home CNAs, public-safety and child-care workers. The current legislation takes a small step to balance the equation for child-care providers, who make an invaluable contribution to working parents and to our state's economy.

If this is "special-interest" legislation to your editorial board, perhaps we agree. The providing of child care is "special" and requires unique solutions. If a group of women -- largely poor, working-class, and previously outside the political mainstream -- can come together and effect change through legislation, our political process is still a lively experiment.

Stan Israel is vice president of District 1199 of the Service Employees International Union.