A Maryland state economic development Web site was touting the state’s low union membership rates in a bid to lure businesses, until pro-labor bloggers started hammering the practice.
Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development chief David Edgerley axed state-sponsored online promotional material that has for many years downplayed organized labor’s strength and presence in Maryland.
The “Choose Maryland” site said Maryland has a “quality workforce … key to achieving corporate goals” and pointed out that private-sector union membership in Maryland is below the national average and that between 1990 and 2001, unions won representation rights for only 1 percent of the total new firms.
Bloggers from Free State Politics were the first to red-flag the material, but soon other popular Maryland politics discussion sites, including Maryland Politics Watch, entered the fray and called on the state to remove the page.
“Outraged e-mails are flying across the state’s entire labor movement,” Maryland Politics Watch’s Adam Pagnucco wrote. “We cannot believe that rhetoric typical of Georgia and Oklahoma would be sanctioned at any level inside the [Gov. Martin] O’Malley administration.”
Officials with DBED say the page’s existence predates their instatement, likely originating during former Democratic Gov. Parris Glendening’s administration between 1995 and 2003, when the state was intensely competing with “Right to Work” states for manufacturing jobs. They acknowledged, however, that staff researchers had occasionally updated data on the pageduring O’Malley’s tenure.
Eric Luedtke of Free State Politics e-mailed Edgerley asking him to pull the info on Saturday. By the end of the day, Edgerley had promised to modify the site.
“[Edgerley] understood the concern and took care of it right away,” DBED spokesman Dave Tillman said. “We are reworking new content that promotes Maryland as an attractive destination for union and nonunion employers alike.”
Union representatives from around the state all said the language seemed out of character with the O’Malley administration, but nonetheless it concerned them.
“When we saw it, we were dismayed that a Web site intended to promote Maryland being a high-quality place for business would rely on the notion that being friendly to business means being unfriendly to labor,” Anna Oman, communications director for the Service Employees International Union Local 500, said. “My impression is that it wouldn’t be in line with the governor’s views, but any time something comes across as anti-worker, we are concerned.”
