[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 154 (Monday, September 17, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S6181]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       TRIBUTE TO KEITH KELLEHER

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, American jobs have changed dramatically in 
the last century, but the reasons Americans work have not changed.
  Work is about more than a paycheck. A job is--or ought to be--a 
source of dignity. Men and women who work hard may not be able to live 
on Easy Street, but they ought to be able to walk down Main Street with 
their heads held high, knowing that they can provide for the basic 
needs of their families, and they ought to be able to retire with 
dignity and security.
  Keith Kelleher understands this. He understands that treating 
workers--all workers--fairly is not an outdated idea; it is a 
requirement for a sound economy and solid future. He has devoted more 
than four decades of his life to improving the lives of some of the 
lowest paid workers in our economy, including nursing home workers and 
home health aides.
  As founding president of SEIU Healthcare in Illinois, Indiana, 
Missouri, and Kansas, Keith Kelleher has helped secure the right to 
form and join a union for more than 91,000 traditionally low-paid 
healthcare workers and to negotiate for better wages and working 
conditions.
  Not only that, like Walter Reuther and other great labor leaders of 
the last century, Keith Kelleher has championed broader causes of 
social justice. In 2014, Keith Kelleher and the members of SEIU 
Healthcare helped lead the fight in Illinois for marriage equality, a 
year before the U.S. Supreme Court made marriage equality the law of 
the land.
  This week, Keith Kelleher is stepping down officially from the union 
he helped found. He is retiring after more than 30 years at the helm of 
SEIU Healthcare, and I want to thank him for his contributions to 
economic and social justice in Illinois and in our Nation.
  Keith Kelleher moved to Chicago in the early 1980s from Detroit. He 
was working with a group called the United Labor Unions, an 
organization that trained people on how to organize and work together 
to advance their common good.
  He lived as simply as the people he came to help. He focused on the 
home care industry because it had some of the lowest paid workers in 
the state. Private-sector workers hired by the State to provide 
services for seniors and people with disabilities earned an hourly rate 
of $3.35, with no benefits. They were a forgotten group, one largely 
ignored by traditional labor unions.
  In 1983, Keith Kelleher gathered seven home health aides in the 
basement of the United Methodist Temple in downtown Chicago, and they 
voted to organize a union. That moment was the beginning of Union Local 
880. Twenty-five years later, Local 880 had grown from 7 members to 
68,000 members. All great things come from small beginnings.
  Keith Kelleher built Local 880 from the ground up by going door-to-
door in some of Chicago's poorest, most neglected neighborhoods. He 
helped convince thousands of workers to pay membership fees even before 
Local 880 could engage in collective bargaining. They won that right in 
1984, when the National Labor Relations Board officially recognized 
Local 880.
  He convinced people that they mattered and that they could change 
their own lives though collective action.
  He found innovative ways to raise funds for the fledgling union, 
canvassing for donations, selling chicken dinners on payday, and 
holding tag sales. Keith and his wife even figured out how to turn 
their wedding into a union fundraiser.
  In 1985, the independent Local 880 merged with SEIU, the Service 
Employees International Union.
  In 2007 and 2008, Local 880 merged with two other SEIU local unions 
in Indiana, Local 20 and Local 4. In 2009, SEIU Healthcare Illinois/
Indiana merged with the SEIU Healthcare local unions in Missouri and 
Kansas. Keith Kelleher was elected founding president of the new 
combined union.
  For nearly 40 years, Keith Kelleher has helped forge new partnerships 
and fought new battles. He is as determined as they come. One battle 
took nearly 20 years to win, but SEIU Local 880 never gave up, and in 
2005, Illinois' Governor finally signed an executive order recognizing 
unionized home care workers who work as contractors for State agencies 
as public employees. That victory gave 50,000 workers the legal right 
to bargain collectively for better wages and working conditions. They 
have since won a 35 percent wage increase over 4 years and other 
improvements in benefits.
  Under Keith Kelleher's leadership, Local 880 has become a significant 
political force. You cannot miss SEIU Health members at public events. 
They are often known as ``the purple people'' because of the color of 
the t-shirts they wear.
  Keith Kelleher has fought for justice for union members and for those 
who don't have the benefit of union membership.
  In addition to marriage equality, he has fought for a higher minimum 
wage across the country.
  Like Tom Joad in ``The Grapes of Wrath,'' wherever there are people 
in need of justice, Keith Kelleher seems to be there.
  As he steps down officially this week from the union he helped 
create, I want to thank Keith personally and wish him, his wife 
Madeline, and his two daughters Ryan and Aileen well. He has made a 
real difference in the lives of tens of thousands of workers, and his 
life's work will continue to lift workers up for generations to come.

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