Editor's note: This article was updated at 4:19 p.m. on Monday, July 15, 2024.
Update: City Council voted unanimously on Monday to pass the collective bargaining measure for city workers to the ballot. Denver voters will decide in November.
The original story continues below.
Juan Manuel Ramirez Anzurez's family has lived in Denver for more than 40 years. But as a library assistant at Denver’s Central Library branch, he’s not sure if he will be able to afford to continue living and working in the city he grew up in.
When asked if he struggles with affordability, Ramirez Anzurez had a clear answer: “That’s not even a question.”
“I'm afraid that I'll never be able to purchase (a house) in Denver, the city that's been my home for a long time,” he said. “I would hope that one day I can continue to serve Denver as a public servant and be able to reside in Denver."
Ramirez Anzurez is not alone. On Monday, dozens of city staff members, labor organizers, union members and politicians gathered to show support for a proposed ballot initiative this November. The ballot measure would allow Denver voters to decide if city employees can have collective bargaining rights. Advocates hope it can help improve affordability and sustainability at city jobs.
City Council initially planned to conduct a final vote on sending the bill to voters Monday evening. Instead, Council voted to re-publish the bill, a technical requirement due to a last minute amendment that pushed the official, final vote to July 15. But supporters treated Monday’s vote like it was final, cheering after Councilmembers overwhelmingly spoke in favor of the ballot measure and voted unanimously to re-publish and vote next week.
Currently, only Denver’s teachers, police officers and firefighters have collective bargaining rights; another approximately 7,000 workers are left out.
Denver is one of the only Democrat-led cities in the U.S. without collective bargaining rights for city staff. If voters approve the potential ballot question, labor advocates say that would be a big win. But city staff would not automatically become part of a union or collective bargaining unit. Like other workplaces, they would hold elections to choose whether or not they wanted to organize.
“Inhibiting public workers’ right to collectively bargain is not only unjust to the workers, it is unjust to the communities that they serve,” said Councilmember Shontel Lewis, one of the co-sponsors of the bill. “I look forward to finishing the work we started and seeing the decision put in the hands of the electorate soon.”
The mood outside the City and County Building Monday night was joyous as city staff and union members cheered in support of collective bargaining. But the bill still requires City Council and voter approval.
Dozens of supporters spoke at a press conference and public comment Monday, though the last minute amendments will push final approval to next week.
Those amendments altered rules around striking and arbitration. They also set standards for the County Court in deciding whether to overturn a strike prohibition. Other amendments expanded the options for how employees can vote to create a collective bargaining unit and altered the role employee discipline can play in bargaining agreements.
The changes set limits on how many groups can form collective bargaining units per year and postponed the implementation of potential collective bargaining by a year, to January 1, 2026.
City Council passed the amendments unanimously Monday.
Chief among city staff concerns include living wages and a seat at the table in decisions with leadership.
Matthew Michalak, a tech assistant at the Denver Public Library, said he considers himself privileged because he owns his home, but worries about his colleagues.
“I am a long time Denverite, where I bought my house at the bottom of the market,” he said. “I'm doing this more for my coworkers who are in situations where I see them not being able to quite get there with making rent.”
Denise Salter talked about her years working at Denver International Airport, including working for abusive bosses. She said she felt like she lacked support and a voice.
“I love the work I do, the people I work with, and the people I serve,” she said. “I am here to tell you that you can love your job and you can still be in a union.”
During public comment, one staff member with Denver Employment, Troy Bettinger, spoke in opposition to the bill, raising concerns about administrative overhead, divisiveness and unions focusing on seniority over merit.
“Collective bargaining unions will rob us of our apolitical views, forcing us to get involved in union campaigns, union votes and union meetings,” he said. “The last thing Denver employees need is more meetings.”
Supporters were optimistic about the ballot measure on Monday.
Last month, City Council voted 12 to 1 in an initial first round vote on the bill, with Councilmember Kevin Flynn acting as the sole dissenting vote over a disagreement on how City Council staff should unionize. On Monday, Flynn said he would support the bill.
“I've been a union member,” Flynn said, talking about his experience getting laid off as a journalist when the Rocky Mountain News closed. “We all benefited very greatly from the representation that the newspaper guild provided for our security up to a year afterward, while we struggled in the middle of that recession to figure out what we were going to do.”
City Council will take a second and final vote next week, which will determine if the question will go to the ballot.
A similar measure failed before voters in 1980 and 1997. But advocates hope the current national movement toward unionization will bring them success in 2024. The state expanded bargaining rights to more than 7,000 county employees in 2022, but that bill did not include Denver staff.
If City Council votes to pass the measure on to voters, Denverites will decide on Nov. 5.
