State workers to rally against furloughs, cuts: 'We cannot allow this to continue'

Simone Carter, The News Tribune (Tacoma, Wash.) on Apr 6, 2025

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Members of Washington’s state-employees union are planning to march on the state Capitol next Wednesday to urge state lawmakers to adopt a budget free from furloughs, cuts and closures.

The group is also demanding that the state Legislature refrain from stripping away any of workers’ legal rights.

The April 9 rally comes as state leaders are working to fill a multi-billion-dollar hole in Washington’s operating budget before session ends later this month. Gov. Bob Ferguson and Senate Democrats have included state-worker furloughs in their respective budget proposals.

The Washington Federation of State Employees (WFSE) blasted lawmakers’ budget plans in an April 1 news release.

Democratic lawmakers have floated cutting workers’ pay, closing facilities and slashing millions of dollars from higher education, the release states. Other ideas include boosting health-care costs and “tak(ing) away our legal right to collectively bargain over healthcare benefits.”

“We are dedicated public servants who put the needs of Washingtonians above ourselves,” the WFSE news release says. “We contribute to the well-being of this great state and we make Washington happen every day.”

WFSE Local 443 is Washington’s biggest public-sector local union, representing more than 13,000 state employees. Members serve in occupations including attorneys, mechanics, corrections officers, social workers and hundreds more.

State employees negotiated labor contracts with the state last year. Now, when the time has come for the state to back its commitments, the Legislature and Governor’s Office are failing to honor them, the news release says.

WFSE President Mike Yestramski told McClatchy that officials’ statements about the budget show what they care about — “and, more specifically, what they don’t.”

“The purpose of next week is to call on not just state employees — not just union members — but everyone in the state to come together to make a statement to the legislators and to the governor that we cannot allow this to continue,” he said Thursday.

The rally will be held at the Tivoli Fountain on the Capitol Campus Wednesday starting at 11 a.m., according to an event schedule posted on ActionNetwork.org. Expected speakers will include Yestramski, WFSE Vice President Ashley Fueston, Local 889 President Jeanette Obelscz, Local 872 President Diana Ruth Olegre, Local 443 Vice President Milo Nicholas and other union leaders.

Rally hosts ask that attendees wear green and be ready “to make some noise.”