Galvanized by the fight against Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and strengthened by a decade of organizing success, Southern California union leaders promised Monday they would find ways to keep the regional labor movement working together despite the split of the national AFL-CIO.
But doing so could pose considerable challenges to union officials, who have built the Los Angeles labor movement into one of the region's most formidable political forces.
The departure of the Service Employees International Union, which is the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor's largest member, could cost the state and local labor federations a third of their annual budgets, complicating their ability to mount political campaigns.
At the same time, maintaining political clout in the face of the national schism might require some deft organizational work from local and state union leaders in the coming weeks and months.
With a ballot fight against several Schwarzenegger-backed initiatives looming this fall, unions have little incentive to part ways in Los Angeles or in California. And several political observers predicted that labor would continue to exert a strong influence.
"My guess is that we're not going to see anything too dramatic," said veteran Democratic political consultant Bill Carrick, who has worked with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and former Los Angeles Mayor James K. Hahn. "Labor will still be allied on its basic agenda
Several of the state's leading unions are independent from the county federation, including the California Teachers Assn.
The SEIU and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters left the national AFL-CIO over the weekend. The United Food and Commercial Workers and Unite Here, which represents garment and hotel workers, are threatening to disaffiliate as well.
But Martin Ludlow, who was just elected to head the influential Los Angeles federation, and California Labor Federation leader Art Pulaski talked optimistically about the future.
"The local labor movement is going to be strengthened by the need to be even more aggressive," Ludlow said from Chicago, where he was meeting with national labor leaders.
The Los Angeles County federation currently comprises 357 unions representing more than 800,000 workers.
Several leaders of SEIU locals also said Monday that they intended to remain part of the county federation, despite the national split.
