Department Of Labor U S

Like many Texas businessmen in 1985, Tom Lundberg was being squeezed by collapsing real estate prices. But he hit upon a novel solution: buying a New Mexico potash mine at a time when the potash industry was as bad off as Texas real estate. Peculiar as Lundberg's plan might have seemed, a clue to his intentions may have emerged at the closing of the potash mine sale on Dec. 31, 1985. He and his lawyer, John N.

The Obama administration has asked California to explain how furloughs for state workers are affecting the state's ability to meet an escalating demand for unemployment insurance benefits and services to millions of jobless people. A regional administrator at the Labor Department this week wrote to the director of the California Employment Development Department, asking him to demonstrate that no decline in the federally financed unemployment insurance program "will occur as the result of this statewide action."

'It gave us a chance to work with young people--both men and women--who need a second chance in life.' Sophia Ramos glanced at the computer screen with a practiced eye. Her fingers roamed confidently across the keyboard. "I've been here a year and four months, and I've learned a lot," the 18-year-old South Gate resident said, pausing briefly between lessons at the Job Corps training center on South Hill Street in downtown Los Angeles. "They're really concerned about you here," she said.

A veterans outreach organization in Long Beach was named one of 17 groups nationwide Wednesday to receive a share of $7.5 million to train veterans for green jobs. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis announced the agency grants to provide about 3,000 veterans with training and employment in green jobs. In California, the Long Beach site will get $500,000 to train more than 100 veterans in Los Angeles County and find work for them.

The U.S. Labor Department approved a $79-million settlement of a lawsuit brought by employees of Global Crossing Ltd. against former company executives including ex-Chairman Gary Winnick over management of its retirement plan. The proposed class-action settlement needs court approval, the Labor Department said Tuesday.

This was no ordinary Vegas convention. Participants donned gas masks, lugged stretchers and struggled with life-and-death decisions. Nearly 300 underground-rescue experts from around the world gathered Wednesday at the Las Vegas Convention Center to compete against one another in rescuing "victims" of a mock mine disaster.

"An injury to one is an injury to all." For years that classic expression of worker solidarity was well-known to the rank and file at Local 13 of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union. It was emblazoned on the hats and jackets members wore to work in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. It topped the letterhead of their union bulletins and was inscribed on a plaque at Local 13's business hall in Wilmington.

The Labor Department announced Friday that it will conduct a "thorough review" of Guess Inc. after finding that the controversial Los Angeles clothing company was receiving merchandise from an alleged large-scale sweatshop. Federal officials said they recently discovered Guess' ties to the alleged sweatshop, Chums Casual of Los Angeles, while reviewing Chums' subpoenaed sales records.

The Labor Department has added a major national retailer, Gap Inc., to its list of "good guy" businesses that have pledged to take extra precautions to avoid selling garments produced in sweatshops. Agency officials hope enlisting the big-name San Francisco-based company will encourage other apparel retailers and manufacturers to join its new campaign to squeeze out rogue contractors that violate labor laws.

President Reagan on Tuesday nominated Ann Dore McLaughlin, a former Interior Department undersecretary and career public relations executive, to be secretary of labor. If she is confirmed by the Senate, where no serious opposition is expected, McLaughlin would replace William E. Brock III, who resigned last month to run the presidential campaign of Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.).

U.S. Rep. Hilda L. Solis, President Obama's choice for Labor secretary, faced new obstacles after lawmakers who were expected to vote on her confirmation Thursday abruptly canceled the hearing amid reports of back taxes owed by her husband. Solis, a Democrat from El Monte, is at least the fourth Obama nominee whose confirmation has been complicated by tax troubles.

Underscoring the bitter debate over a proposal to make it easier for workers to form unions, Republican senators are suggesting that President Obama's pick for Labor secretary must recuse herself from lobbying for the bill's passage. A Senate committee will vote today whether to confirm Rep. Hilda L. Solis, a Democrat from El Monte. In a written exchange with Solis, Republican senators indicated they are wary of her ties to a tax-exempt group dedicated to helping workers unionize.

Her father came from Mexico and was a Teamster who worked at a battery recycling plant. Her mother is from Nicaragua and had a union job on a Mattel assembly line. Rep. Hilda Solis, the daughter of immigrants who lives in a modest home in El Monte not far from where she was raised, takes her first step to almost certain confirmation as U.S. secretary of Labor today at a Senate hearing.

Labor Secretary Elaine Chao is the only Cabinet member to serve during President Bush's entire presidency, through nearly eight years marked by terrorism, Hurricane Katrina and long-running wars, including ideological battles. But as the soft-spoken Chao's tenure winds down, she finds herself defending her legacy amid criticism from labor groups and government watchdogs who say the department has backed off of its vital regulatory functions during the Bush years.

Rep. Hilda L. Solis (D-El Monte), a Congressional Hispanic Caucus leader considered to be one of the most reliably pro-union voices in the House, is President-elect Barack Obama's choice to head the Labor Department, a Democratic official said Thursday. Obama is expected to announce the selection at a news conference today in Chicago. Solis, 51, would be the third Latino member of Obama's Cabinet, a measure of diversity that has garnered praise from this fast-growing slice of the electorate.

Federal regulators have proposed relatively minor changes to the popular Family and Medical Leave Act, a relief for advocates who had feared a sweeping rewrite that would have made it difficult for people to take advantage of it. The proposals, released this month by the Labor Department, would give employers more leeway to verify that people taking medical leave were actually sick.

Seven garment workers who cooperated with a recent federal crackdown on Orange County sweatshops now say they have been blacklisted, intimidated or forced to give kickbacks to their bosses, prompting a second round of investigations by the U.S. Department of Labor.

The federal government sued Time Warner Inc. and its subsidiaries Monday, alleging that they denied health and pension benefits to hundreds of eligible workers by incorrectly classifying them as temporary workers or independent contractors. The workers come from various divisions within Time Inc., a unit of Time Warner, and include writers and photographers for Time Inc.'s subsidiary publications, the Labor Department said.

The case started with a phone call to a Spanish-speaking volunteer at a small office in San Bernardino. A Los Angeles domestic worker said her boss owed her a few hundred dollars. The U.S. Department of Labor opened an investigation and, with the help of the Mexican Consulate, discovered hundreds of workers who hadn't been paid the minimum wage or overtime for their work cleaning homes and carpets.

Federal officials proposed rules Thursday to ensure better disclosure of the fees levied to administer 401(k) retirement accounts, but critics immediately blasted the measures as inadequate. The Department of Labor said its proposal was designed to address concerns that retirement nest eggs are being eroded by obscure fees and deductions that employees may not even know they are paying.