The Guild of Pacific Northwest Employees

The Guild of Pacific Northwest Employees

by the members for the members

About Us

In 2019, after many months of our membership being threatened by AFSCME Council 2 staff that they would “drop us” if we didn’t “get in line”,  a handful of Bellingham employees joined together and formed their own employee-run entity. They named it The Guild of Pacific Northwest Employees (PNWE). The goal was for PNWE to eventually be the Exclusive Representative of our 400-member bargaining unit in Bellingham, Washington. In May of 2020, despite delays of all kinds, roadblocks and constant harassment by AFSCME & Council 2, our members voted overwhelmingly to leave AFSCME & Council 2.

We purposely, at this time, do not have any affiliation with a larger, national organization. Our experience has shown we can be a more effective and responsive union by making our own decisions at the Local level and by keeping our dues money within our own community.

During the process of exercising our rights under Washington State Law to change our exclusive bargaining representative, we realized that AFSCME International was a big part of the problems we were having with Council 2. Not only did they NOT take action to stop the unconstitutional and abusive behavior of Council 2 officials, they participated in it. At some point, you have to recognize the corruption for what it is. This tyranny is not something that we wanted to be involved in or finance with our hard- earned dues money any longer.