Whereas, at our January 2026 meeting, the UAWD membership approved “A Program for Building Local UAWD Chapters Grounded in Shop Floor Struggle” to anchor the work of UAWD’s Organizing Committee (OC).
Whereas, provision #2 in the program says: “Beginning in February 2026, each UAWD member shall coordinate with other members of their Local to convene a meeting to initiate a Local Chapter. All UAWD members shall participate in building their Local Chapter. If a member has an issue implementing any part of this language, they shall discuss next steps with the OC Co-Chairs or the full OC, who will recommend a solution with that member. Local groups shall report to the OC Co-Chairs about their progress and outlook for building a Chapter and struggle at their shops, and they may ask the OC Co-Chairs for support in doing so.”
Whereas, despite the provision above, many UAWD members remained unclear about how to begin the work of organizing a Chapter and were not able to follow through;
Whereas, throughout the process of creating our three current UAWD Local Chapters, and the ongoing organizing to create the several Chapters that are currently in-development, Chapter leaders and our OC Co-Chairs have learned a lot about how to initiate Chapters and overcome the common early roadblocks of Chapter formation;
Whereas, our recent training, “Communicating with Coworkers and Building a Shop-Floor Movement,” featured leaders from existing and forming Chapters demonstrating the exact kind of organizing around shop floor struggles that enables the seeding of new Chapters;
Whereas, following provision #3 in the program, updates are being proposed to the resolution to hone the strategy for the early-stage phase of Local UAWD Chapter development that has proved challenging for many members.
Be it resolved, to supplement the program, the UAWD Organizing Committee (OC) Co-Chairs shall implement the following strategy for seeding Local UAWD Chapters:
- Support UAWD members in a shared Local or shop to focus their organizing around ongoing shop floor struggles or political crises in their workplaces. This could include struggle over working conditions, like mandatory overtime or insufficient staffing, or conflict over workplace control, like censorship or policing. Members are encouraged to start with a particular struggle, it doesn’t need to cover every shop within a Local or every area within a shop.
- Encourage UAWD members who are organizing together to use UAWD’s name on flyers or events and present their efforts as UAWD efforts when appropriate, which they may do prior to petitioning to start a Chapter with approval by the OC Co-Chairs, the OC as a whole, or the Steering Committee.
- Support UAWD members in a shared Local or shop to start building a chat to coordinate, even though they won’t yet be able to function together as a Chapter. This can happen prior to meeting the requirement in our Bylaws to petition to start a Chapter: 5 members or supporters who have agreed to our UAWD Member Platform, and at least 3 of them must be members.
- Offer to build an “anchor chat” for each UAWD member leading efforts to start a Chapter. When there is interest, the Co-Chairs will build teams of OC members with experience establishing Chapters or building shop floor efforts, using these chats to support Chapter anchors in their early stages.
Be it further resolved, guided by the strategy above, each UAWD member shall coordinate with other members of their Local to convene a meeting to initiate a Chapter prior to the Annual Meeting this fall, with the same reporting and support structure as detailed in the program.
Be it further resolved, based on challenges and successes in implementing the strategy above, the OC Co-Chairs shall work with the OC and the Steering Committee to bring a comprehensive resolution to the Annual Meeting to set a future strategy for building Local UAWD Chapters and consider proposing amendments to the UAWD Member Participation Commitments.