BY MAGGIE TROWE
LOS ANGELES - Some $48,000 was pledged during the December 4-
6 Young Socialists convention and socialist conference here for
the capital fund to help in the transformation of the
production of Pathfinder books and pamphlets.
Altogether, the fund is seeking to raise $550,000 for Pathfinder's printshop to cover the $350,000 cost of its newly installed Agfa Galileo computer-to-plate (CTP) system and to pay off $200,000 still owed on the shop's web and two sheetfed printing presses. By the end of the conference, $266,000 had been contributed or pledged toward this goal; $84,000 more is needed by January 1 to complete payments on the Galileo platesetter.
United Airlines `blood money'
Pledges totaling $40,000 came from four socialist workers
employed as cleaners, baggage handlers, or mechanics at United
Airlines. All four are currently seeking other jobs as part of
an effort by cadres of the Socialist Workers Party and Young
Socialists to strengthen the political work of the communist
movement in eight industrial unions. Each of them has pledged
to sell the United stock they acquired while working for the
airline and donate the proceeds to the fund.
The appeal for funds was presented to the conference by Dave Prince, a member of the international capital fund committee. Prince explained that United's so-called Employee Stock Ownership Program (ESOP) was initiated in 1994 as part of a takeback contract in which wages were cut 15 percent and the 30- minute paid lunch break was eliminated. Employees were "compensated" with United stock, the value of which is subject to fluctuations in the stock market. "Many workers," Prince said, "view the ESOP as `blood money' taken from them by the company's assault on their wages and working conditions. So it's satisfying for socialists to put these chunks of capital to good use for the working-class movement."
Conference and convention participants had time between sessions to look at a display prepared by printshop volunteers showing the new equipment being installed, featuring a countdown thermometer for the capital fund.
The display included the first plates produced on the new equipment; the plates were for the cover of Panama: the Truth about the U.S. Invasion, the first Pathfinder title scheduled for production using the new equipment. Press operator David Rosenfeld, who is organizing the installation of the CTP equipment, and other shop volunteers answered questions about the new system from those attending the conference.
The display also described the efforts of the 140 volunteers across North America and around the world who are scanning, proofreading, formatting, and preparing the covers and graphics for reprints of Pathfinder books and pamphlets. The most recent title submitted by the volunteers for production by the Pathfinder printshop is The Changing Face of U.S. Politics: Working-Class Politics and the Trade Unions by Jack Barnes.
Transformation of printshop
In his presentation to the conference, Prince explained that
getting the Galileo platesetter up and running will help
drastically cut labor time and the cost of producing Pathfinder
books and other printed material used by the communist
movement. "Doing this is necessary if we are to maintain the
printshop financially," Prince said. "And everything we are
discussing at this conference politically tells us it's more
important than ever to keep Pathfinder's full list of books by
revolutionary leaders in print and available for fighters."
All aspects of the organization of labor in the shop must be transformed in order to increase productivity, Prince said. This includes the expansion of cross-training on presses and bindery equipment; stepping up production rates and cutting scrap rates and costly remakes of plates; greater attention to quality control; and the growing involvement of the entire shop cadre in commercial sales to help finance the operations of the shop.
Along these lines, Prince announced that the shop would decrease its size by at least two volunteers between now and the opening of the Socialist Workers Party convention in San Francisco at the beginning of April. He presented the names of four volunteers being released in December to go out and take part in the movement's efforts to build the industrial union fractions, and the name of a fifth who will be released early next year. Following the convention, a sixth volunteer was released to take on responsibilities in San Francisco as a member of the Young Socialists National Executive Committee.
Four volunteers will come in to the shop over the next four weeks to begin training in the shop bindery.
At the final conference session, Prince gave an update reporting the additional pledges raised over the weekend. The capital fund committee is organizing further meetings with potential contributors over the next few weeks to raise the rest of the funds needed by the end of the year.
To find out how you can make a capital contribution, write to the Capital Fund Committee, 410 West St., New York, NY 10014.