Blanca Paniagua on Sunday was flipping through AFSCME’s 90th Anniversary book, which contains photographs of key moments in our union’s history, when she saw a familiar face — her own.
She was in a picture taken in Las Vegas in 2002. Paniagua had traveled to Las Vegas with a small delegation of Servidores Públicos Unidos de Puerto Rico for AFSCME’s 35th International Convention.
SPUPR/AFSCME Council 95 was a relatively new union then. Public service workers in Puerto Rico had gained the right to unionize in 1998 through the Puerto Rico Public Service Labor Relations Act (Law 45). Paniagua had been among the workers who, with help from AFSCME, fought hard to make the law a reality.
Now, 24 years — and 12 conventions — later, seeing herself in a history book at the 47th International Union in Chicago made Paniagua reflect on how far Puerto Rico’s public service workers have come since forming their union.
“Puerto Rico is more than grateful for AFSCME because of what it helped workers achieve in Puerto Rico,” said Paniagua, now the president of AFSCME Retirees Chapter 95 in Puerto Rico. “I feel very honored, very proud to be part of the history of AFSCME. … Being part of this history fills us with great satisfaction.”
Even as she reflects on the past, Paniagua knows that she and her fellow union members remain part of AFSCME’s history today.
“We continue to be a part of it because we are Council 95 … we continue to grow and to fight,” she said. “As for me, until God allows me to, I will continue to fight for workers and retirees in Puerto Rico.”
Delegates to the Convention in Chicago can browse through our union’s history book at the AFSCME 90th Anniversary Gallery, located in the Exhibit Hall inside the McCormick Place Convention Center.
