California Professional Firefighters - Firefighters, Teachers, Nurses Re-Form Winning Coalition to Back Brown

Under the CPF Banner

Joint Apprenticeship Committee: Labor-management fire training program with more than 146 participating departments serving more than 6,500 firefighter apprentices.

California Fire Foundation: Honoring the courage of fallen firefighters and their families and the perseverance and sacrifice of fire victims.

Firefighters Print & Design: Full-service union print shop, providing CPF members and corporate clients with high-impact printing at competitive prices.

Firestar Studios: Award-winning, state-of-the-art video and audio production, serving the fire service and corporate clients.

The CPF Callback Association: CPF’s communication link with retired firefighters, keeping retirees in touch with the profession they love.

CPF Insurance Trust: Improving the lives of all professional firefighters and protecting their families.

Firefighters, Teachers, Nurses Re-Form Winning Coalition to Back Brown

CPF members from Hayward, Modesto and Santa Clara County rallied with 1,100 union members from the California Nurses Association in front of Meg Whitman's home to protest Whitman's attacks on unions.

When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger went after your political rights, funding stability and retirement security in 2005, working families came together in an unprecedented, unified coalition.

Over time, the coalition came to be identified with three marquee elements: firefighters, nurses and teachers.

Five years later, labor once again finds itself in the "fight of our lives." And once again, firefighter, nurses and teachers are stepping forward to help elect candidates that put the concerns of working people first, including Jerry Brown, CPF's endorsed candidate for governor.

"Our rallying cry in 2005 was 'no retreat ... no surrender,'" said CPF President Lou Paulson. "This year, we're standing together again with the same mission - protect jobs for working families, and secure the basic rights and security we've worked our careers to maintain.

As the largest statewide firefighter organization, California Professional Firefighters has been at the forefront of the campaign.

President Paulson is co-chair of California Working Families, a coalition that is pushing back against the anti-labor, anti-employee message of self-financed billionaire candidate Meg Whitman. CPF is also launching an ambitious member-to-member campaign, aimed at educating front line firefighters about what's at stake in this year's campaign.

As they were in 2005, CPF's partners in these efforts have been the California Nurses Association and California Teachers Association. CPF members joined more than 1,000 nurses who rallied recently outside Whitman's Atherton mansion (see photo). And CPF, CNA and CTA are all part of a broader labor campaign - spearheaded by the California Labor Federation - to explain why the election matters so much to working families.

"The choice is clear, but the challenge is even clearer," said Paulson. "Whitman has a bottomless checkbook and is willing to spend it to attack us, our jobs and our retirement. As Ben Franklin said, 'if we don't all hang together, we shall all surely hang separately.'"