Roland Garza, civil rights chairman of the Felix Longoria chapter of the American GI Forum

United Way pawn
Roland Garza, civil rights chairman of the Felix Longoria chapter of the American GI Forum, showed up at City Hall this week demanding that the city deduct a portion of workers' paychecks so they can have a union.
It's debatable whether the lot of city workers would improve with a union, but Garza certainly had the right to press the point. But he gets a THORN for threatening to use deductions for the United Way of the Coastal Bend as a pawn if he and his supporters did not get their way.
The payroll deductions,agreed to by city workers, support services for the needy and for children. They fund an array of services that in many cases the recipient agencies couldn't provide otherwise.
Garza can debate the union issue with the city, but he and his supporters should refrain from using vulnerable fellow citizens who depend on United Way-funded agencies as a bargaining chip.