Text of the speech delivered by Vasdev (Vas) Singh at the
AFSCME PEOPLE Conference held in Sacramento, CA on April
22-24, 2006
 Brothers and Sisters,
Good Morning!
How are you doing this morning?
My name is Vas and I represent Council 36 Local 3090 from
City of Los Angeles, CA. I work in the Department of Public
Works, City of Los Angeles, CA.
I am from a different ethnic background, so please bear
with me for my different accent.
This has been my first time to attend an AFSCME PEOPLE Conference
and for this I am grateful to our great sister Alice Goff,
President Local 3090 who inspired me to attend this conference.
It has been a wonderful experience for me to listen to our
great brothers and sisters:
Lee Saunders
Alice Goff
Henry Nicholas
Willie Pelote
Senator Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles)
Chuck Loveless
Rob Reiner
Lorraine O'Harra
Vernon Watkins
Temo Figueroa
and other brothers and sisters.
Please forgive me if I have left out names of any of my
brothers and sisters.
We Fight We Win
This has been proved beyond any doubts
when we defeated Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's propositions
75 and 76 in the recently held elections and this has been
due to your great united fight and efforts put through by
our own brothers and sisters by going to precinct walking
and phone banking by the AFSCME dedicated volunteers.
There should be no doubts in anyone's mind that our AFSCME brothers and sisters will stand upto the challenges as and
when these arise. There are many talented brothers and sisters
and AFSCME is proud to have them amongst us.
You have listened to many great brothers and sisters and
amongst them our brother Rob Reiner has rightly said we should
support and elect those political candidates who are sincere
and dedicated not only to put forward short term goals but
also long term goals affecting the education and other needs
of our children which run anywhere from 15-20 years.
We should identify these politicians and support them to
get elected to make our voice effectively
heard by the Government
of the day. These elected politicians should be so competent
as to achieve the goals set forth.
On the politicians who get elected with AFSCME's support
and then forget to fulfill their promises committed prior
to their elections, brother Temo has rightly said that we
should continue our efforts to put pressure on them through
phone calls, personal contact and emails to remind them of
their obligations towards the electorate.
We all should support our Latino brothers and sisters who
are fighting for their rights. AFSCME has always been fighting
for the rights of the people and I am confident that it will
come upto the expectations of our Latino
brothers and sisters in meeting this challenge.
Last but not the least, I do appreciate our great brother
Willie Pelote who has been conducting the stage proceedings
so very well. Please join me in giving a standing ovation
to our brother Willie Pelote.
Thank you.
God Bless
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