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Will they unionize?

It’s vote week in Vance as the United Auto Workers union tries to take its next step toward its stated goal of unionizing the car-making industry in the South.

AL.com’s William Thornton reports that workers begin voting today at the Mercedes-Benz U.S. International plant in Tuscaloosa County. Totals are expected on Friday.

Drama is the norm with these things. And just last week the National Labor Relations Board said it was investigating six charges of unfair labor practices levied against Mercedes-Benz by the UAW.

The pro-labor non-profit More Perfect Union Solidarity has been airing ads supporting the union. Its director, Faiz Shakir, explained that it used cultural points, such as faith and football, to connect with Alabamians who aren’t steeped in union ideology.

One of those ads featured comments from former Alabama football coach Nick Saban. It took cuts from Saban making positive references to unions in various clips.

Saban has said the ad takes his comments out of context and that he does not endorse the UAW. He said he’s asked for the ads that feature him be pulled.

Saban has previously spoken to workers at the plant and owns seven Mercedes-Benz dealerships through the Dream Motor Group.

Rejected legislation

While you’re looking for a backup investment opportunity now that the lottery-and-casinos financial plan has fallen apart again, here’s a list of non-gambling bills that did NOT make it through the Legislature during the regular session that ended Thursday, according to reporting by AL.com’s Mike Cason. I’ll go over some that we mentioned here during the session and haven’t wrapped them up yet.

These weren’t voted down but were passed by one chamber only to die in committee or just never come up for a vote in the other:

• The bill that would’ve replaced the ethics law. Supporters had said it would clarify the law. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall and the Ethics Commission said it would’ve weakened the law.
• The bill that would’ve held librarians criminally liable if they distributed “sexual or gender-oriented material” to minors without parental consent.
• The bill that would’ve banned so-called Glock switches — or anything that converts a semiautomatic firearm into a fully automatic firearm.
• The bill that would’ve expanded from K-5 to K-12 the ban on classroom discussion on sexual orientation or gender identity. It also would’ve prohibited school employees from displaying sexual-orientation or gender-identity flags in a classroom or on school property.
• The bill that would’ve defined male and female based on biological sex for the purpose of bathroom, locker-room, sports-team and other rules.
• And a bill expanding the religious exemption to vaccine requirements that would’ve made it easier for parents to avoid vaccine requirements for their public-school kids.

School administrator’s arrest

A McAdory Middle School assistant principal was arrested last week in connection with a decade-old triple homicide, reports AL.com’s Howard Koplowitz.

The Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said Keante Harris turned himself in on a fugitive-from-justice warrant. He’s among four men to be charged in the 2013 asphyxiation killings of three people found in a vehicle in Union City, Ga.

Investigators believe the victims were lured to a home in Jonesboro, Ga., where they were tortured and killed.

Jefferson County Schools Superintendent Walter Gonsoulin said Harris has been placed on paid administrative leave.

Review Quiz results

Here are the answers from (and how the readers performed on) Friday’s quiz:

What tax was increased by a bill that made it through the Alabama Legislature this session?

• The additional tax rates at the state-run ABC liquor stores. (CORRECT) 71.9%
• Supplies that are purchased to be used at least partly in the production of medicinal marijuana. 13.7%
• Taxes on liquor anywhere it’s sold in the state. 11.6%
• Ending a little-known 17-year tax cut on Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pies. 2.7%

Recently and Auburn University student who’s seeking a master’s degree in forestry established a Guinness world record for doing this to 1,123 trees in Tuskegee National Forest:

• Hugging them (CORRECT) 73.3%
• Planting them from seedlings 13.7%
• Pruning their unhealthy branches 9.6%
• Because scientific evidence suggests plants respond well to music, exposing them to a nonstop loop of Lionel Richie singing “Easy Like Sunday Morning.” 3.4%

The Alabama Legislature passed a bill this session setting timelines for state agencies to respond to public-records requests. Previously, government officials effectively responded to such requests:

• whenever they got around to it (CORRECT) 62.3%
• within 6-8 weeks 23.3%
• within a year 13.7%
• sometime after Charles Barkley is elected governor 0.7%

Kyle Ogden of the Florence restaurant Odette won the annual Alabama Seafood Cook-Off recently. What was the winning dish?

• A pompano filet with a crab and shrimp mousse. (CORRECT) 69.2%
• Pecan-crusted mahi mahi with gouda cheese grits. 16.4%
• Crawfish bisque 10.3%
• Smoked gar throats on saltine crackers. 4.1%

Former University of Alabama player and athletics director Hootie Ingram recently passed away. His career also included a number of coaching gigs as well as work with the SEC. Among his many contributions to the sport, which of these things did Ingram help bring about?

• Clemson’s paw-print logo (CORRECT) 56.8%
• The fake ball-spike 16.4%
• Florida State’s “planting the spear” tradition. 14.4%
• The mirrored visors that were once popular with players. 12.3%

More Alabama News

Born on This Date

In 1914, World Heavyweight Champion Joe Louis of rural Chambers County near Lafayette.

In 1993, actress/singer Debby Ryan of Huntsville.

The Podcast