As AFSCME members, we’re committed to serving the public and giving back.
This holiday season, AFSCME Locals around the state lived our union values by taking part in a variety of community giving programs. It’s just one more way we’re walking our talk: helping our neighbors, lifting up working families and strengthening the communities where we work and live.

• Members of Local 3558 participated in multiple holiday giving projects. At the Duluth YWCA, members collected supplies for the Young Moms Program, a transitional housing program that helps young moms and their kids get into the workforce and build secure lives. At the Head of the Lakes United Way, members planned and hosted the AFL-CIO Community Services’ annual kid’s holiday party, where union families decorated cookies, met Santa, and received holiday meal baskets and gifts.
• Local 3800, University of Minnesota Clerical Workers, held a toy drive for the U of M Masonic Children’s Hospital. In addition to collecting toys in the weeks leading up to the holidays, local leaders held union coffee breaks at multiple campuses to collect toys and organize members. The local also hosted a holiday cookie and craft party for union kids.
• Local 552, Hennepin County Probation and Parole, donated $1,000 to the John Servaty Toy Drive in Hennepin County.
• Local 404, Department of Human Services, participated in a campus-wide St. Peter Regional Treatment Center toy drive for Toys for Tots, collecting hundreds of toys for kids in need. They teamed up with their coworkers and members of other unions to collect the toys, which were given to children in Nicollet, Le Sueur, and Blue Earth Counties.
• Local 1539, Rush City Corrections, collected $725 for St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital.
• Local 638, Minnesota State University – Mankato, participated in a campus-wide “Unions United” food drive for those in need. Together, the union members raised $1216 in cash donations and collected 725 pounds of food to stock the pantry at the ECHO Food Shelf.
• AFSCME Retirees United Chapter 5 turned old AFSCME t-shirts into tote bags which they donated to customers at Fare for All, where the group volunteers to pack low-cost bundles of nutritious food for community members.