Nearly 500 public safety employees in Washington’s King and Snohomish counties have voted to affiliate with Teamsters Local 117, a move that would shift their collective bargaining representation from Public Safety Employees Union Local 519. The August 31 vote comes as public-sector workers remain among the most unionized groups in the U.S., with the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting a 32.9% union membership rate for government workers in 2025.
Nearly 500 public safety employees across King and Snohomish counties in Washington have voted to affiliate with Teamsters Local 117, adding another large group of workers to one of the region’s major labor organizations.
The employees, who currently belong to Public Safety Employees Union (PSEU) Local 519, voted overwhelmingly in favor of the change during an internal union election on August 31, 2026. The transition still requires certification by Washington’s Public Employment Relations Commission before Local 117 becomes the group’s exclusive bargaining representative.
Teamsters Local 117 said it expects that certification to take place by the end of the year. Until then, the existing representation arrangement remains in place.
The employees span multiple classifications and worksites across King and Snohomish counties. Their roles include positions within public safety and government operations, including administrative specialists supporting the King County Department of Judicial Administration.
The move highlights an important characteristic of public-sector workforce management: collective bargaining remains a significant part of how government employers manage compensation, working conditions, benefits and organizational change.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 32.9% of government workers were union members in 2025, compared with 5.9% of private-sector workers. Local government had the highest union membership rate among government levels, at 37.8%. Protective service occupations also had one of the highest unionization rates among major occupational groups, at 31.3%.
Those figures help put the Local 117 vote in context. Public safety organizations often operate in environments where staffing levels, schedules, overtime, workplace safety and job classifications can have direct implications for both employees and the communities they serve.
For HR departments and public-sector employers, a change in bargaining representation can also create a new layer of workforce-management work. Employers may need to coordinate with a new bargaining representative, review existing agreements and ensure that changes to policies or employment conditions comply with applicable labor laws and collective bargaining requirements.
The transition can also affect how employee concerns are communicated and escalated. A larger union organization may bring additional bargaining, legal and administrative resources, but it can also introduce different processes and expectations for negotiations.
Teamsters Local 117 said the employees chose the affiliation because they were looking for a union with greater resources and experience representing public safety professionals. The union also pointed to its existing experience with legal administrative specialists in other departments.
For employees, the appeal of a larger labor organization can extend beyond contract negotiations. Union infrastructure can provide access to dedicated staff, legal resources, contract expertise and representation during workplace disputes.
William Welty, a court administrative specialist in the King County Department of Judicial Administration, said the Teamsters’ staffing and resources were among the factors that made the affiliation attractive to workers. He also cited the organization’s experience representing similar employees elsewhere.
The vote comes amid a broader period of continued attention to organized labor in the U.S. While overall unionization remains well below historical levels, public-sector workers continue to have substantially higher representation rates than their private-sector counterparts.
The BLS reported 14.7 million union members nationwide in 2025, representing 10.0% of wage and salary workers. The agency also found that 16.5 million workers were represented by a union, including employees who were not themselves union members but whose jobs were covered by a union contract.
For HR technology providers, the continued importance of collective bargaining also has implications for workforce software. Payroll, scheduling, time and attendance, benefits administration and workforce-management platforms must often accommodate collectively bargained rules around overtime, shifts, leave, seniority, classifications and compensation.
That makes labor relations an important consideration in public-sector HR technology deployments. A system designed around standardized private-sector workflows may not easily accommodate complex bargaining-unit rules without configuration or integration work.
The potential Local 117 transition therefore represents more than an organizational change for the affected workers. It demonstrates how union structure remains closely connected to workforce operations, particularly in government and public safety environments where employment policies can involve detailed contractual requirements.
For public-sector HR leaders, the next stage will be managing the practical implications of the representation change if and when state regulators certify it. That could include contract administration, employee communications, payroll and workforce-system updates, and coordination between management and the new bargaining representative.
For employees, the central issue will be whether the new representation delivers the stronger bargaining capacity and resources that workers said they were seeking.
The outcome will ultimately be measured less by the affiliation itself than by what follows: the quality of labor-management relations, the terms of future agreements and whether the new structure helps employees and public employers address an increasingly complex workforce environment.
Market Landscape
The U.S. labor market continues to show a sharp divide between public- and private-sector unionization. BLS data show that government workers had a 32.9% union membership rate in 2025, compared with 5.9% in the private sector. Local government workers had a 37.8% rate.
Public safety is particularly relevant to organized labor. Protective service occupations had a 31.3% union membership rate in 2025, placing the occupation group among those with the highest levels of unionization.
For HR and workforce technology vendors, this environment creates specific requirements around collective bargaining, contract rules, scheduling, overtime, compensation and employee relations. Public-sector HR platforms increasingly need the flexibility to support workforce policies that vary by bargaining unit and jurisdiction.
Top Insights
- Nearly 500 public safety employees are seeking new collective bargaining representation through an affiliation with Teamsters Local 117.
- The transition remains subject to certification by Washington’s Public Employment Relations Commission before Local 117 becomes the exclusive representative.
- Public-sector workers continue to have significantly higher unionization rates than private-sector employees, according to federal labor data.
- Union representation can affect HR operations spanning payroll, scheduling, compensation, workforce policies and employee relations.
- Public-sector HR technology must accommodate complex bargaining-unit rules rather than relying solely on standardized workforce-management processes.
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