Local lawmakers, unions scramble to support federal workers harmed by Trump cuts

April 25, 2025 by

Members of the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees (MAPE) held informational picketing in support of about 170 employees at the Department of Health who have been laid off as a result of federal funding cuts.

Unions, local lawmakers and community volunteers are acting to support Minnesotans ensnared by the Trump administration’s reckless attempt to gut the federal workforce.

“If the Trump administration turned you away, Minnesota wants you,” Gov. Tim Walz said, announcing a new one-stop website with referrals to state employment openings, resources for veterans and tips for accessing state unemployment insurance benefits.

DFL legislators, meanwhile, have introduced bills that would bolster the safety net for workers navigating the federal chaos.

One measure would guarantee unemployment benefits for workers who accepted the so-called “fork-in-the-road offer” from Trump megadonor Elon Musk, head of the administration’s “DOGE” team.

Jacob Romans, president of American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3699, which represents 2,300 VA hospital workers, praised the proposal. He called it “legitimate” to question whether DOGE and the Trump administration would honor terms of the buyout through Sept. 30, as originally promised.

Another bill would establish a relocation bonus program for veterans who have been fired by the Trump administration, incentivizing public employees to continue their public service in Minnesota. Veterans make up roughly 30% of the federal government’s workforce.

Some House DFLers are also pushing a measure to tack on a 13-week extension of unemployment benefits for government workers whose federal benefits expire.

“We want to make sure that these dedicated public servants stay here in Minnesota and are not forced to leave their communities and find work elsewhere,” Rep. Pete Johnson of Duluth said. “But the goal is clear – make the job unbearable for workers so that they leave.”

“What we are trying to do is absorb some of the shock and the impact of the Trump-Musk actions, and protect Minnesota’s economy,” Rep. Greenman of Minneapolis said. “Right now our job is to protect Minnesota with the power that we have.”

Unions, too, have stepped up their advocacy on behalf of federal workers. As their attorneys continue fighting Trump’s war on the federal workforce in court, unions announced a new partnership that aims to connect individuals impacted by the cuts with free legal support.

The Rise Up Federal Workers Legal Defense Network, backed by the AFL-CIO and several federal government unions, put out the call for attorneys to volunteer their services to advocate for workers who have seen their rights violated – and careers upended – by the Trump administration’s recklessness.

“Attacks on federal workers are attacks on all workers and on the essential services that our communities rely on daily,” AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said. “Getting these workers the justice they deserve in the face of this onslaught will take all of us.”

Anna Chu, executive director of We The Action, an organization that connects volunteer attorneys with community initiatives, said lawyers are “uniquely positioned” to assist federal employees in this moment.

“This is a moment for lawyers to support the federal workers who serve us all,” Chu added.

Tens of thousands of federal workers have been laid off, put on administrative leave or left their jobs since Trump took office. Over 18,000 federal employees reside in Minnesota.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Union plumbers provide free repairs on Water’s Off day of service

April 10, 2025 by

Jared Solway (L), Tyler McGhan and Erika Reil.

Erika Reil, Tyler McGhan and Jared Solway spent a Saturday morning last month making plumbing repairs at the home of a Marine veteran in St. Paul’s West Seventh neighborhood.

They put a new seat on a basement toilet and replaced its fill valve and flapper to stop it from running. Upstairs, the crew removed and reinstalled the hot and cold faucets on a new bathroom sink, after a handyman installed them backwards.

And best of all for the homeowner, Reil, McGhan and Solway did the work for free as part of Water’s Off, their union’s annual day of service.

Sponsored by St. Paul Plumbers Local 34 and Minneapolis Local 15, the event provides free service calls to low-income, senior and disabled homeowners in the Twin Cities. Journey workers and apprentices volunteer their skills, and union contractors donate any supplies and parts needed to complete the repairs.

Since its founding in 1994, union volunteers have given more than 14,000 hours of their services to over 4,000 households at a value of over $2 million. And that doesn’t include the savings on their future water bills.

“I think a lot of people don’t realize how much plumbing they use in their daily life,” Reil said. “They don’t think about it – until they need it.”

Reil, a Local 34 member, works as a foreman with Modern Heating and Air. Both McGhan and Solway are in the second year of Local 34’s apprenticeship program and employed by Mike’s Custom Mechanical.

Local Community Action Partner-ship agencies help unions identify homeowners in need of assistance.

Find a list of union residential plumbers in the Twin Cities at members.minnesotamca.org/directory.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Contractor who stiffed Bricklayers loses license, must pay $70,000

March 12, 2025 by

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi (R) held a media briefing with Bricklayers Local 1 President Doug Schroeder (L) and Fair Contracting Foundation Executive Director Mike Wilde.

A local masonry contractor pled guilty last month to felony tax fraud after a joint investigation by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office and the Minnesota Department of Revenue found that he failed to report $2.5 million in income and did not pay taxes that should have been withheld from his employees’ paychecks.

As part of the plea, Stillwater Masonry owner Todd Konigson received a sentence of three years’ probation. Konigson must pay over $70,000 in restitution to the state and forfeit his state contractor’s license, and he is barred from holding any position of authority in a construction, remodeling or masonry firm in Minnesota.

The charges stemmed from an investigation into Konigson’s books from 2017 to 2022.

County Attorney John Choi said the investigation began after his office received complaints that Konigson had failed to pay workers, sub-contractors and vendors related to work on the historic Masonic Temple in St. Paul.

Previously, Stillwater Masonry entered into an agreement with Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 1 to become one of the union’s signatory contractors. BAC Local 1 President Doug Schroeder said Konigson signed on to meet the terms of a project labor agreement (PLA) covering a publicly subsidized development in Duluth.

PLAs are pre-hire collective bargaining agreements that establish minimum conditions of employment – like wages and benefit contributions – on a project before contractors begin bidding on the work.

Stillwater Masonry failed to make the agreed-upon contributions to its workers’ health and pension funds on four projects, Schroeder said. The funds have since taken independent civil action to recoup most of what they are owed.

But Konigson’s blatant disregard for his workers was a red flag for investigators, according to Mike Wilde, director of the Fair Contracting Foundation, an independent watchdog in the public construction industry.

“An employer or a contractor, even those bidding on a public contract, if they’re willing to cheat the very people that do the work for them, then they’re certainly OK with cheating their subcontractor, the project owner or the taxpayer at large,” Wilde said during a press conference to announce the plea at the County Attorney’s offices.

Contractors who commit tax fraud aren’t just cheating the system, Choi said. They’re getting a leg up on responsible firms and cheating the public services that rely on tax dollars.

Choi’s office is one of the first in the state to hire a full-time wage-theft investigator, who has been prioritizing payroll fraud, misclassification and similar crimes since 2022.

“If we can develop true partnerships with our labor community, our advocacy community and create the conditions by which people can come forward – and also work out the systems that can investigate and prosecute these crimes – that’s the secret sauce to make (cases) like this happen,” Choi said.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Proposal would allow Minnesota Uber, Lyft drivers to unionize

March 10, 2025 by

Dawit Kassa (R) spoke during a Capitol press conference on a bill that would allow Uber and Lyft drivers to unionize. (SEIU photo)

Two labor-endorsed state lawmakers announced plans last month to introduce legislation that would give drivers in Minnesota the right to unionize and bargain collectively with ride-hailing apps like Uber and Lyft.

Drivers in the Twin Cities have been organizing in recent years to push local and state officials to address low pay, safety concerns and a lack of transparency in their industry. State lawmakers responded last year with a bill establishing a new minimum wage and other guarantees.

But Dawit Kassa, a driver who served on Gov. Tim Walz’s task force to offer recommendations for the new law, said it doesn’t do enough to level the playing field between the ride-hailing companies and their drivers.

“No law is going to address all of the issues we are facing from these companies,” Kassa said. “We need a union. We need a seat at the table so we can ensure this industry works for us.”

Kassa was among roughly 20 Uber and Lyft drivers at a Capitol press conference Feb. 25. Most were wearing the Service Employees union’s trademark purple shirts, and SEIU Local 26 President Greg Nammacher said the union would support any Uber and Lyft drivers looking to organize.

Lead authors Rep. Samakab Hussein (D-St. Paul) and Sen. Zaynab Mohamed (D-Minneapolis) said they are modeling their bills after a historic ballot measure approved by Massachusetts voters in November.

The Massachusetts law establishes a process for drivers to organize a union and, if successful, bargain one contract with all the apps licensed to operate in the state, known as “sectoral bargaining.”

Drivers, like most other workers in the gig economy, are classified by law as independent contractors, making them ineligible to form a union without a special process like the one in Massachusetts.

Under the proposal from Hussein and Mohamed, pro-union drivers would need to sign up at least 25% of the potential bargaining unit – open to anyone who has completed 100 rides in the previous quarter – before contract talks could begin.

Any tentative agreement would need approval from a majority of voting union members and from the commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Labor before taking effect.

The proposal also establishes an arbitration process if the union and ride-hailing apps fail to reach an agreement within six months of opening talks.

Hussein said that stories from Uber and Lyft drivers confirmed that they need collective bargaining to address their shared concerns around fare transparency and pay for time spent waiting for a job.

And despite safeguards in the new state law, drivers continue to report being deactivated from their Uber or Lyft accounts – making it impossible for them to work – due to rider feedback, without getting an opportunity to respond in their defense.

“Without a voice, these problems are going to continue to come back to the Legislature,” Local 26’s Nammacher said. “The Legislature does not need to be the HR department for these multimillion-dollar, global corporations like Uber and Lyft,”

“Ride share companies continue to do the bare minimum while making millions,” Hussein added. “It’s time for change.”

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Report on AI’s impact a ‘wake-up moment’ for MN lawmakers, unions

February 5, 2025 by

Artificial intelligence is poised to have a greater impact on Minnesota’s workforce than most other states’, according to a report released last month. But it’s not too late for workers, unions and state lawmakers to erect guardrails that protect jobs and promote fairness and accountability.

Researchers at the Minnesota-based North Star Policy Action think tank found that the state ranks 10th nationally and second in the Midwest for workforce vulnerability to AI, with 500,000 Minnesotans – or 17% of the workforce – at “high risk” of having their jobs altered by the emerging technology.

Those impacts could be positive or negative for workers, but the implementation of AI is more likely to be good for workers, according to the report, if they have a voice in the process. And that means collective bargaining.

Aaron Rosenthal, North Star’s research director and author of the report, said he hopes its publication serves as a “wake-up moment for both unions and legislators.”

“AI is advancing rapidly in both its technological capacity and its workplace adoption,” Rosenthal said. “It’s time that workers are given protections to ensure that its implementation helps but doesn’t harm them, and that unions are aware of the need to bargain over AI in any negotiation.”

AI implementation can be a good thing for workers, employers and the economy, “but it has to be done in concert with worker welfare,” Rosenthal stressed.

An Al revolution?

AI systems are designed to perform complex tasks normally done by humans, like reasoning, decision making and creating. Generative AI systems like Chat GPT create content – text, images, music and more – from a human prompt, while machine learning AI systems analyze data, images or other systems to perform a task.

Unlike computerization and automation, which have impacted workers in blue-collar jobs like manufacturing, AI is more likely to impact workers with higher levels of education, according to the North Star report. AI is already impacting fields like medical research and health care, law and engineering.

The report points to Minnesota’s strong agricultural, software development and construction industries as areas AI is likely to impact moving forward, making the state more vulnerable than most others. But Rosenthal emphasized that AI is “probably going to touch every industry in the state, and it’s that breadth that’s going to require a similarly broad effort by legislators to respond.”

The stakes are high. AI’s potential impact “puts it into a class with only the most significant economic shifts, such as the Industrial Revolution,” during which labor lost a significant share of its income, according to the report.

Without protections for workers, the report warns, AI could “accelerate” income inequality and consolidate more wealth and power among the elites. One AI executive, Sam Altman, already has predicted the technology will create the world’s first trillionaire.

Legislative responses

What should lawmakers be doing in response? The report offers four policy recommendations, and they begin with strengthening workers’ bargaining rights.

Union density is low in many of the industries AI is poised to impact, but collective bargaining is an effective way for workers to “use their expertise to guide an effective employment of AI in their workplace,” Rosenthal said.

Other policy recommendations include worker training and transition programs, regulations governing AI’s use in employment decisions, and a long-term framework – or task force – for keeping tabs on the technology and its use.

State Sen. Erin Maye Quade (D-Apple Valley) co-sponsored a law passed last session to protect Minnesotans from AI-generated deep fakes and non-consensual sexual imagery. This session she hopes lawmakers will prohibit the use of AI in hiring decisions, as a first step toward regulating the technology’s impact on workers.

While the technology may be good at identifying the typical worker an employer has hired in the past, AI won’t be able to account for the racial or other biases that might have factored into those decisions.

“AI knows what, but it doesn’t know why,” Maye Quade said. “AI is built by humans, so it is rife with the same biases that humans carry. The thing about humans is we can be cognizant of our own biases and know that we have them and try to ameliorate that. AI is not going to do that.”

Maye Quade said she is hopeful that the hiring measure will gain bipartisan support in the Legislature. Other AI-related issues lawmakers could consider, she said, include the environmental impact of data centers built to support AI systems across the state and the technology’s use by state agencies.

“There’s only so much a state legislature can do,” Maye Quade acknowledged. “Even between last session and this session, we have seen AI be integrated almost against our will and in more places in our life. We just keep finding out more places.”

Space for unions to act

Some unions, meanwhile, already have taken steps to protect members against negative impacts of AI. In contract negotiations with entertainment studios in 2023, members of the Writers Guild bargained for language that allows them to use AI as a tool for script writing but protects against the use of fully AI-generated scripts.

And last month, National Nurses United – the umbrella organization that includes the Minnesota Nurses Association – put AI concerns at the forefront of its contract campaign covering more than 100,000 California nurses. The union conducted a survey last year that “found nurses repeatedly reported that their own assessments of patients did not match assessments from AI technology deployed in their facilities.”

North Star’s report suggests Minnesota unions should be taking similar action, whether it’s organizing new workers susceptible to AI’s impacts or bargaining to protect their current members.

“There’s an opportunity here for unions across the state to reach out to individuals in industries that are experiencing newly found precarity due to AI and build cross-class, cross-industry solidarity,” Rosenthal said.

“I think there’s a way of looking at this as Luddite panic about technology, but we’re not saying that AI innovation is a bad thing,” he added. “Far from it. It could complement existing work, making jobs more fulfilling by automating mundane tasks. But it could also produce income inequality by cutting wages, leading to job replacement.

“The difference comes down to legislative responses and, most importantly, the ability for workers to organize and bargain around the shape that AI implementation takes.”

Learn more

Read the full report, “Progress and Protection: Aligning AI Innovation with Worker Welfare,” online at northstarpolicy.org.

– Michael Moore, UA editor

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Up for a challenge: Competitors test their skills at WBS Trade Games

December 10, 2024 by

Ashley Kula (L) and Anya Davis raced to finish Cement Masons Local 633’s challenge.

It wasn’t gold, silver or bronze, but there was plenty of metal in play during the Trade Games Challenge at St. Paul Pipefitters Local 455’s training center Nov. 21.

Hosted by Women Building Success (WBS) to celebrate National Apprenticeship Week, the friendly, hands-on competition drew nearly 200 participants in its second year.

“This event has hands-on challenge activities for each trade,” WBS board member Jenny Winkelaar, director of workforce and community development for Operating Engineers Local 49, said. “It is a fun way to showcase what the trades have to offer.”

Competitors included apprentices, journey workers and community members with an interest in exploring careers in the union construction trades.

Cement Masons apprentice Grace Olson checked out her virtual paint job.

Participants walked from station to station on the shop floor, trying their hand at challenges sponsored by different local union apprenticeship programs. Each union designed the challenge to reflect their unique craft.

At booths hosted by Plumbers Local 34 and Sprinklerfitters Local 417, instructors timed competitors as they followed the instructions for connecting pieces of pipe into a “pipe guy.” Insulators Local 34 challenged competitors to affix insulation to the proper place on a pipe structure, like a puzzle.

Some Trade Games challenges pitted competitors against each other. Laborers Local 563 held wheelbarrow races. At Pipefitters Local 455’s station, it was a chain hoist race, with competitors racing to raise their large spool to the finish point fastest.

Madi Jennings, a fourth-year apprentice with the Insulators union, tied rebar at Ironworkers Local 512’s station, clocking the second-fastest time of the event’s early session. Local 512 training coordinator Erik Hansen said that it’s good for apprentices like Jennings to gain exposure to other crafts – and good for apprenticeship programs’ recruitment efforts, too.

“We’re hoping this kind of becomes a word-of-mouth thing,” Hansen said. “OK, you’re already in a trade, but maybe you know someone considering their options, and you tell them, ‘Hey, check out the Ironworkers.’”

For competitors like Matt Segal, who learned about the event from a friend, the Trade Games Challenge also served as a career fair. After working in the tech industry for a decade, he’s looking for a change.

“I’m exploring my options and seeing what’s out there,” Segal, 34, said after splitting a pair of chain hoist races – hosted by the Pipefitters – with IBEW Local 110 member Marisa McAndrew. “I like working with my hands, and I’d like to learn some skills that I can take with me – that are applicable in my home and anywhere I go.

“It’s been exciting to be here and talk not only to trades instructors, but tradespeople, too.”

Dorlisa Squires (L), an apprentice with Local 49, and Glenda Tejada race to assemble a “pipe guy” at Sprinklerfitters Local 417’s challenge.
Rockett (R), who said she uses just one name, matched insulation with piping at Insulators Local 34’s station during the Trade Games Challenge.
Ironworkers Local 512’s Erik Hansen timed Madi Jennings, an Insulators apprentice, as she raced to tie rebar.
Mahaila Houle (R), a career navigator with Operating Engineers Local 49, guided Plumbers Local 34 apprentice Karen Severson through the excavator event.

For most attendees, though, the primary objective was fun and fellowship.

At Cement Masons Local 633’s station, that meant playing in the “mud,” as competitors raced to flatten and level wet cement, edge the sides and install control joints – the cuts in walkways or other slabs that allow for movement due to temperature or moisture.

Local 633 apprentice Grace Olson was not tempted to leave her craft behind after trying the virtual spraypainting booth, hosted by the Finishing Trades Institute, Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT) District Council 82’s training arm.

“I think I did OK, but I probably could have done better,” the third-year apprentice laughed. “I think I over-sprayed it a little.”

But Plumbers Local 34 apprentice Karen Severson joked that she “might switch trades” after climbing into the excavator that Operating Engineers Local 49 parked inside the Pipefitters’ training hall, challenging participants to pick up and transfer a flagpole from one road cone to another. “That was fun,” Severson said.

WBS was founded in 2017 to recognize and promote the achievements of women in union construction trades. WBS hosts an annual awards ceremony, an apprenticeship photo contest and other events.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Union educators tracking effects of federal funding loss

October 23, 2024 by

NEA President Becky Pringle spoke to media members alongside SPFE member Nicki Nolen before the “walk-in” at Adams Spanish Immersion school.

During the previous three school years, Nicki Nolen worked as Adams Spanish Immersion Elementary School’s reading support teacher. She spent school days dropping into kindergarten, first- and second-grade classrooms, where she led small, guided reading groups tailored to meet students’ individual needs.

Every elementary school in the St. Paul Public Schools had a reading support teacher like Nolen – until this year, when the federal pandemic-relief program that funded the position, known as ESSER, expired.

“This year I’ve had families coming to me in the hallway and saying, ‘Oh, you’re not a reading teacher anymore, what happened?’” Nolen, now a first-grade teacher at Adams, said. “And I have to say that the funding was cut.”

In a show of unity on Sept. 30 – the ESSER program’s official expiration date – St. Paul educators, school administrators, union leaders and lawmakers held two events to raise awareness of the impact the loss of funding will have on students and families.

“What will end are after-school programs,” National Education Association President Becky Pringle said. “What will end are successful literacy programs. What will end is that one-to-one attention that our students need. What will end is making sure we have counselors and mental health services.”

Pringle, who leads the nation’s largest labor union, joined a “walk-in” event at Adams before the start of the school day, one of several staged by members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators at their school buildings Sept. 30. Similar events took place in 17 other states, Pringle said.

SPPS received approximately $207 million in ESSER funds as part of the 2021 American Rescue Plan (ARP). Among other things, the district used the money to expand arts and after-school programming.

It also went toward the literacy program that brought Nolen and other reading teachers into the classroom, known as What I Need Now (WINN). Due to its success, the district allocated $7 million this year to keep some WINN programming in place, but it came at the expense of other district offerings.

And WINN didn’t survive at many elementary schools, including Adams.

“COVID funds gave SPPS the opportunity to focus on what students actually need to be successful learners,” Nolen said. “Students, parents and educators all saw our students improve. The loss of these funds will be devastating for our community.”

Pringle said the NEA has been working in partnership with the Alliance to Reclaim Our Schools to track and evaluate the effectiveness of local initiatives funded by ESSER, like St. Paul’s literacy program.

“This is actually working,” Pringle said. “We have evidence that we are closing those reading gaps, we have the evidence that students are doing better, that their social, emotional and academic learning is increasing… We need to make sure that we have this funding permanent.”

Later in the afternoon, Pringle joined a press conference with school board members, educators and U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, who said the COVID aid provided a glimpse of the gains schools could make with fully funded Title I and IDEA programs, federal supports for low-income students and students with disabilities, respectively.

The 4th District representative has co-sponsored the Keep Our PACT Act to put the federal government on a 10-year path to full funding for both programs.

“As a former teacher, I understand the importance – as well as the challenges – of ensuring that every child receives a great education,” McCollum said. “We must fulfill our commitment to our nation’s youth, no matter their abilities, skin color, zip code or background.”

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Flanagan marks first Workplace Rights Week at union laundry in St. Paul

September 25, 2024 by

The Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry is putting a spotlight on workers’ rights this week, with hundreds of outreach events across the state to educate workers and employers.

It’s the state’s first-ever Workplace Rights Week, and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan marked the occasion today at an industrial laundry facility on St. Paul’s East Side, where she and DLI Commissioner Nicole Blissenbach met with union workers and plant managers.

“This is a place where workers can feel supported and know their rights,” Flanagan said. “We can help spread that word to other worksites across the state of Minnesota.”

Health Systems Cooperative Laundries (HSCL) employs 230 people who pick up, clean and deliver linens to 600 clinics and 28 hospitals. The 80,000-square-foot facility, located on the former Hamm’s brewery site, processes up to 1 million pounds of laundry each week.

Members of three unions work at HSCL: the SEIU-affiliated Workers United, Operating Engineers Local 70 and Teamsters Local 471. The workforce is diverse, with 12 different languages spoken at the facility.

Workers United Vice President Kathy Hanshew spoke during an event at Health Systems Cooperative Laundry during Workplace Rights Week.

Workers’ rights on the job are the same no matter what language they use, Flanagan noted, crediting HSCL and its unions for working together to educate all employees about their protections and benefits.

Kathy Hanshew, vice president of Workers United, said union members at HSCL “have no trouble … defending themselves, defending their fellow workers and standing up for what’s right inside the workplace.”

“We understand that a safe, supportive and fair environment to work in is not only essential for our success as a company, but also to the individual employee,” HSCL Director of Operations Tabitha Zieman said. “I’m proud to work alongside these 230 employees who come from various backgrounds.”

DLI rolled out Workplace Rights Week in response to a flurry of new labor laws passed by state lawmakers since 2023, when union-endorsed DFLers took control of the Legislature.

The changes include an earned sick and safe time law, new protections for pregnant and lactating parents, and safety standards specific to the meatpacking and warehouse industries. Other laws crack down on wage theft, ban noncompete clauses and prohibit employers from holding captive-audience meetings about politics, religion or collective bargaining.

Blissenbach said the agency hopes its weeklong push will “reach workers, managers and owners with the message and materials” they need to maintain compliance with the new regulatory landscape – and ensure Minnesota remains “one of the best places for workers and their families.”

“We know that it takes everyone to maintain a safe and healthy work environment, where every worker realizes protections afforded to them in the law,” she said.

Learn more about Workplace Rights Week, which runs through Sept. 28, at https://dli.mn.gov/rights-week.

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Pipefitters’ service day keeps heat on for homeowners in need

September 24, 2024 by

Members of Pipefitters Local 455 and Local 539 gathered for a photo after the Heat’s On volunteer breakfast in Roseville.

Union pipefitters on Saturday carried forward their fall tradition of providing free furnace repairs and inspections to senior, low-income and disabled homeowners in the Twin Cities.

St. Paul-based Steamfitters Pipefitters Local 455 and Minneapolis-based Local 539 team up for the annual service day, Project Heat’s On, each year. Union volunteers provide service to homeowners identified by two Community Action Partnership agencies, and union contractors, members of the Minnesota Mechanical Contractors Association, cover the cost of materials needed for the repairs.

The volunteer effort, started in 1986, has since given back over $4 million in volunteer work hours and repairs to nearly 8,500 Minnesota households, reducing their energy costs and preventing heat failure.

Local 455 journeyman Brian Nelson volunteered for the sixth time this year, traveling to Cottage Grove with fellow Local 455 member Ray Bear, a four-time Heat’s On volunteer. At their first of two scheduled service calls, they tuned up a recent retiree’s furnace.

Brian Nelson (L) and Ray Bear tune up a retirees’ furnace in Cottage Grove during Heat’s On 2024.

“I just like giving back,” Nelson said. “You feel good about it. Doing this for people who need help feels better than doing it for your shop.”

Bear said union volunteers offer more than just their expertise during Heat’s On visits; they provide companionship, too.

“Talking with the customers – a lot of them don’t have a lot of resources or see a lot of visitors,” Bear said. “Providing that connection is the part that’s the best.”

That’s what Sonia Gass, executive director of Community Action Partnership of Ramsey and Washington Counties, refers to as “the human touch,” and at a breakfast before volunteers fanned out across the metro, Gass told union members that it’s an important part of the service they provide. it

She remembered tagging along with a volunteer crew that serviced the home of a retired big-band musician. “The service prodder asked him, ‘Do you play?’” Gass said. “And before you knew it, the service provider was getting an hourlong concert while he did the repairs.”

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Minnesota apprentice wins Insulators union’s international skills contest

July 26, 2024 by

Pictured (L to R) are Tommy Haun, the union’s international training director; Local 34 Business Agent William Meyer; Jordan Haller, who hoisted a Stanley Cup replica at the awards banquet; and Local 34 Business Manager Albert Byers. (photo by William Brouillette)

If insulating were an Olympic event, Jordan Haller would be heading to Paris this summer.

The 22-year-old from East Bethel placed first in a skills competition open to 4,000 apprentices with the International Association of Heat and Frost Insulators and Allied Workers, held June 23-27 in Orlando, Fla.

Haller is the third apprentice from Twin Cities-based Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34 to win the Master Apprentice Competition in 20 years.

“I think it says a lot about what our training program can do, about our instructors and the knowledge they have, the experience they have,” Haller said. “We’re putting a lot of time and effort and money into the apprentices, and when they’re coming out toward the end, they’re ready to go.”

Haller is finishing the fourth and final year of his apprenticeship with Local 34, and he will “turn out” as a journey-level worker later this summer. He entered the trade out of high school at the encouragement of his father, a former insulator apprentice who now owns a contracting firm, Insulation Midwest Inc.

John Hosley, who teaches fourth-year apprentices in the local, credited Haller’s work ethic and said the apprentice is “very mechanically inclined.”

“We’re not a very big trade, so it’s kind of nice that if you’re really good at it they acknowledge it with this competition,” Hosley said. “And then there’s the camaraderie that goes into it, the connections you make.”

Haller’s journey to Orlando began on the shop floor in Local 34’s training hall in St. Paul, where he competed with fellow fourth-year apprentices for the right to represent the local at the Midwest Conference competition in Omaha at the end of April. Haller won both competitions, advancing to the finals along with seven other regional champions from the U.S. and Canada.

In Orlando, the finalists took a written exam on Day 1, then spent the next three days in the shop, working to complete a project that would be judged by experts in mechanical insulation.

“They hand you a specification sheet of how this project needs to be insulated and finished, how it’s getting judged, what day it needs to be done and how everything needs to look,” Haller said.

(photos by William Brouillette)

The location of the competition changes each year, and contest planners tailor the final project to reflect the locale. In Orlando, of course, that could mean just one thing.

“Basically, it was two pipe risers with a big, large sweep that kind of represented the entrance to Disneyworld,” Haller said. “There were some other pipe systems to the side of that, and a large cake-looking thing in the middle, representing the 20th anniversary of the Master Apprentice Competition. And then there was a box with a big copper pipe that was insulated to represent a roller coaster, like the Tower of Terror.”

After receiving the specifications, Haller and the other finalists went to work.

“My approach was to create game plans for each day and set goals and reach those goals no matter what,” Haller said. “Making sure you can get it done is job No. 1, but while you’re doing that, take these skills you’ve learned over the last four years and apply them in that moment – and just attack it.”

The pressure was intense, Haller added.

“There were a lot of points throughout the three days of the shop competition where I felt like I was behind as far as the workload,” he said. “I felt like I was doing a good job, but there were moments where I felt like I needed to get going, otherwise I’m not going to finish.”

Indeed, Haller said he worked right up until time was called on Day 4 of the competition.

From there, it was a waiting game as judges inspected the apprentices’ projects before an awards banquet the following night.

“That’s the big moment,” Haller said. “They called each of us up one by one, and then announced the winner. It was probably one of the biggest moments of my life. My heart was pounding out of my neck.”

Haller said he felt both relief and excitement upon hearing his name. After shaking the other competitors’ hands – “all great guys, all top notch too,” he said – organizers presented Haller with the trophy, a replica of the National Hockey League’s Stanley Cup.

He also received a cash prize and a smaller cup that will go on display in Local 34’s trophy case. All eight finalists received scholarships to pursue training as an apprenticeship instructor at the international union’s facility in Maryland, too.

Sharing his skills and expertise with up-and-coming insulators is something Haller said he would like to pursue as a way of giving back to the union that gave him an opportunity to challenge himself at the highest level.

“I’m thankful for all the instructors I had, my union officers, everybody involved with the local side – and also on the contractor side, especially my dad, my boss and the journeymen out in the field, who I’ve worked with for many days,” Haller said. “I’m thankful for every experience that I’ve had throughout my whole apprenticeship.”

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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