Unions bring tradeswomen together with Minneapolis conference

October 4, 2019 by

Tradeswomen participating in a service project at Ascension House included (L to R) Jamie Joseph of Painters Local 61 in St. Paul, Timesha Beattie of Bricklayers Local 5 in Houston, Carissa Shaffer of Local 61 and Keisha Campbell of Carpenters Local 327 in Boston.

Tradeswomen from across the U.S. and Canada are descending on the Twin Cities for the union-sponsored Tradeswomen Build Nations conference this weekend.

In its ninth year, the annual event has grown to become the world’s largest gathering of women working in the skilled construction trades. Organizers expect this year’s conference, taking place at the Hilton in downtown Minneapolis, to draw 2,500 participants, as well as labor leaders, elected officials and industry experts.

“On a lot of job sites, you’re the only woman there,” Tamika Foster, a member of St. Paul Plumbers Local 34, said. “This conference is a nice reminder that you’re not the only one.”

Increasing women’s participation in the construction workforce is a major focus of the conference. About 3 percent of construction tradespeople nationwide are women, and the rate hasn’t changed much over the last decade.

There are plenty of benefits to a career in the building trades: family-sustaining wages, high-quality health insurance, retirement security and, notably for women, pay equity.

Women working in the construction trades earn about 96 cents for every dollar earned by men, and under a union contract, the pay scale works the same for men and women workers alike.

“You can support your family all on your own,” said Monique Lewis, a member of Steamfitters Local 469 from Phoenix. “It’s an amazing feeling to wake up an have all that earning opportunity in front of you.”

Minnesotans from the United Association participating in the conference gathered on the steps of Ascension House for a photo.

Early arrivers to the conference participated in a Day of Service this morning. Some packed meals at Second Harvest Heartland in Brooklyn Park; others spruced up Haven Housing’s Ascension Place, a women’s shelter in North Minneapolis.

As she stood atop a ladder painting a hallway in Ascension House, Timesha Beattie, a member of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 5 in Houston, said she’s excited to reconnect with the union sisters she met a year ago, when the conference was in Seattle.

“Last year I was completely amazed that we had so many strong women working in the Building Trades. It was inspiring,” Beattie said. “I’m looking forward to seeing what everyone has been able to do, the ideas they’ve come up with to recruit and inspire more girls to join us.”

“We’re half the population, and maybe 2 percent on the job site?” Foster said. “That’s a whole untapped labor market – half the world!”

The Tradeswomen Build Nations conference is sponsored by North America’s Building Trades Unions, an alliance of 14 national and international unions in the building and construction industry that collectively represent over 3 million skilled craft professionals in the U.S. and Canada.

The conference continues through Sunday.

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , ,

Fresh air, free clinics, lots of smiles at union-sponsored outdoors clinic

October 3, 2019 by

More than 40 boys and girls sampled shooting sports, fishing and archery under the guidance of local union volunteers Sunday, Sept. 15, at Get Youth Outdoors Day in Clear Lake Township.

Among the attendees were four siblings from Princeton: 9-year-old Jack Kohl, 12-year-old Laura, 13-year-old Timothy and 15-year-old James. It wasn’t long after they arrived at his archery station that Bryce Mastin, a volunteer instructor, sniffed out the sibling rivalry.

“You can all hit the target,” Mastin said, lining up the young archers to shoot at a stuffed buck. “Now we’re going to find out who can put meat in the freezer.”

Before long, other children had wandered over, looking to get in on the family’s friendly competition. Some of their arrows whizzed past the deer. Others pierced its back and side.

But it was the second-oldest Kohl, Timothy, who hit the “kill zone,” site of the deer’s vital organs. Mastin howled with delight as Timothy collected grudging high-fives from his brothers and sisters.

It was the kind of scene Mark Conroy, business manager of Roofers Local 96, saw play out over and over at the event, which has been offered free to area children for the last eight years, thanks, in part, to proceeds from Local 96’s sporting clays shoot, held the day before.

Eric Bakken, an event coordinator with the Union Sportsmen’s Alliance and native of Blaine, taught 9-year-old Elsie Franklin of Oak Grove how to cast a fishing line.

“I walked around there during the youth event, and every single kid had a big old grin on their face,” Conroy said. “It is always a fun event, and it just keeps getting better every year.”

Both the sporting clays shoot and the youth event were held at Wild Marsh Sporting Clays, and facilitated in partnership with the Union Sportsmen’s Alliance. The USA is a nationwide nonprofit that builds union solidarity by bringing together members who enjoy hunting, fishing and the outdoors.

“It bridges a lot of gaps,” Scott Vance, USA’s executive director said. “We do a lot of events to connect unions together through conservation and passing that outdoors heritage along to the next generation.”

To make that work possible, local unions sponsor fundraising banquets and events around the country. Roofers Local 96’s sporting clays shoot, which drew 226 shooters Sept. 14, raised a record $150,000 in its ninth year.

The success of Local 96’s shooting competition – and of Get Youth Outdoors Day – speaks to the support of the Roofers’ international union, local building trades unions and their vendors, Conroy said.

Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 1 and the Central Minnesota building trades council co-sponsored the youth event, along with the National Shooting Sports Foundation. The law firm of Reinhart, Boerner, Van Deuren covered the cost of renting the facility for Saturday’s competition, and the Roofers’ international sponsored any youth shooter between 11 and 17 who wished to compete.

Kinsey Robinson, the Roofers’ international president, attended both the competition and the youth event. Robinson has long been a vocal proponent of USA, and he noted that about 70 percent of union tradespeople nationwide count outdoors sports among their hobbies.

“We want to support them, and we want to ensure access to the outdoors for their sons and daughters,” Robinson said.

“Events like this around the country bring together different crafts, different unions,” he added. “And just like in collective bargaining or political issues, we’re speaking with one voice. Except here we’re speaking with one voice to say we support conservation.”

Gavin Goenner, 11, tried his hand at clay shooting with coaching from Kinsey Robinson, international president of the United Union of Roofers.

Before Get Youth Outdoors Day wrapped up, participants watched a dog-training exhibition, enjoyed a catered lunch and received a bag stuffed with birdcalls, outdoors literature and other freebies.

“These tools that they learned today, we hope it’s something they carry with them,” USA conservation coordinator Cody Campbell said. “For most of these kids, this is an opportunity they wouldn’t get on a normal basis.”

At least one youngster was hooked. By the time his name was pulled during a drawing for door prizes after lunch, he was already back on the trap range, busting clays.

“Events like this are about teaching kids that there’s more to life than video games, there’s more to life than concrete,” Vance said. “We love doing events like this. We see it as the culmination of our mission.”

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Carpenters say prominent developer turns blind eye to abuse allegations

October 2, 2019 by

Samuel Saucedo (L) and Eric Macias (R) attended the Sept. 16 Roseville City Council meeting with their union rep, Jorge Duran, to share their experience working on construction sites managed by Reuter Walton.

What might have been a routine redevelopment deal instead prompted members of the Roseville City Council last month to weigh their oversight responsibilities when it comes to developers reaping tax benefits from the northern suburb.

During a final round of public comment on an arrangement between the city and Reuter Walton Companies, two carpenters stepped forward and detailed abuses they experienced while working on the Minneapolis-based developer’s construction sites.

Samuel Saucedo of Minneapolis and Eric Macias of Rochester say they are still owed thousands of dollars in unpaid wages for work they did on Reuter Walton projects over the course of more than a year.

The two men, who often worked side by side, decided about a year ago to stop accepting jobs arranged by a common “labor broker,” Jose Merino. That included jobs on Reuter Walton sites.

They subsequently filed complaints with the state Department of Labor, but dropped them, Saucedo and Macias told council members Sept. 16, after receiving hostile phone calls from Merino.

In an interview before the public hearing, Macias remembered answering the phone call while his wife, who had recently given birth, looked on.

“You don’t know me. I’ve got money. I’ve got people. Somebody will find you,” Macias remembered hearing. “He said he’s going to kill me and kill my wife and my daughter, just because I want to get paid the money he owes me.”

After the call, Macias’ wife began hiding whenever anybody came to the door. Even when it was Eric.

A shell game with wages

At the public hearing, a representative of Reuter Walton denied any involvement in the allegations made by Macias and Saucedo. The developer has only two minor labor violations on its record, which resulted in fines totaling $1,000, he said.

The developer also claimed to have cut ties with a carpentry subcontractor that, workers say, did business with Jose Merino, Caliper Building Systems.

But Jorge Duran, a representative for the North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters, said a muddled network of contractors, subcontractors and brokers breeds worker exploitation on large construction projects. And it won’t change unless developers are ultimately held accountable.

“Reuter Walton, they claim they don’t know what’s going on, but what does that really tell you?” Duran said. “That’s why the City of Roseville needs to keep an eye on who this developer hires.”

For Saucedo and Macias, trying to get paid for their work on Reuter Walton projects was a demoralizing cycle that left them spiraling further and further into debt. Subcontractors would say they were waiting to get paid by the contractors; contractors would say they had paid the subcontractors in full.

Macias said he finally approached a Reuter Walton representative. “I said, ‘I’m at your jobsite every day, seven days a week, 12 hours a day. Why don’t you guys pay us?’” Macias remembered. “He said I don’t know. So you go to Caliper, and they say I don’t know. You go to Jose, he says I don’t know.”

Macias said he remains over $9,000 in debt.

Unsafe working conditions, unsafe living conditions

Wage theft wasn’t the only abuse workers recruited by Jose Merino say they experienced. Saucedo said his two teenage sons found work with Merino, despite being minors. (They weren’t paid either.)

And safety wasn’t even an afterthought, Saucedo added, resulting in “a lot of injuries.”

Merino “never provided safety equipment for us – no glasses, harnesses, hardhats, gloves, nothing,” Saucedo said. “People used to get shot with the nail gun, and he wouldn’t pay the hospital bills.”

Workers say Merino recruits them to move to the Twin Cities – Saucedo relocated from North Dakota, Macias from California – with promises of housing for themselves and their families, in three-bedroom, two-bathroom apartments.

The apartments turned out to be real, Saucedo and Macias said, but there were more than a dozen other construction workers already living in them.

And while he didn’t always get paid by Merino, Saucedo added, Merino never failed to collect the $300-per-week rent.

“I would work 70 hours per week, and he would pay me for 45,” Saucedo said. “And he would never pay me overtime.”

Both Saucedo and Macias regret ever moving to the Twin Cities.

“You drive with your family downtown Minneapolis, see so many big Reuter Walton signs,” Macias said. “It makes me really mad. I can’t believe they aren’t paying people.”

Union steps up pressure

Since walking away from Merino a year ago, Saucedo and Macias have joined the Carpenters union. Macias laughed when asked about the difference between working for Merino and working union. “It’s unbelievable,” he said.

But the two have also provided union representatives like Duran a window into the shadowy world of nonunion construction. Duran said he has talked to at least 150 other workers, many of whom are immigrants, who have experienced exploitation and wage theft at the hands of a labor broker.

“This is a very bad, infected virus in construction right now,” Duran said. “And it’s happening all across the state.”

In Roseville, council members didn’t go so far as to dump the redevelopment deal with Reuter Walton, but they did add language allowing the city to withhold and “claw back” tax financing dollars if Reuter Walton or any of its subcontractors on the project are found guilty of wage theft. And the language will be included in all future development deals.

The Carpenters union, meanwhile, plans to continue shining a light on the stories of Macias, Saucedo and other workers who allege mistreatment on Reuter Walton projects. The union also raised its concerns at a St. Paul City Council meeting in August, briefly putting a zoning change requested by Reuter Walton in jeopardy.

The union’s objective, public affairs director Richard Kolodziejski said, is to prevent future abuses by increasing public scrutiny at every level. Developers know Minnesota has a new wage-theft law on the books, and both the Attorney General’s Office and the Department of Labor have announced plans to put that new law to good use.

“The enforcement is going to come now,” Kolodziejski said. “The state is going to be holding (developers) accountable, not just the wage broker.

“So we’re going to keep ratcheting this up and, hopefully, tighten things up in our cities.”

Filed Under: Organizing Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Twin Cities workers launch campaign to stop construction industry abuses

December 18, 2018 by

Supporters of the “March for Dignity and Respect” make their way down Lake Street in Minneapolis’ Uptown neighborhood.

With a dramatic rally in the streets of south Minneapolis today, Twin Cities construction workers launched a new movement to improve labor standards in their industry and guarantee dignity for all workers.

“I don’t want to see any more injustice in construction,” Yimer Iriarte said at the start of a rush-hour march along Lake Street in Uptown. “We’re tired of seeing our brothers and sisters tired or hurt because of the way these contractors act.”

Iriarte is part of a group of local construction workers – mostly from residential projects – who began organizing with the Twin Cities-based worker center CTUL two years ago.

CTUL’s efforts to document abuses in the industry led to the arrest of a local construction contractor in September on criminal charges. The case exposed serious problems – wage theft, dangerous working conditions, labor trafficking – that are rampant in the industry’s web of contractors and subcontractors, workers allege.

Yimer Iriarte speaks at a rally before the march, alongside CTUL’s Veronica Mendez Moore.

Iriarte said he experienced wage theft and trafficking firsthand when a contractor refused to pay him and other immigrant workers for their labor.

“We were promised so many things that didn’t happen, and in the end we were threatened with immigration,” Iriarte said. “And I know it’s not just me.”

To raise industry standards, CTUL’s construction members are taking cues from local janitors, who recently won major improvements in the retail cleaning industry after a 6-year-long fight.

Janitors won by pressuring big-box chains like Target and Best Buy to sign Responsible Contractor Agreements, guaranteeing janitors employed by the store’s cleaning contractors have safe working conditions and a voice on the job.

Construction workers want large developers in the Twin Cities area to meet a similar demand: participation in the “Dignity and Respect Standards Council.” The council establish higher standards in the industry, and it would  create a process for monitoring construction sites to ensure all subcontractors are in compliance.

Workers first target is a big one: Lennar Homes. A nationwide firm, Lennar is the Twin Cities’ largest home-builder, and it stands to gain even more work under the City of Minneapolis’ ambitious new rezoning initiative, Minneapolis 2040.

According to CTUL, Lennar has seen a litany of reported abuses on its projects locally and across the country, including the labor trafficking charges filed in Hennepin County earlier this year and a jobsite fatality in Lakeville in 2016.

During the march along Lake Street, CTUL members stopped at a Wells Fargo branch to point out the bank’s history of lending to Lennar despite the allegations stemming from its projects.

And the march involved a bit of street theater. Actors performed an updated take on a centuries-old tradition throughout Spanish Central America, “Las Posadas.” The story alludes to Mary and Joseph’s difficult journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem in search of a warm place to stay the night, with an emphasis on its moral and political message.

The march drew over 100 people, including representatives of the Carpenters, Laborers and other Building Trades unions, who stood in solidarity with CTUL members.

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In some local unions, #MeToo has galvanized members

December 14, 2018 by

A hashtag that began trending on social media just over a year ago is now the rallying cry of a movement seeking to change cultural attitudes toward sexual harassment, especially in the workplace.

But ask a trade unionist, and she’ll likely tell you workplace cultures don’t change on their own.

Last month the East Side Freedom Library in St. Paul brought together a panel of local women fighting for change through the collective bargaining process. They exchanged ideas and strategies, reported their victories and setbacks, and reflected on the impact the #MeToo movement has had – and could still have – on both union and non-union workplaces.

It was the first in a series of monthly conversations planned by the ESFL and the University of Minnesota’s Labor Education Service exploring how labor and social movements intersect.

Up next: “The Labor Movement and Environmentalism.” The discussion is set to begin at 7 p.m. Dec. 17 at the Freedom Library, 1105 Greenbrier St.

Beyond celebrity scandal

The #MeToo hashtag – and the movement it inspired – created a community of support that emboldened women to come forward with their experiences of harassment. Their allegations helped reveal the misconduct of several powerful, prominent men, making headlines worldwide.

But these cases represent just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to workplace sexual harassment. Far less visible are the multitudes of women working in the shadows, harassed by bosses, clients or co-workers who aren’t rich or famous.

The federal agency that investigates workplace sexual harassment, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, says it is difficult to pinpoint how pervasive the problem is, as the overwhelming majority of those who experience harassment do not file a legal complaint. An EEOC task force two years ago estimated anywhere between 25 and 85 percent of working women experience sexual harassment – which includes unwanted touching or comments, requests for sexual favors and sexual assault – on the job.

In August, the National Women’s Law Center released a report analyzing the sexual harassment charges that do get reported. Between 2012 and 2016, researchers found, the most charges came from three industries ­– hospitality, retail and health care – that “employ women in lower paying jobs.”

“A precarious economic situation, including lack of a financial cushion, may make such women more vulnerable to coercion and harassment,” researchers wrote, adding that the same factors make women in low-paying jobs less likely to report harassment.

Shifting the power dynamics

Having a union on the job doesn’t protect workers – in low-wage jobs or any line of work – from sexual harassment. But harassment is fundamentally an abuse of power, and having a union increases workers’ collective power.

Two panelists at the Freedom Library last month discussed how their unions are using the power of solidarity to get justice for women who experience harassment, and to bargain contracts that protect against harassment in the first place.

In negotiations with 20 Twin Cities hotels, members of UNITE HERE Local 17 are demanding all housekeepers be equipped with panic buttons capable of calling for help at a moment’s notice. Local 17 President Christa Mello said union leaders decided to launch the “Hands Off Pants On” campaign after talking to members about their experiences in guest rooms.

“Some of the severe cases of harassment and assault made it really apparent something needed to be done,” Mello said. “Other workers didn’t even know it was a problem … to have something like that happen. And management didn’t want to address it because these (guests) are the people giving them money.”

UNITE HERE locals in other U.S. cities, starting with Chicago, have successfully bargained for panic buttons. Mello said Local 17 members plan to lobby state lawmakers in support of a bill requiring all hotels to equip housekeepers with panic buttons.

Standing with survivors

Members of Local 2822 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees took up #MeToo organizing under much different circumstances, local president Ali Fuhrman said.

The clerical workers’ union last year mobilized support for a member sexually assaulted by her manager at the correctional facility where they work. The survivor, Fuhrman said, reported the incident to management immediately, but it wasn’t until her bosses attempted to discipline her – not her attacker – that she got AFSCME involved. (Management said she was in violation of a policy prohibiting corrections workers from being at the facility on their days off.)

“For me, it was a real quick introduction to supervisor abuse, to the … lengths management will go to protect their own,” said Fuhrman, who won election as president of Local 2822 just two months before the assault.

The county finally put the supervisor on administrative leave after a call from union leadership. When Fuhrman asked for a meeting with a director in the county’s HR department, she brought along 20 fellow members who wanted to show their support for the survivor.

The supervisor was fired, but Local 2822 members didn’t stop mobilizing around the issue. They have since formed a committee on workplace harassment, and taken on the work of confronting harassment claims workers levy against fellow union members – a topic that can be tricky for organizations committed to due process.

“We’re hoping to create a culture in our local where people are given a chance to learn and change,” Fuhrman said. “But if they blow it, then they blow it.”

‘All you have to be is a co-worker’

Unions like Local 17 and 2822 offer solidarity, grievance structures and access to representation that strengthen workers’ ability to stop harassment before it happens and seek justice when it does. But differences exist even among unionized workplaces when it comes to cultural attitudes toward sexual harassment.

Several workers at the Freedom Library discussion – panelists and audience members – said it remains difficult to speak up about incidents on a construction job site, in particular.

Joanne Hager, a member of Laborers Local 563, said most tradespeople are nomadic, moving from job site to job site as their skills are needed. Working in an industry that cycles through workers quickly, Hager knows the risks that come with speaking up or pushing back against harassment.

“Every day I come home and my husband asks, ‘So, are you going to be invited back?’” she said.

Construction, of course, is a male-dominated industry. (“I don’t just hear locker-room talk,” Hager said. “I work in the locker room.”) But unions, employers and public policymakers are working on multiple fronts to recruit more women into careers in the trades – and to make the construction job site less threatening when women get there.

Kathrine Engel, a labor-law attorney who sat on the Freedom Library panel, began leading harassment training sessions for apprentices in Local 292 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers more than 20 years ago. The trainings make apprentices aware of what harassment looks like – and how one person’s toxic behavior can cause distractions and distrust on the job site, making all workers less safe.

“All you have to be is a coworker,” Engel tells apprentices. “One of the most powerful things you can do if you see somebody being harassed is to say, ‘I saw that, and that’s not OK.’”

Changing workplace culture doesn’t happen overnight, but Engel has seen changes over the last two decades that give her hope.

The first year she led a training, the room was filled exclusively with white men, most of whom were openly hostile to her presence. “I joked about wearing a flack jacket,” she said.

“Now it has evolved to where the apprentices are much more diverse racially and gender wise,” Engel added. “And increasingly, I see just one or two or three people in a class of 20 who are having a hard time with the concept of not harassing.

“But certainly, there’s still a long way to go.”

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Concrete Christmas display brightens Cement Masons’ holiday party

December 4, 2018 by

When they arrive at their union’s holiday party tonight in New Brighton, active and retired members of Cement Masons Local 633 will find their training hall decked with festive Christmas concrete.

It’s a seasonal tradition the local’s apprentices carried on this year, with help from apprentices from Local 633’s sister union, Twin Cities Plasterers Local 265.

Together, they molded some 40 cubic yards of concrete into a gingerbread house, miniature hockey rink, candy-cane-shaped golf hole and other holiday displays spanning the entirety of the training center’s shop floor.

Apprentices from Plasters Local 265 erected the gingerbread house. Decorative concrete patterns on the floor around the structure simulate wood paneling and cobblestone.
Both Cement Masons and Plasterers apprentices put in time on the display.
Apprentices from Local 633 fashioned a candy-cane-shaped mini-golf hole.

The display took six weeks to complete. Six different groups of apprentices, ranging from first- to third-year hands, each put in a week of work on the project under the supervision of Apprenticeship Coordinator Brian Farmer and instructors Pete Dubay and Moke Eaglefeathers.

Dave Schutta, Local 633’s business manager, said the display “covers the scope of work” union members do on job sites across the state every day: flat work, decorative work, highway and heavy jobs, curb-and-gutter work and more.

“We try to include everything we do into this project – with a twist, of course,” Schutta said.

[Click here to view a video of Farmer describing the work apprentices did on the project.]

The display has been a highlight of the union’s holiday party for the last eight years. More recently, apprenticeship instructors and staff began inviting neighbors and friends to visit the display, incorporating a food drive that netted 280 pounds of food for New Hope-based The Food Group last year.

“Members and especially retirees love to come to this party, get dinner, see old friends and experience what the apprentices have put together,” Schutta said. “They always seem to be amazed. Of course, some guys like to pick things apart a little bit in good fun, but for the most part everyone seems to appreciate the display and how our apprenticeship program has grown over the years.”

By tomorrow afternoon, the entire display will be demolished, making way for a new round of hands-on training.

Christmas doesn’t last forever.

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On right to work and prevailing wage, it’s Walz … or Wisconsin

October 24, 2018 by

Tim Walz, the labor-endorsed candidate for governor, is pictured speaking at a union rally in 2016.

When Tim Walz addressed delegates to the Minnesota Building Trades’ annual convention in Duluth over the summer, the labor-endorsed candidate for governor did not mince words, giving the labor leaders and union stewards a message to take back to their union halls.

“People will tell you, ‘I’m not into politics,’” Walz said. “You tell them too damn bad because politics is into you.

“The choice is Walz or Wisconsin when it comes to organized labor. It’s that simple.”

Walz was referencing the string of attacks Wisconsin union members saw on their wages, benefits and freedom to join together after Republicans, led by Gov. Scott Walker, seized total control of the state’s government eight years ago.

It began with Act 10, which gutted the collective bargaining power of teachers and other public-sector workers in 2011. Four years later Walker signed a right-to-work bill, weakening the bargaining power of all unions.

And last year, Wisconsin Republicans unleashed a pair of attacks on union tradespeople and their quality of life. One law banned local governments from entering into project labor agreements, which establish fair wage and benefit standards on construction projects. Another repealed the state’s prevailing-wage law, which builds fair wages into the public construction bidding process.

But it hasn’t just happened in Wisconsin.

“We’ve got to keep Minnesota from going the way of Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Alabama, Kentucky, New Mexico – all states that since 2012 have gone right to work, have banned project labor agreements and have eliminated prevailing wage,” said Tony McGarvey, government affairs liaison for District 82 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades.

Already, the effects of Wisconsin’s anti-worker agenda are noticeable even here in Minnesota.

In Rochester, where construction of a Destination Medical Center has helped create a booming job market for tradespeople, Painters Local 681 rep Scott Parker said he sees an “influx of union workers coming over from Wisconsin,” where they would earn less for doing the same work.

“If we go right to work, where do we go? North Dakota? South Dakota? Wisconsin? Iowa?” Parker said. “We are an island surrounded by right to work. Where will I go to make the money I’m making now?”

Prevailing wage: A case study

No issue better represents what’s at stake for construction workers in this election than prevailing wage.

Minnesota’s prevailing wage laws establish wage floors in regions across the state that contractors must agree to meet in order to win bids on publicly funded construction projects. The principle behind the law is that workers should be able to afford to live in the area where they find work.

Opponents argue that repealing the law would save taxpayers money, and as a former state legislator, it’s an argument Carly Melin, now executive director of the Minnesota State Building and Construction Trades Council, has heard plenty of times.

“We know repealing prevailing wage doesn’t save the public any money,” Melin said. “The contractor still makes the money, it’s just the workers who see less of it in their paychecks.”

The vast majority of peer-reviewed academic studies on prevailing wage support Melin’s claim, according to a report issued earlier this year by researchers at the nonpartisan Midwest Economic Policy Institute and Colorado State University-Pueblo.

The report concludes that if Minnesota joins its neighbors in repealing prevailing wage, tradespeople stand to lose their wage advantage and more. “Minnesota’s prevailing wage law supports self-sufficient construction workers,” the report’s authors, Frank Manzo and Dr. Kevin Duncan, concluded.

By comparing data from seven Upper Midwest states, the report found Minnesota tradespeople are doing better than their counterparts in Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin – states without strong (or any) prevailing wage laws. Because Minnesota still has prevailing wage on the books, construction workers here see 5.2 percent higher incomes, are more likely to have health and pension benefits, and are less likely to rely on food stamps.

Threat to apprenticeship

In fact, rather than driving up public construction costs, the researchers found Minnesota’s prevailing wage law actually delivers significant value to the state in terms of workforce development.

By setting a higher wage floor, the law guarantees local union contractors a fair shake at publicly bid construction projects. And when Building Trades union members are working, a portion of their wages are deducted to help fund their unions’ apprenticeship training programs, which provide world-class training opportunities to thousands of Minnesotans without any government funding.

Without prevailing wage, the authors conclude, Minnesota contractors who participate in apprenticeship training programs would lose more bids to “fly-by-night contractors from neighboring states with low wages, resulting in fewer training opportunities (not to mention shoddier infrastructure).

That’s the reality Building Trades union members are now facing in states like Wisconsin and Michigan – labor strongholds where “we never would have thought they would repeal prevailing wage,” Melin said. And it’s a threat Minnesota’s Building Trades unions are hoping to keep at bay by electing Tim Walz governor Nov. 6.

“If it can happen in Wisconsin and it can happen in Michigan, then it can happen in Minnesota,” Melin said. “We have a lot at stake.”

Filed Under: Organizing, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Area Building Trades councils honored for community outreach

April 20, 2018 by

At the Ayers Award ceremony (L to R): Duluth Council President Craig Olson, NABTU President Sean McGarvey, Dan McConnell and Jenny Winkelaar of the Minneapolis Building Trades, Minnesota Executive Director Carly Melin, Minneapolis President Dave Ybarra, St. Paul Executive Secretary Don Mullin, St. Paul President Tom McCarthy and NABTU Secretary-Treasurer Brent Booker. submitted photo

Local Building Trades unions have put an emphasis in recent years on reaching out to make more women, veterans and people of color aware of their registered apprenticeship programs and the middle class career opportunities they make possible.

Those efforts earned national recognition Wednesday in Washington, D.C., when North America’s Building Trades Unions presented the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Minnesota Building Trades councils with the annual Mark H. Ayers Community Achievement Award.

After the longtime president of NABTU died in 2012, the organization created the award to honor Ayers’ passionate belief that Building Trades unions are a force for good in their local communities.

Tradespeople deliver value to communities not only on the jobsite, Ayers believed, but also as stewards of their registered apprenticeship programs, which create a pathway for thousands of people across the country to get good jobs with family-supporting benefits and a secure retirement.

In presenting the award to the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Minnesota councils, NABTU recognized several union-driven initiatives piloted here – and replicated across the country – that recruit and prepare people for construction apprenticeships.

• Construct Tomorrow. In this program, representatives of different Building Trades apprenticeships set up interactive, hands-on exhibits in a school gymnasium, rec center or other public space, offering young people an opportunity to try out more than a dozen different construction crafts in the same day.

• Minnesota Trades Academy. This paid summer internship brings teenagers from a handful of urban schools into several different unions’ training facilities, where they spend their days learning from registered apprenticeship instructors.

• Outreach into public schools. Building Trades councils have been aggressive in cultivating new relationships with public schools, so that students, counselors and technical-education instructors are more aware of the opportunities available through unions’ apprenticeship programs.

Don Mullin, executive secretary of the St. Paul Building and Construction Trades Council, credited the award to the “broad efforts” of the council’s affiliate unions, as well as the vision laid out by his predecessor in office, Harry Melander, who now serves as the top officer of the state Building Trades council.

“All of our affiliates have had a hand in earning this recognition,” Mullin said. “We’ve worked together – in St. Paul, Minneapolis and statewide – to create opportunities for people across our state to take advantage of construction apprenticeship as a pathway to the middle class. And we’re proud of that work.

“President Ayers was a strong believer in community, that as Building Trades union members we live and work and volunteer in our communities. To be associated with his legacy is an amazing honor.”

The University of Minnesota’s Labor Education Service produced the video below for the 2018 Ayers Award ceremony.

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Why aren’t more women entering the construction trades?

March 8, 2018 by

Clara Schiller, a member of St. Paul Pipefitters Local 455, speaks during a panel discussion with representatives of unions and their apprenticeship training programs Tuesday, part of Women in Construction Week events across the Twin Cities.

As International Women’s Day draws attention to the persistent gap between wages earned by men and women worldwide, it’s worth noting one area of the U.S. economy where the gap is uniquely narrow: construction.

On average, women working in the construction trades earn about 96 cents for every dollar earned by men. That’s miles ahead of the economy as a whole, where women earn 81 cents on the dollar, and women of color fare even worse.

“The one great thing about the roof is it doesn’t discriminate against anyone,” Roofers and Waterproofers Local 96 organizer Tristan Lundblad said. “The wage scale is the same for everyone, and no one judges you about anything except whether you work hard.”

Experts have long argued that adding more women to the construction workforce would help reduce broader pay disparities, but efforts to attract more women have seen limited success. Today, about 3 percent of construction tradespeople nationwide are women, and the rate hasn’t changed much over the last decade.

“One of the big factors in women’s lower earnings is they tend to work in occupations where many other women work,” said Ariane Hegewisch, who studies employment and earnings at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. “Women’s underrepresentation in construction has an impact on women’s earnings and their poverty rates.”

Why aren’t more women pursuing careers in the trades? Locally, at least, it’s not for lack of outreach from construction unions.

Lundblad was among more than a dozen union-affiliated recruiters at an event for women interested in exploring construction careers, held Tuesday in St. Paul as part of Women in Construction Week. Their pitch was familiar – middle class wages and earn-while-you-learn apprenticeship training, first-class health benefits and retirement security – but most chairs in the union hall remained empty.

“We definitely need women,” Tim Grimm said of his union, Local 110 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. “We are begging for women.”

Attracting sisters into the brotherhood isn’t just a matter of increasing the local’s diversity, Grimm explained. The construction workforce is aging, and unions aren’t going to meet the demand for skilled workers if they ignore half of the potential workforce.

Women also are vital to Minnesota construction contractors’ ability to capture market share. The state considers “workforce participation goals” for women as part of its process for awarding public construction contracts over $100,000, and those goals jumped sharply last July, from 6 percent to 20 percent in Ramsey and Hennepin counties.

Meeting new goals will require union contractors and apprenticeship programs to keep hustling to recruit and retain women, but there are challenges associated with both.

For starters, too many women and girls dismiss construction as a career path, or never even consider it. Tasha Lawrence, a member of St. Paul Plumbers Local 34 and vice president of the National Association of Women in Construction (NAWIC), put it this way: “A lot of women don’t know what they want to do, but they know they don’t want to be a plumber.”

Many children are steered toward “gender-specific” activities at a young age, Hegewisch said, and building things falls squarely in the realm of male activities. Research shows shop classes in high school too often are taught in ways that “put off” female students, she added.

And while policymakers have pushed initiatives to increase interest in science and technology among girls, the subsequent step is usually a push toward “college, college, college,” Lawrence said.

Samantha Kaneakua, a member of the Carpenters union, worked with girls as part of the union’s Kids Build programming.

Minnesota’s Building Trades unions have been proactive in developing “youth build” programs that welcome girls into their training centers, pre-apprenticeship programs that connect women with contractors eager to hire, and stronger relationships with area high schools – a particularly good idea, Hegewisch said, pointing to research showing most career counselors have little familiarity with the construction industry.

“Career counselors that are exposed to the construction industry are more likely to point girls into construction careers,” she said.

Retaining women construction workers, meanwhile, means addressing the factors that deter women from pursuing jobs in the trades, including the industry’s culture.

“Men act a little differently” when women are on the job site, Lawrence said, adding that some women feel intimidated, unwanted or out of place.

Hegewisch, who surveyed tradeswomen from across the country for a 2015 report, said workplace harassment remains a problem in the industry. But she pointed to other, more subtle ways job sites could change to become more welcoming to women, like providing equipment that fits and bathrooms that offer privacy.

“Too often on a construction site they get the harness in two sizes, and they’re two or three sizes too big for most women,” Hegewisch said. “Work gloves are much harder for women to find in their sizes too… It feels like an insult, like they don’t really want me here.”

Promoting women to leadership positions – and ensuring they get equal access to job opportunities – helps keep apprentices and tradeswomen in the industry, Hegewisch said, as do mentoring programs and networking groups like NAWIC.

For Lawrence, just being able to see women wearing a hardhat or tool belt, swinging a hammer or pouring concrete helps change the culture – and perception – of the industry in an organic way.

“I don’t want to sit behind a desk. I’m not a pencil pusher,” she said. “I’m just as capable as men to do the work, and I know I’m not alone.”

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‘Women in Construction Week’ begins Monday

February 28, 2018 by

2018wwheaderMinnesota Building Trades unions will join the construction industry in celebrating women workers March 4 to 10. Women in Construction Week will feature series of local networking events, panel discussions, workshops and festivities.

The events are open to tradeswomen, project managers, engineers, estimators, students, designers and anyone interested in learning more about a career in the construction industry.

Of particular interest to union tradeswomen is a discussion Tuesday, March 6, with representatives of several Building Trades unions: “It’s YOUR Union.” The event is hosted by St. Paul Plumbers Local 34, and it will run from 2 to 5 p.m. at the St. Paul Labor Center, 353 W. 7th St. Finger food and drinks will be served.

Women in Construction Week events are free, but some have limited space. To view the events and register, go to www.eventbrite.com and search “WIC week 2018.”

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