Union volunteers step ‘outside their element’ on ice palace job site

January 22, 2018 by

Dick Kentzelman, a retired Bricklayer, shaves down ice in Rice Park. Building Trades volunteers step out of their areas of expertise to construct the ice palace. “It’s out of the ordinary for anyone in the trades to be using a chainsaw on the job site,” longtime volunteer Terry Wong said.

The ice palace towering above Rice Park during the St. Paul Winter Carnival this year will be three times the size of any palace festivalgoers have seen in a decade. But for longtime volunteers building the super-sized palace, the challenges are familiar.

“The palaces I’ve worked on before were 25 feet high at most,” Bricklayers Local 1 business agent Terry Wong said during a break from work on the bustling job site last week. “They’ve been practice runs to get ready for this one. Everyone’s gotten used to the work.”

Wong and other volunteers from St. Paul Building Trades unions pitch in annually to build ice palaces during Winter Carnival. This year organizers hope a 4,000-block, 70-foot tall ice palace will lure visitors in town for the Super Bowl to downtown St. Paul.

Most of the work involves unloading, stacking and securing 500-pound blocks of ice, harvested earlier this month from a lake near Spicer, Minn.

Nearly all of the St. Paul Building Trades’ affiliate unions have pitched in on the project. Volunteers range from a first-year apprentice to a 72-year-old retiree.

Dick Kentzelman, a retired member of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 1 from Osseo, said the project inspires a “sense of camaraderie” among tradespeople who volunteer.

“I get to meet people I’ve worked with over the years, and I’m meeting new people too,” said Kentzelman, who has volunteered in each of the last six years.

Wong, a Minneapolis resident, said working on the ice palace offers tradespeople a chance to “step outside their element.” The 500-pound bricks of ice aren’t always uniform. Their corners aren’t square. And they melt.

Terry Wong (R) watches an ice block take flight with other volunteers.

“We’ve made up different tools over the years to scratch the bricks down and take off layers, either a sawmill or by hand to adjust that inch or half inch when you need it,” Wong said. “As a bricklayer, we’d just pour cement or mud in between them, but we don’t have that luxury here.”

Safety is a priority on the job site, where Skid loaders scoot by carrying pallets of ice and cranes hoist massive blocks overhead.

Volunteers are reminded in a daily briefing to be cautious and aware of their surroundings. That message changes with the weather conditions.

“As it gets warmer, those blocks slide more as it gets wet,” Wong said. “You’re not going to get them to freeze together as quickly, and once the block gets moving it wants to keep moving. So you’ve got to be very careful you don’t set it right off the wall.”

Work on the ice palace continued through a stretch of sub-zero temperatures in the Twin Cities. Volunteers were reminded to dress in layers and warm up in trailers as often as possible.

“I will say that we’ve got some pretty tough cookies out here,” Wong said. “Everybody’s been just great.”

The challenges – and the long days outside in bitterly cold weather – aren’t without a payoff, though.

“It’s just been a good thing to see something go up – something you accomplished and something a lot of people will see,” Kentzelman said. “It brings a lot of enjoyment to people, and it’s a big deal not just to St. Paul, but to the state of Minnesota.”

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Community Ed offers courses in labor history, construction careers

January 10, 2018 by

Want to learn more about local labor history? Looking to explore career opportunities in the construction trades? These two labor-related courses are among the St. Paul Public Schools’ lineup of Community Ed offerings this winter.

Peter Rachleff, a retired Macalester professor and co-director of the East Side Freedom Library, will teach “The Labor Movement and the Struggle for Democracy in Minnesota” on Tuesday nights, Feb. 13 to March 20, at the historic Carnegie library, located at 1105 Greenbrier St. Registration cost is $53.

The course description promises a survey of how Minnesota workers – “native born and immigrant, women and men, skilled and unskilled, blue collar and white collar, people of color and white” – have organized over the last 150 years for political power and a collective voice on the job.

“Learn how they struggled for citizenship and the right to vote; demanded the right to organize and engage in collective bargaining; organized unions to protect their rights at work; and organized politically to shape public policy.”

People entering the labor force – or considering a career change – will get an overview of opportunities in the construction trades at a one-day course Feb. 27, taught by Don Mullin, executive secretary of the St. Paul Building and Construction Trades Council. The session will cover coursework and skills needed for different trades, expectations, insurance, work cycles and more.

“Choosing a Career in the Trades” will meet from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the St. Paul Community Ed offices, 1780 W. 7th St. It’s open to ages 16 and up. Cost of registration is $7.

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Learning Jet classroom gets lift from Trades apprentices, volunteers

November 21, 2017 by

Matthew Price (R), an apprenticeship instructor with the North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters, led a crew of union apprentices in framing the interior of an airplane hangar at the St. Paul Downtown Airport.

The Learning Jet has been wowing kids since the cargo plane-turned-classroom opened at St. Paul’s Downtown Airport two years ago.

The facility’s portable restrooms, on the other hand, have drawn a much different reaction.

That will change when the Learning Jet’s expanded space opens next spring, thanks in part to volunteers and apprentices from area Building Trades unions. They are renovating a nearby airplane hangar with a kitchenette, classroom space and, yes, indoor plumbing.

“Those little blue houses are not a great way to expose kids to STEM education,” laughed Steven Hurvitz, Learning Jet’s project director. “With this hangar project, every union seems to have come forward to help us, and it just shows the heart that they have. It’s been fantastic.”

Work began on the 3,400-square-foot hangar in September. Some unions sent volunteers, while others, like the Carpenters union, made the project part of their apprenticeship curriculum.

Matthew Price, a carpentry instructor for the North Central States Regional Council, led a crew of eight apprentices in framing the hangar’s walls last month.

Apprentices Alex Brown (R) and Ron Schuster.
Carpentry apprentice Daniel Swanson worked atop scaffolding.
Carpenters union apprentice Daniel Swanson (L) and instructor Matthew Price worked together.
Plumbers Local 34 volunteers Tony Tietje (L) and Mike Danley.
Union volunteers poured concrete for a new floor in the Learning Jet hangar. Pictured (L to R) are Chris Peltier of Laborers Local 563, and Brian Farmer and Brian Gullickson of Cement Masons Local 633.
Carpenters union apprentices Dustin Monson (R) and Daniel Swanson installed the hangar’s new ceiling.

Other unions that provided support to the Learning Jet project – or committed to doing so – include Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 1, Cement Masons Local 633, Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 110, Laborers Local 563, Plumbers Local 34, Roofers Local 96, Sheet Metal Workers Local 10 and Sprinklerfitters Local 417.

“I wouldn’t doubt there might be more locals to sign on at some point,” said Dean Gale, a business representative with St. Paul Plumbers Local 34 who is coordinating work on the project. Several unions have partnered with their signatory contractors to provide building materials for the project, he added.

When finished, Gale said, the refurbished hangar will have new flooring, heating, plumbing, ventilation and more, at a value of about $250,000. Hurvitz plans to house two small aircraft in the hangar, as well as at least one flight simulator.

(photo courtesy MN Association of Women in Aviation)

But the big draw at Holman Field remains the Learning Jet, a Boeing 727-200 retired by FedEx and repurposed into a classroom. Students from kindergarten through high school take field trips to the Learning Jet, which has tailored a curriculum for each grade to enhance the experience.

The goal, Hurvitz said, is to get more children interested in STEM – science, technology, engineering and math. (At the Learning Jet, they add an “A” for aerospace to make it “STEAM.”)

“How many people get to sit in the flight deck of a large aircraft?” Hurvitz asked. “Kids get to sit in the captain’s seat, explore all the controls and learn what they do. They get to touch, to feel and to understand.”

That’s how Building Trades apprentices learn as well – a connection not lost on Gale and other union leaders.

“Kids on field trips from all over Minnesota are coming to the Learning Jet and getting interested in STEM,” Gale said. “It may pique their interest to pursue a career at a tech firm like 3M or St. Jude’s, or it may pique their interest to go into the Trades.”

Minnesota’s strong technology sector, Gale added, provides Building Trades union members with a steady stream of work, as firms build, remodel and upgrade their facilities to keep up in a rapidly changing field.

Unions aren’t the only organizations supporting the Learning Jet. The Metropolitan Airports Commission has been a critical partner since long before the jet arrived at Holman Field, Hurvitz said. He credited Home Depot, York Air, United Rental, Kirtland Electric, Kraus-Anderson Construction and RRTL Architects for their contributions to the hangar as well.

“The support we’ve received has been just unbelievable,” he said. “I have no other words to describe it.”

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Volunteer Pipefitters keep heat on for homeowners in need

October 2, 2017 by

Local 455’s Maria Pinzon and Christopher Kristenson repair a Frogtown homeowner’s furnace.

Over 100 low-income, elderly and disabled homeowners in Minnesota received free furnace repairs and inspections Saturday, thanks to union pipefitters and their contractors.

Project Heat’s On, in it’s 31st year, drew volunteers from local unions in St. Paul, Minneapolis, Rochester and St. Cloud. In the Twin Cities, 90 members of St. Paul Pipefitters Local 455 joined the effort, as did 80 members of Minneapolis-based Local 539.

Pipefitters like Maria Pinzon and Christopher Kristenson, fifth-year apprentices with Local 455, traveled in teams to homes, where they repaired minor furnace problems, replaced smoke detectors and checked for dangerous heat-related health conditions.

“We do a lot of simple things that people aren’t able to do because they are elderly or busy in life,” Pinzon said. “It can really make a world of difference and possibly save a life.”

At a breakfast banquet before the volunteer event, union leaders and elected officials, including Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, thanked pipefitters for their work – and for raising awareness about the importance of keeping home-heating systems in good repair.

Among the causes of home fires in Minnesota, heating systems recently dropped from second-most common to third, A.J. Neis, a fire inspections supervisor with the City of St. Paul, told volunteers.

“The needle is moving in the right direction, and that’s because of the work you guys are doing,” he said.

 

Since its launch in 1986, Heat’s On volunteers have donated more than 34,000 hours of skilled labor, providing more than $3.7 million worth of repairs to 7,869 Minnesota households.

“There is a definite need for this service in our community,” said Greg Rottach, energy conservation construction manager with Community Action of Ramsey and Washington Counties, a nonprofit agency that identifies homeowners for Heat’s On assistance. “For our participating households, knowing that you have safe and adequate heat for the winter is quite a relief.”

For Pinzon and Kristenson, the first stop of the day was a home in St. Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood. After tuning up the furnace and replacing a condensate drain line, they headed for another home in the city’s North End.

“I have family members that struggle in similar situations,” Kristenson said. “It was a good opportunity for me to give back.”

Pipefitters from Locals 455 and 539 gather for a photo after the Heat’s On breakfast banquet.

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Minnesota union members marched against Trump in droves. Here’s why

January 27, 2017 by
web-womensmarch-trades1

D Rojas, a member of Carpenters Local 322, attended the Women’s March in Minnesota a day after Donald Trump’s inauguration with several other Minnesota union tradeswomen.

 

Dressed in hard hats and union colors, union members were among the estimated 100,000 people who joined the Women’s March in Minnesota one day after Donald Trump’s inauguration, capping three days of protests – locally and nationally – that put the new administration on notice of popular opposition to his policy objectives and governing approach.

Stretched from the cathedral to the Capitol in St. Paul, the historic crowd represented, for union members who participated, a stirring display of the solidarity it will take to fend off attacks on working people’s rights, women’s rights, immigrant families and others feeling vulnerable as the former reality-TV boss – with a track record of not paying his employees and joking about sexual assault – assumes the highest office in the land.

“We’re in the majority,” Sprinklerfitters Local 417 member Kimberly Brinkman said from the steps of the Capitol, overlooking a sea of anti-Trump demonstrators. “We want common decency to prevail.”

Home Depot janitors staged a strike on Trump’s first day in office.

Home Depot janitors staged a strike on Trump’s first day in office.

Trump’s inauguration inspired a flurry of events locally planned by unions and progressive groups, who offered hopeful counterprogramming to offset the president’s message of “American carnage.” Union teachers in St. Paul rallied around the district’s immigrant students. Janitors from 12 area Home Depot stores went on strike. And U of M students and workers led a massive march into downtown Minneapolis.

Working people who joined the protests spoke of a need to find strength in numbers at the dawn of uncertain times.

“There’s an immediate need to be together with people, to link arms and to have it be about love and inclusiveness,” Mona Meyer, president of the Communications Workers of America’s statewide council, said. “Right now all of that feels like it’s being threatened.”

For Samantha Kaneaukua, a member of Carpenters Local 322, the threat posed by Trump and congressional Republicans feels uniquely personal. “As a union carpenter, as a person of color and as a lesbian, it’s pretty much everything I stand for, everything I am, that he is opposed to,” she said. “There’s no reason not to be here fighting.”

Why don’t working people get over it and give Trump a chance? After all, he did win fair and square (albeit with an assist from some Russian friends).

“I respect the office,” Meyer said. “I don’t respect the policies and ideas of division and hatred. I don’t like personal attacks on union leaders, civil rights leaders – all of this childish, outlandish behavior. It isn’t becoming of a president.”

If there were any doubts about Trump’s anti-labor intentions, other union members said, his cabinet picks removed them.

Trump’s nominee for Education secretary, Betsy DeVos, has donated millions to political campaigns aimed at defunding public schools. His nominee for Labor secretary, Andrew Puzder, is a fast-food executive who opposes raising the minimum wage.

“This is going to be an all-out assault on working families,” St. Paul Federation of Teachers Vice President Nick Faber said.

Eliot Seide, executive director of AFSCME Council 5, called it a “cruel” bait and switch: “A campaign that promised to lift up working people is transitioning into an administration designed to tear all of us down.”

Marching against Trump’s agenda were (L to R) Debra DeBruzzi, Operating Engineers 49; Casey Hudek and Karlan Bean, Teamsters 120; Megan Bean, Christina Nelson and Kiya Caturia of Gustavus Adolphus College; and Rod Olson of Local 120.

Marching against Trump’s agenda were (L to R) Debra DeBruzzi, Operating Engineers 49; Casey Hudek and Karlan Bean, Teamsters 120; Megan Bean, Christina Nelson and Kiya Caturia of Gustavus Adolphus College; and Rod Olson of Local 120.

It’s true that many working people supported Trump, and he did better among union members than recent Republican presidential nominees. Karlan Bean, who drove Teamsters Local 120’s semi-truck to the Jan. 21 march, said he knows “too many union members” who backed Trump.

“I’m hopeful that it doesn’t turn out as bad as in the back of my head I fear it will, especially for unions,” Bean added.

“We already know he’s been sued so many times for not paying his labor, and we know he supports Right to Work,” Brinkman said. “A lot of union guys were talking about Trump. It’s going to be one eye-opener for them to see what he does to working families.”

Maybe it was the intoxicating hopefulness of a mass march. Or maybe living in hope is an easier choice than wallowing in despair. But many union members insisted that, by standing together and remaining vigilant, they could fight Trump’s agenda and hold onto their rights.

“The union is kind of reflective of how we need to be,” Carpenters Local 322 apprentice Michelle Rousseau said. “If we stand together and stay united, we’ll be OK.”

Faber said his union would increase its efforts to connect “with other groups and other causes in town” that share teachers’ values. Hager and Brinkman said women in the Trades plan to push locally and nationally to increase hiring goals within the industry for women. Meyer said CWA members have been “thinking not just defensively, but how to move forward based on what workers need, what people need, what families, women, immigrants and LGBT people need.”

Union tradeswomen stood together at the Women’s March, saying they will push for increased hiring goals to bring women into the industry both locally and nationally.

Union tradeswomen stood together at the Women’s March, saying they will push for increased hiring goals to bring women into the industry both locally and nationally.

Kaneaukua, meanwhile, plans to fight for her rights one person at a time by engaging people with different perspectives than her own. And opportunities abound on the job site.

“We need to speak up against discrimination in all of its forms,” she said. “We don’t know each other well enough. I feel like being able to have those conversations and talk about things that maybe my co-workers aren’t used to, that makes a big difference.

“That’s going to be my day-to-day approach.”

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#NAW2016: Minnesota’s Building Trades apprentices earn paychecks while mastering their craft

November 16, 2016 by
Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34 instructor Lee Houske drives home a point to apprentices about pipe insulation.

Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34 instructor Lee Houske drives home a point to apprentices about pipe insulation.

 

When Joe Odell’s friends plan to go out on Friday nights, he usually takes a pass. It’s not that the 23-year-old from Monticello is no fun, but Odell has someplace important to be early on Saturday mornings: Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34’s training center in St. Paul.

Odell is one of the 11,000-plus registered apprentices enrolled in accredited programs statewide, most operated by Building and Construction Trades unions and their signatory contractors.

Minnesota’s apprentices have a wide range of backgrounds, and they enroll at different times in their lives. But almost all are seeking the same thing out of their apprenticeship: a middle-class career.

Joe Odell works a bead roller in Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34’s metal shop.

Joe Odell works a bead roller in Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34’s metal shop.

“It was kind of hard jumping into it right away, with how young I was,” said Odell, now in his fourth and final year of apprenticeship with Local 34. “But you’re making money the whole time.

“I have health benefits and a pension. If the union stays strong, I’ll probably always have a job.”

By definition, an apprenticeship is an on-the-job training program. Most Building Trades apprentices work regular shifts with a union contractor. They earn more with each year they complete until finally “booking out” into journeyperson’s wages.

Joanna Rojas, a 48-year-old college graduate, is still three years away from earning her journey card with St. Paul-based Plumbers Local 34. But apprenticeship already has enabled the former social worker and stay-at-home mom to make the emergency mortgage payments necessary to keep her Coon Rapids home.

“When you’re only making $15 an hour, and $8 of that is paying for health insurance, you need to do something different,” Rojas said. “I needed the union. I needed a good living wage, or I would have lost my house.”

[Click here for a list of apprenticeship opportunities sponsored by Minnesota’s Building and Construction Trades unions.]

Apprenticeship programs are rich with stories like Rojas’, of men and women in their 30s and 40s taking the plunge into a new career.

Ken Flores, a 36-year-old St. Paul resident, quit his white-collar job four years ago to enroll in Heat and Frost Local 34’s program. “I realized what I had was just a job,” he said.

Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34 apprentice Angela Sheehan gets a sewing tip from instructor J.J. Ralston.

Heat and Frost Insulators Local 34 apprentice Angela Sheehan gets a sewing tip from instructor J.J. Ralston.

Angela Sheehan, 39, said enrolling in Local 34’s program “has changed my life a lot in just two years.” The mother of two from North Branch earns about three times what she took home in the manufacturing job she left behind, and the union’s health insurance plan is far superior.

“Some days I’m like, ‘I still can’t believe this is happening,’” she said.

A ‘win-win’ for workers, employers

The apprenticeship model works well for employers, too. They can customize a training curriculum with the union while coaxing workers into greater responsibilities on the jobsite.

It’s a proven formula for guaranteeing contractors a highly skilled workforce for years to come, Elevator Constructors Local 9 apprenticeship coordinator Jeff Burns said.

“We have them for 144 hours at the training center,” he said. “The companies have them for 2,000.”

The two experiences go hand-in-hand, said Local 9 apprentice John Haider, a 35-year-old resident of Bayport in his second year of the four-year program. He works a 40-hour week with All City Elevator and attends class at Local 9’s training center in Little Canada on Monday nights.

“You learn a lot in here, but out on the job every day you’re seeing something new and going through it with your (journeyperson) mechanic,” Haider said. “He’s almost like another instructor for those four years.”

Apprentices with Elevator Constructors Local 9 test their skills in the union’s motor lab.

Apprentices with Elevator Constructors Local 9 test their skills in the union’s motor lab.

Surrounded by support

The willingness of members of the same union to support each other and share advice is, for Haider, a sharp contrast to his experience working an oil rig in North Dakota for three years.

“Oil fields were huge like that, guys trying to stab you in the back,” he said. “It’s nice having guys looking out for you as opposed to trying to get a step up on you.”

That might help explain why the number of military veterans in Minnesota’s apprenticeship programs is on the rise.

Chris Vant of Osseola, Wis., saw a year of active combat duty as an Army specialist in Iraq. After being honorably discharged in 2010, Vant worked for a non-union construction firm, then used his education benefits to take classes at Dunwoody until a spot opened up in Local 9’s program.

“I saw the benefit package,” the second-year apprentice said. “It’s a pretty good deal.”

A better deal than working non-union, he added. That meant going without sick pay, vacation time or a pension.

“You started off pretty low in the wages, too, so the only way you could make a decent living was through the overtime,” Vant said. “I worked piles of OT, almost 80-hour weeks, and often out of town.”

Registered apprentices in Plumbers Local 34’s program include (L to R) Tamika Foster-Dixon, Matt Paolo, Joanna Rojas, Jon Antolick, Mitch Gale and Jason Meyer.

Registered apprentices in Plumbers Local 34’s program include (L to R) Tamika Foster-Dixon, Matt Paolo, Joanna Rojas, Jon Antolick, Mitch Gale and Jason Meyer.

‘Dirty and grimy’

Still, the rewards of apprenticeship go beyond the wages and benefits. For Tamika Foster-Dixon of St. Paul, a fourth-year apprentice with Plumbers Local 34, there’s something gratifying about working with her hands.

“That’s not to say it isn’t dirty and grimy every day – it is,” she said. “But it’s fun.”

Jon Antolick, a 37-year-old from Hastings, agreed with his classmate.

“Being an apprentice means you’re a part of something bigger,” he said. “You’ve been a part of a project and built something that’s going to last. There’s a sense of pride in what you do.”

Foster-Dixon laughed: “Even if they immediately cover it up with sheet rock.”

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In North Branch, union volunteers help build home for disabled veteran’s family

November 11, 2016 by

web-habitat-groupA partially disabled military veteran and his family own a new home in North Branch, thanks to a little help from East Central Minnesota Habitat for Humanity and several Building Trades unions.

After a dedication ceremony Oct. 29, Eric and JoAnn Trudeau took ownership of the 1,3252-square-foot home, with four bedrooms, two bathrooms and a 400-square-foot garage. It’s enough space for the couple and their four children: Briana, Mariana, Wyatt and Ziva.

St. Paul-based Plumbers and Gasfitters Local 34 donated bathroom fixtures, sinks, a tub, shower and other interior features. Union plumbers also volunteered their time and skills to help build the house.

So, too, did members of St. Paul-based Local 110 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, who wired the house with materials donated by the union.

Members of the North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters framed and closed in the building, and installed siding.

Work on the home began in July.

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With Lowertown development, union pension fund invests in Building Trades workers

September 16, 2016 by
Workers at 333 on the Park, a new housing development in Lowertown St. Paul, enjoy a lunch catered by the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust.

Workers at 333 on the Park, a new housing development in Lowertown St. Paul, enjoy a lunch catered by the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust.

The AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust treated the men and women working to redevelop a property in St. Paul’s Lowertown district to lunch Aug. 31, highlighting the trust’s unique approach to investing union pension funds in union-built construction projects.

The development, 333 on the Park, is transforming an eight-story office building, originally constructed in 1913, into an apartment building with 134 market-rate units. HIT, which pools together union pension funds, has invested $27.7 million in the $42 million project.

Upon completion, 333 on the Park will have generated an estimated 190 jobs for members of the St. Paul Building and Construction Trades.

About 120 people attended the appreciation lunch last month, including construction workers, HIT staff and representatives of unions, general contractor Frana Companies and management company Timberland Partners.

“The Housing Investment Trust is pleased to partner with the men and women of the St. Paul building trades to rehabilitate 333 on the Park by investing their pension capital in their community,” HIT Chief Operating Officer Ted Chandler told attendees.

Situated adjacent to Mears Park and two blocks from the Mississippi River, 333 on the Park will offer residents easy access to recreation, transit, shopping and employment options. It’s connected to the Saint Paul skyway system, and the Metro Transit’s Green Line runs right past the property.

Don Mullin, executive secretary of the St. Paul Building Trades, said the development would both create jobs and increase housing options in the area.

web-333park-eatinbg“This is a good example of investing union pension dollars to create construction jobs with health care and retirement benefits, and at the same time benefiting the community at large,” Mullin said. “It’s a win-win scenario for St. Paul residents, the HIT, and the St. Paul Building Trades.”

“It’s good to come to a job with quality people and work, giving the company a high-quality product,” Jerry Grobe, a member of Cement Masons Local 633 who’s working on the HIT project, said.

The development of 333 on the Park brings the HIT’s total investment in St. Paul to $139 million on 10 projects since 1991. The trust has invested a total of $564 million in 42 projects in the Twin Cities over that time, building or preserving 6,500 housing units and creating an estimated 5,075 union construction jobs, as well as approximately 6,775 jobs across other industries.

“We look forward to working with HIT on its next project,” IBEW Local 110 Business Manager Jamie McNamara said.

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This summer job is a crash course in construction careers

August 19, 2016 by
MN Trades Academy grads Romeo Guevara (L) of Harding Senior High and Austin Fink of Open World Learning Academy level scaffolding at the Laborers Training Center in Lino Lakes.

MN Trades Academy grads Romeo Guevara (L) of Harding Senior High and Austin Fink of Open World Learning Academy level scaffolding at the Laborers Training Center in Lino Lakes.

 

One by one Friday, graduates of the inaugural MN Trades Academy stepped up to the podium inside IBEW Local 110’s union hall and offered their three favorite construction crafts.

Welding was a popular choice – not surprisingly, given the teenage demographic – but there was something for every one of the 20 graduates, who spent nine weeks this summer working as paid interns, touring the apprenticeship centers of 16 local Building Trades unions.

At the IUPAT District Council 82 training center in Little Canada, apprenticeship instructor Kerry Gallagher offers tips on filling in the color wheel to Randy Cuate of Minneapolis Roosevelt.

At the IUPAT District Council 82 training center, apprenticeship instructor Kerry Gallagher offers tips on the color wheel to Randy Cuate of Minneapolis Roosevelt.

In other words, finding a construction craft they like was their summer job.

“Knowing all the trades gives them insight into all the opportunities available out there,” Como Park Senior High shop teacher Bob Prifrel said. “Now it’s up to them to take advantage of it.”

Prifrel led one of two crews of interns participating in the inaugural MN Trades Academy. His consisted of students from the St. Paul and White Bear Lake school districts; another included students from Minneapolis Public Schools.

Interns worked 30 to 35 hours per week and earned $9 per hour. On workdays they bused to local technical colleges and apprenticeship centers for crash courses in various crafts. They also completed the OSHA 10 training.

Although in its first year, MN Trades Academy has been more than a decade in the making. It grew out of forerunner programs like UnderConstruction, a summer program that provided urban youth with work experience on a construction job site.

Launching MN Trades Academy took a great deal of collaboration between the school districts and Building Trades unions, as well as contractors, public agencies and community groups like Greater Twin Cities United Way, all of which provided logistical or funding support.

Organizers say the program is in line for a funding boost that will enable it to increase enrollment next year, creating more summer jobs for young people that, down the road, might spark interest in a career.

So beyond welding, what crafts did the graduates enjoy most?

Laborers instructor Darrell Jones (R) works with Highland Park student Akshay Schneider.

Laborers instructor Darrell Jones (R) works with Highland Park student Akshay Schneider.

“My favorite was commercial painting,” Nicholas Eichrodt of Minneapolis said. “I just love how you’ve got to do it specifically right, or you’ve got to do it all over again.”

Austin Fink of St. Paul liked the trip to Operating Engineers Local 49 best. “We got to sit in all the big, heavy machinery that we wanted to, and we learned a little about each one,” he said.

“I like the hands-on experience we got at IBEW, the wiring we did,” Randy Cuate of Minneapolis said. “I also really like math, so it worked out.”

Como Park student Lah Htoo took to crafts like tiling and bricklaying. “You get to make stuff that people will actually see,” he said. “It’s like a work of art.”

Chris Sheffield of St. Paul isn’t afraid of heights. He was the only intern to put the visit to Ironworkers Local 512 at the top of the list.

“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do since I was little,” Sheffield said. “I want to be that guy standing 100 stories up on that high beam, getting to see the whole town.”

Romeo Guevara offers his top three trades during graduation.
The Minneapolis crew works on color wheels.
Da’Shawn Gordon
Representatives of the White Bear Lake School District pose for a photo at graduation.
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Native pride meets union pride in Cement Masons’ training program

August 2, 2016 by
For their final project, participants in Local 633's pre-apprenticeship program finish their own flat concrete slabs with attached curbs.

For their final project, participants in Local 633’s pre-apprenticeship program finish their own flat concrete slabs with attached curbs.

 

NEW BRIGHTON – As the first trickle of mud oozed out of the concrete truck’s chute, 13 trainees dressed in hardhats, safety vests and tall rubber boots sprung into action, using shovels and trowels to distribute the concrete evenly across 13 rectangular slabs.

The July heat was pushing 90 degrees, and the trainees, participants in a unique pre-apprenticeship program co-sponsored by the Cement Masons and area tribal authorities, worked in silence, heads down, as their instructors barked orders and critiqued their work.

“Let’s go, you’ve got to pick up the pace,” Local 633 apprenticeship instructor Moke Eaglefeathers warned three trainees as they leveled and smoothed one of the slabs. “Those guys over there are waiting on you. You’re falling behind.”

Concrete, any cement mason will tell you, is a perishable product. The brighter the sun, the shorter the lifespan. And the trainees, working on their final project of the program, wouldn’t get more than one shot to do the job right.

“Guys, this is the real world here. This is how fast it moves,” Local 633 instructor Dave Schutta said. “We’re not trying to bury you, but this is just it. This is the real deal.”

Two days later, all 13 trainees – 11 men and two women – were back at the Local 633 training center in New Brighton. They had traded the boots and vests for more formal attire, and their friends and family members, tribal leaders and dignitaries from MnDOT and the state Department of Labor had gathered to watch them take one big step closer to working, as Schutta put it, in the real world.

They’d made it to graduation.

“They went through 12 weeks of hell,” Eaglefeathers said. “I’m pretty hard on them, and I do it on purpose. If they can handle me, they can handle any supervisor or foreman out there.”

A member of the Cheyenne Tribe from Montana, Eaglefeathers calls Local 633’s pre-apprenticeship program “his baby.” He began reaching out to tribal authorities in Minnesota and Wisconsin six years ago after growing “tired of hearing about how there were no skilled workers on the reservations,” he said.

Since then Local 633 has graduated four classes of pre-apprentices, thanks to funding support from the Tribal Employment Rights Office (TERO) and public agencies, currently MnDOT. The most recent graduates included members of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa, the Ho-Chunk Nation, the Red Lake Nation and the Leech Lake and Mille Lacs Ojibwe bands.

At the graduation ceremony, state and tribal representatives offered the program high praise. For MnDOT, it’s the “longest and most physically intense program we have going right now,” Office of Civil Rights supervisor Maria Conley said, and it’s helping build a reserve of “ready-to-work individuals” for highway and construction projects on reservations across the state.

Pre-apprenticeship graduate Billy Joe Garbow of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe opens the graduation ceremony at Cement Masons Local 633’s hall in New Brighton with a peace song, singing and playing on a hand-crafted drum.
Graduates of the latest Local 633 pre-apprenticeship training, with their instructors, are, L to R, (back) Payne Martinson, Lindsay Mason, Jarvis Goodsky, Alexa Goodsky, Russell Barrett, Billy Jo Garbow, David St. John, (middle) George White, Charles Robinson, Tony Beaulieu, Cameron Fisher, Jasmine Funmaker, Dave Schutta, Moke Eaglefeathers and (front) Mark Boshey.
Minnesota Department of Labor Commissioner Ken Peterson addresses graduates of the Cement Mason’s pre-apprenticeship program.
Tony Beaulieu (L) accepts his plaque upon graduation from the pre-apprenticeship training.
Local 633 instructor Moke Eaglefeathers tears up a little after graduates present him with an eagle feather at the end of the graduation ceremony.

State Labor Commissioner Ken Peterson said programs like the Cement Masons’ are critical to making the construction trades workforce more reflective of the state’s broader demographics. Jobs in the trades used to be “reserved” for white males, but “things have changed a lot,” Peterson said. Now, apprenticeship programs statewide are creeping up on 20 percent women and minority participation. “And there’s still room to grow.”

On reservations where families struggle with unemployment, poverty, gang membership and other challenges, the training program offers a social benefit as well.

“You guys are going to be working in our communities, and you’re going to stabilize your families, stabilize your communities,” Bois Forte representative Ray Toutloff told graduates. “You’re all role models.”

Indeed, not everyone who started Local 633’s training program in late April made it to graduation 12 weeks later. Schutta and Eaglefeathers say they run the program like a jobsite, with strict rules about attendance and no tolerance for tardiness.

“When we do tool-recognition training, the first tool we bring out on the table is an alarm clock,” Schutta said. “The second is a backup battery.”

In addition to the “soft skills” necessary for employment, Local 633’s curriculum includes flat work, paving, curb-and-gutter technique, patching and decorative work – “skills that we’ll use for a lifetime,” according to Jasmine Funmaker, a graduate from the Ho-Chunk Nation.

Tony Beaulieu
David St. John
Moke Eaglefeathers works with trainee Alexa Goodsky.
Jasmine Funmaker
Lindsay Mason
Dave Schutta (R) pours concrete for David St. John (L) and Jarvis Goodsky.
Jasmine Funmaker (L) and Jarvis Goodsky

Picking up the craft took determination and patience, said Bois Forte member Alexa Goodsky, who left her job as a housekeeper at Fortune Bay hotel and casino to enroll in the training.

“It started getting progressively easier, and what I’m supposed to do got clearer as time went on,” Goodsky said. “Every time we pour, I’ve learned something new and gotten better.”

Goodsky’s sister graduated from the Cement Mason’s program last year and has been working in the field with JE Dunn Construction ever since. Hers is just one of several success stories that indicate graduates of the program are in high demand.

“These people can go out next Monday and fit right in on a jobsite, as opposed to somebody coming in off the street and filling out an application with no experience,” Schutta said.

Several even decide to continue their training as union apprentices.

“We show them the basics here,” Eaglefeathers said. “We show them the necessary work ethic. If they don’t want to be a concrete finisher, we’re fine with that. We’ll open the door for them to go into another trade so they can have a good life and provide for their families.

“Union life has that pension, that security, that pride. Like any Native American out there, I have pride, and I also have union pride. We show them that. We show them that going union is the best way to work.”

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