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March 19, 2010
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Labor movement knocks Obama administration: ‘We’ve been sidelined’ By Mark Gruenberg ORLANDO, Fla. (PAI) – The labor movement is angry with the Obama administration – and some leaders say they’re only reflecting views of their members. That’s what came through after the AFL-CIO Executive Council spent two hours on the morning of March 2 behind closed doors venting its frustration with a Democratic president and Democratic-run Congress – whom its members played a top role in electing in the last cycle. According to AFSCME President Gerry McEntee, who spoke publicly, and half a dozen other council members, who spoke privately to Press Associates Union News Service, frustrations ranged from failure to push the Employee Free Choice Act to Obama’s backing of the Rhode Island school superintendent who summarily fired all 74 high school teachers when their union, AFT, wouldn’t give in to her demands. It even extended to reaction to Vice President Joe Biden’s speech to the council the day before, and their closed-door meeting with the V.P., McEntee said. Biden publicly pleaded for time to let the administration’s economic program work. “I was sitting in the room when we discussed Biden’s speech,” McEntee, chair of the federation’s political committee, added. “There were a lot of discouraged people. They believed it was a speech they had heard a number of times before.” The complaints are important. “The problem is that people will either sit on their hands or say we’re being taken for granted,” one state fed president told PAI. And Vince Panvini, legislative director for the Sheet Metal Workers, reminded PAI his union is so mad at congressional Democrats’ refusal to pass EFCA that it suspended all political contributions to candidates last year – and will concentrate on issues instead. Others were more caustic. A “P-O’d” description came from an attendee who sat in on the session. “For this we elected him?” the man asked. Still other council members complained the Obama administration “is taking labor for granted,” overlooking that unionists and their families were approximately one-fourth of all voters in 2008 – and went for Obama by 2-to-1. That helped the Democrat carry many key states. “We’ve been sidelined,” another council member told PAI, with issues such as EFCA dropped from Obama’s agenda. And a third noted there is no ex-unionist in the White House, much less on Obama’s inner staff. When a reporter pointed out that Biden’s top economic aide is Jared Bernstein, former co-head of the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute, this attendee replied that strictly speaking, “There’s nobody in the White House with a direct labor connection.” That’s just like in the Clinton administration, the attendee added. This leader conceded, however, that Biden himself might be a conduit for unionists’ frustration. But “once it (complaints) started rolling, it built momentum” inside the council, he said. Frustrations ranged from the general to the specific. “They’re still very upset about the (future) excise tax” on health insurance that Obama forced the union leaders to accept as part of the now-stalled health care overhaul, McEntee said. And when he asked Biden whether “there would be a second stimulus bill like the first, he unequivocally said ‘no.’ We’re very disappointed in that.” Another general complaint came over Obama’s proposed budget for the year starting Oct. 1. It features an overall spending freeze for many domestic discretionary programs, raises for some and cuts for others. There were even rumbles about “triangulation,” the Bill Clinton tactic of antagonizing an ally to play to the middle. Council members didn’t spare the Senate. In Arkansas, the AFL-CIO formally backed Democratic Lieut. Gov. Bill Halter in his planned May 18 primary showdown against incumbent Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln. Lincoln is not a supporter of labor’s top legislative priority, the Employee Free Choice Act, which is expected to make it easier for unions to organize. But the administration was the top target. “Many said their people had real angst and anger” over the stimulus, jobs, and the health care excise tax, McEntee said. And one attendee quoted AFL-CIO President Richard L. Trumka as saying he would convey labor’s frustration to the White House. “Rich said, ‘We’ve got to speak with one voice, or 57,’ and he is it. He said someone has to take the message to the White House that unless they get off their ass, we’re going to sit on our hands,” the unionist said. |
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So far, lip service is only support for EFCA By Mark Gruenberg ORLANDO, Fla. (PAI) –The Obama Administration is giving only verbal support, and nothing more, to the Employee Free Choice Act, a top legislative priority of organized labor – the movement that played a big part in propelling the president into the Oval Office in 2008. That conclusion comes from the response on March 3 to a press conference question to Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, who addressed the AFL-CIO Executive Council meeting in Orlando, Fla., that day. She barely mentioned EFCA in her speech. Solis, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden all have said they support the law, and Obama promises to sign it once it reaches his desk. But EFCA hasn’t even come up in the Senate, where the majority Democrats can’t muster the 60 votes needed to stop a planned GOP filibuster – a talkathon which needs just 41 supporting senators and which is backed by a multimillion-dollar big business campaign. Asked bluntly what she, Biden and Obama would do to pass the law, former Los Angeles congresswoman Solis replied: “I’m not going to tell you I have any ability to persuade members of the House and Senate” to approve it. And Solis told the council that “I’m frustrated, too” by the slow overall pace of change. “It’s like moving a battleship.” The Employee Free Choice Act would help level the playing field between workers and bosses in organizing drives and in negotiating first contracts. It would do so by writing majority sign-up, also called card-check recognition, into labor law. Majority sign-up, part of original labor law, has been recognized by NLRB rulings since 1962. EFCA’s version says that when the union gets an NLRB-verified majority of election authorization cards at a worksite, the workers, not the bosses, get to choose between immediate mandated recognition or a board-run election. EFCA would also sharply increase penalties for labor law-breaking, make it easier to get court orders against violators, and mandate binding arbitration between the union and management over a first contract if the two sides can’t reach agreement on their own within 120 days. Solis’ response to the Employee Free Choice Act question did not surprise Communications Workers President Larry Cohen, chair of the federation’s Organizing Committee and an outspokenly vehement backer of the bill. “There is no current path to passage” for it in the Senate, Cohen told Press Associates Union News Service. House approval of EFCA is taken for granted. |
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New tower goes up at old tank plant WARREN – The U.S. Army TACOM Life Cycle Management Command is a major beneficiary of the 2005 Congressional Military Base Realignment and Closure directives, as the facility will welcome 1,251 new positions next year. Granger Construction Co., its subcontractors and the building trades are also major beneficiaries: they’re erecting an eight-story, 583,750-square foot administration building along Van Dyke north of I-696 to accommodate the new staff. The project will also include a new 1,800-spot parking structure and renovation and new construction associated with the Weapons Maintenance and Operations Building. Ground was broken on the project last May, and it’s expected to be complete in about a year. The total contract cost is $69.2 million. The “Detroit Arsenal” administers planning and technology for armored vehicles and an armaments production center, and is the headquarters for the Army's TACOM (Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command). A production facility on the grounds of the arsenal first built tanks during World War II and then all the way through the Gulf War, before it was shuttered in 1996. We attempted to feature the administration building project by requesting permission to go inside with a camera and take photos of tradespeople, but a Granger representative said nothing doing – the owner isn’t allowing photos.
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Focus on jobs prompts trades’outreach to state GOP, Chamber By Marty Mulcahy LANSING – Changing times, changing faces. The 51st annual Legislative Conference of the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council broke some new ground by inviting guest speakers who have been traditionally unaccustomed to speaking to a group of labor union leaders, but were welcome this year because some of their views go hand in hand with the building trades when it comes to creating jobs. At the same conference where both Democratic and Republican gubernatorial candidates talked to building trades delegates about their plans for the State of Michigan, the head of the state’s largest business group and a conservative state lawmaker reciprocated the cordial welcome they received from the delegates. Michigan Chamber of Commerce CEO Richard Studley and State Rep. Kevin Elsenheimer (R-Kewadin) both told delegates that they welcomed the outreach from the building trades leaders, who linked up with a number of conservative lawmakers over the last 18 months in the effort to win state approval for construction of several power plants in Michigan. Thanks to the union pressure, and with bipartisan legislative support and prodding by the state Chamber, the administration of Gov. Granholm finally approved permits for a new $1.2 billion clean coal boiler on the grounds of Consumers Energy’s Karn-Weadock plant near Bay City. A proposed new power plant in Rogers City is in limbo as it awaits permits. “We were able to accomplish some good things with this coalition, and I think it’s extremely important that we give credit where credit is due,” said Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council President Patrick “Shorty” Gleason. Referring to the unlikely alliance with the conservative Michigan Chamber of Commerce, Gleason said: “We met with Mr. Studley several times and the building trades were able to set several things aside and focus on what’s important to his contractors and our members.” For his part, Studley said the state Chamber of Commerce supports the trades when it comes to the power plant construction, as well as other areas like maintaining good state roads. Studley joked that he “felt like a long-tailed cat at a rocking chair convention,” but added, “I was a little surprised to receive the invitation but glad to accept it.” He said the building trades and the state chamber have worked together in the past – not coincidentally when former Attorney General Frank Kelley said 30 years ago that new power production in the state was unnecessary. “We are proud to stand with you,” on the power plant issue, Studley said. “The building trades are known as being strong advocates for their members, and their leaders have the rare commodity, that they say what they mean and do what they say.” He said he wants to see the chamber and the building trades continue to “look for points of opportunity to work together.” Studley said the chamber is open to user fees or increased fuel taxes to fund state road improvements. He echoed a fact that the state’s road builders have been bemoaning for years: Michigan continues to be a “donor” state with Washington, sending more in tax dollars than we receive in benefits to fix our roads. Currently he said we’re getting back about 92 cents on the dollar. Without being overly political, Studley called for overhauling the state’s tax structure, and said we’re at a “tipping point” for people who rely on taxes vs. those who pay taxes. “We’re dangerously close to having more people riding in the wagon than are pulling the wagon,” he said. |
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Who’s got trouble? We’ve got trouble. LANSING – Twice in a six-year period, U.S. stocks and other markets underwent stomach-churning, historic drops that the experts said should only come once in a lifetime. And to make matters worse, accompanying the second stock market free-fall in the fall of 2008 was the start of the Great Recession for most of the U.S. economy – and what’s shaping up to be a depression for the U.S. construction industry. Even though stock values have climbed back a bit, the double whammy of sustained lower investment values and plunging construction industry man-hours have wrought havoc on building trades union multi-employer pension plans. Most of the union plans are now in serious financial trouble, with the only way out of insolvency involving instituting changes in federal pension accounting laws, and/or taxpayer bailouts. That was the gist of a March 2 presentation by Randy DeFrehn, executive director of the National Coordinating Committee for Multi-Employer Plans, to the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council Legislative Conference. “Multi-employer plans have been hammered,” he said. “The federal government found money to bail out AIG, but they haven’t been willing to put out money for pension plans.” The federal government sent out surveys to 200 multi-employer fund managers last year to get a handle on their finances. “There was a good response, and it shows how critical the issues are,” DeFrehn said. He said the survey found there are 6.3 million workers among U.S. multi-employer plans, with construction workers representing about one-third of all those participants. The survey found that going into the financial meltdown in the fall of 2008, multi-employer plans in the U.S. had $266 billion in assets, making the group the largest source of private sector equity in the nation. He said there’s no reason to believe that risky investment strategies led to subsequent losses by the multi-employer funds: 90 percent of the funds are considered conservatively managed. But the financial meltdown in 2008 was far-reaching. Before the crash in the fall of 2008, 70 percent of multi-employer plans were in the healthy Green Zone, or were more than 80 percent funded. Only 9 percent were in the Red Zone, with funding levels below 60 percent. By the end of 2009, things changed drastically: only 20 percent of multi-employer funds were in the Green Zone, and 42 percent were in the Red Zone. The Yellow Zone (less than 80 percent funded but with a projected inability to pay benefits within seven years) – had a population of 38 percent. DeFrehn said the Central States Teamsters pension plan is one that’s really in trouble – and it illustrates the problems for all multi-employer plans and the federal government. In 1980, before trucking was deregulated, the plan had 80 employers. Today, the plan only has two trucking companies barely propping it up – and it has at least $5 billion in unfunded obligations. But the quasi-government agency that backs multi-employer plans – the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. – only has $1.8 billion in total funding ability for all multi-employer plans. DeFrehn said the federal government seems to have little choice but to change accounting rules that would primarily allow multi-employer plans to restructure, merge, and re-amortize their financial obligations over a longer period of time. In fact, there are two separate bills in the House and Senate that would allow those changes. The House bill, he said, is better and offers more potential relief for union multi-employer plans than the bill in the Senate. The Senate’s bill would allow for only “limited, targeted relief.” For example – without getting too much into the financial mechanics in the bill – the Senate bill would allow a lesser percentage of recent fund losses to be spread out over a 30-year amortization period. The House bill, among other features, would change accounting rules to allow a much larger percentage of fund losses to be spread out over a longer period of time. Theoretically, either the House or Senate bill would help pension plans to slow the rate of increased contributions from workers and employers that are currently keeping the plans above water. “The chances of relief are pretty good, and the Senate’s bill is more likely” to be adopted, DeFrehn said. “But I can’t figure out why there’s any resistance.” Long-term, of course, the answer to the pension problems is for contributions to pick up resulting from more man-hours worked, as well as improvements in plans’ stock market investments. But, he said “some plans aren’t going to make it.” For them, fund mergers will be necessary. Federal money will need to be brought in with specific, industry-targeted relief. Right now, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation is not backed by the full faith and credit of the federal government – Defrehn said it should be. One of the consequences of not doing anything to help the multi-employer plans: the loss of some or all retirement benefits for workers. “When you figure in investment returns with the 40-60 percent unemployment we have in the building trades, and the roller coaster going on with our investments in the market itself, the snowball becomes an avalanche,” said Michigan Building and Construction Trades President Patrick “Shorty” Gleason to the conference delegates. “It’s imperative that we get a handle on this.”
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Outdoor lovers, DNR and MUCC would like to get to know you LANSING – Every year around Nov. 15, it’s expected that productivity on construction sites around Michigan will suffer a bit with the mass migration of tradespeople headed out to the woods to hunt deer. Building trades workers, like no other group, take advantage of the opportunities to hunt, fish and camp in Michigan. And now, there are a couple groups that would like to take advantage of the trades workers’ love of the outdoors and explore a stronger relationship. “Over the last 40 years, the few times there have been upticks in (deer) permits, it has corresponded with downturns in the building industry,” said Russ Mason, director of the Michigan DNR Wildlife Division. Mason was given an opportunity to speak to Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council Legislative Convention delegates on March 3. “Your members are our core constituency, so we want to find out what you want from the landscape, and we want to listen to you.” Following Mason on the dais was Erin McDonough, executive director of the Michigan United Conservation Clubs (MUCC). She reiterated to delegates: “You are our core constituency. I can’t believe we haven’t made this connection before.” She said having a connection with the building trades would be particularly valuable when it comes to combating or promoting ballot issues that affect outdoor sports and conservation. Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council President Patrick “Shorty” Gleason, an avid hunter, is pressing for the strengthening of ties with the MUCC. He told delegates he first worked with McDonough last year to tone down the MUCC’s convention language opposing the construction of new clean-coal plants in Michigan. When the MUCC softened its opposition, Gleason said it was “a natural” that the building trades, the MUCC and the DNR open the lines of communication. “So many of our people hunt and fish, we really need to look at ways where we can work together,” Gleason said. Mason said strengthening its ties with the building trades would help to provide a unified voice for a constituency of hunters and anglers that historically have had little unity, and not much of a collective voice. “I’d like to see conservation as a great force in this state,” Mason said. “Right now, frankly, it’s pretty weak.” He added: “Outdoor opportunities have the great potential to be an economic driver in this state. Right now we don’t have a consistent message to drive that home.” One of the nagging issues for which the DNR is seeking input and solutions as part of a long-term deer management plan, Mason said, is the annual deer harvest. He said deer kills vary widely across the state, with northern Michigan hunters generally seeing less deer than southern hunters during the 2009 season. “It’s a lot easier to make fundamental change when people are unhappy,” he said. Information released by the MUCC said the deer harvest over the entire state in 2009 was down an estimated 5 to 10 percent from 2008. The likely causes are a significantly delayed corn harvest, which provided deer with cover. Also likely factors were the severe winter weather in the northern two-thirds of the state the year before, causing herd mortality, and warm weather during hunting season. For economic reasons, to scrutinize the 2009 hunting season, the state DNR has moved away from a checkpoint system to one that relies primarily on a mail/internet survey from hunters to gather information. The survey, and a wealth of other outdoors-related information, can be found at www.michigan.gov/dnr. A second survey that will gather information from building trades union workers can be found online at www.michiganoutofdoors.com.
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NEWS BRIEFS LANSING – The Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council, representing nearly 100,000 workers across the state, announced today that they are throwing their support behind Andy Dillon for Michigan Governor. Dillon's commitment to protecting and creating good-paying jobs, as well as his record of getting things done, led the group to back him as quickly and strongly as possible. "Andy has stood shoulder to shoulder with Michigan workers as we've fought to bring more jobs to this state and make sure new jobs go to the men and women who live right here," said Patrick Devlin, Secretary-Treasurer of the MBCTC. "He's a leader who has the right plan for a better economy and the ability to make it happen." Dillon has been a strong advocate for economic projects that would add thousands of jobs in every area of the state. He pushed for a massive energy overhaul that could lead to new construction projects, as well as long-term savings for consumers with greater renewable energy capacity. He shepherded a "Hire Michigan First" plan through the legislature that would ensure government backed projects give Michigan workers first crack at new positions. And he has long defended attacks against the No Worker Left Behind program that provides assistance and training to help workers affected by the economic crisis find new jobs in growing fields. In Dillon’s 5 years in office, he has a 90% voting record with the Michigan AFL-CIO. "Andy Dillon is able to cut through the political gridlock that paralyzes Lansing and prevents job growth," said Patrick "Shorty" Gleason, President of the MBCTC. "As our next Governor, he won't let anything get in the way of getting workers back on the job where they belong." Serving Michigan’s highest-skilled construction workers since 1957, the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council helps protect the safety, working conditions and wages of Michigan's unionized construction workforce. It supports building trades unions by working with contractors, contractor associations, lawmakers and local and state government agencies to promote unionized construction. |
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