Rally time: Trades ready to make their voices heard

State Republicans reduce jobless benefits to 20 weeks

Trades on a roll at Severstal with pickle line, rolling mill

Report finds (surprise!) state’s bridges in bad shape

AFL-CIO, chamber link up for infrastructure bank bill

Republicans’ lies about jobs demand a response Instead, we get the silence of the Dems

NEWS BRIEFS

Rally time: Trades ready to make their voices heard

By Marty Mulcahy
Managing Editor

LANSING – Building trades union workers from across Michigan are asked to converge on the steps of the State Capitol Building on Wednesday, April 13 as part of a “We are the people” rally to protest a myriad of anti-worker, Tea Party-fueled Republican legislation.

The rally will take place that day from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. in front of the Capitol Building – where the lawn will likely have a difficult time getting growing this spring due to the constant treading by protestors from around the state. Attendees are asked to wear their union colors.

With no less than 37 anti-union and anti-worker pieces of legislation on state lawmakers’ docket, construction workers, teachers, municipal workers, cops, firefighters, and senior citizens not wanting a cut in their pension have come to Lansing in waves this year to protest what’s happening in state government.

“We’ve seen some bad legislation pass already this term, and there’s more on deck,” said Patrick Devlin, secretary-treasurer of the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council. “Our purpose with this rally is to make sure that labor’s voice isn’t going to be lost amid this sea of anti-union, anti-worker legislation. We really need to have a good showing to show our solidarity, and to get our people fired up to contact their lawmakers to convince them not to further any more of this legislation that’s only going to help kill good-paying jobs and the middle class in this state.”

Michigan’s Republican lawmakers in the House and Senate are currently considering bills that would repeal the Michigan Prevailing Wage Act, likely creating an instant cut in wages for thousands of trades workers on state-funded projects.

Republicans are also considering two separate proposals that would end the ability of both the state and local school districts to enter into project labor agreements.

Passage of either would be a huge blow to both the organized construction industry and its contractors.
The state’s Republicans have also introduced bills to repeal MIOSHA and place Michigan under federal OSHA’s less-watchful, non-local control. Another bill would outlaw the ability of stewards or other union reps to conduct union business on taxpayer-funded property.

Still another bill would introduce right-to-work zones in Michigan, allowing local governments to create their own districts where free-riders can enjoy the benefits of union representation, without paying dues.

“We are not Wisconsin,” Gov. Rick Snyder told the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council at their legislative conference last month. He said his focus “is not on finding areas to fight.”

But actions speak louder than words, and so far, the governor and Republicans who completely control the levers of power in state government have not been hesitant to pick fights with various constituencies.

Scores of cities and school districts in Michigan are in such dire shape that they could be placed under financial management.

“These emergency managers will have the ability to remove elected officials elected by the people of Michigan,” said Michigan AFL-CIO President Mark Gaffney. “ As hundreds of thousands have chanted in Wisconsin, ‘This is not what democracy looks like.’

“Democracy is following the will of the people, and Michiganders spoke out loud and clear in November. Working families want the politicians to set aside agendas and come together to focus on strengthening our economy.”

The Capitol Building is located at the corner of South Capitol between West Allegan and Ottawa Street.

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State Republicans reduce jobless benefits to 20 weeks

LANSING – Michigan has suffered through its share of dubious “firsts” during this Great Recession that involve population loss, unemployment statistics, budget woes and political battles.

Next in line is a first involving reducing jobless benefits: A bill adopted by the Republican-led Michigan House and Senate and signed by Gov. Rick Snyder on March 28 made Michigan the first state in the nation to lower the number of weeks jobless workers can get benefits. The new law means from now on, unemployed workers will only be eligible for 20 weeks worth of benefits vs. 26 in the past.

However, in signing off on that six-week reduction in benefits, Snyder said a short-term trade-off would allow people currently out of a job to receive up to 20 additional weeks of benefits from a federal jobless program for those who have used up state benefits and most of their federal benefits. Those 20 weeks of federal benefits would have expired for 35,000 Michigan residents on April 1, and then for 150,000 jobless Michiganians by the end of 2011, if Snyder hadn't signed the bill.

“These benefits are a lifeline for many Michigan families who are struggling in this challenging economy," Snyder said in a statement. “Cutting them off so abruptly would have jeopardized the well-being of those who are trying hard to find work. Now that we have continued this safety net, we must renew our focus on improving Michigan's economic climate. We will continue driving forward with our job-creating reforms so that fewer people need to rely on unemployment benefits.”

Snyder made no mention in his press release about the permanent reduction in unemployment benefits. That 26-week benefit level has been the standard among states for the last half-century. Michigan would be the first state to make such a reduction, but likely wouldn’t be the last, given the copycat nature so far shown by Republicans leaders controlling so many state governments.

State Republicans said they instituted the reduction in an effort to lower unemployment insurance costs for state businesses. Republican Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville – a moderate whom organized labor hoped would bottle up some of the anti-worker legislation in Lansing – told The Detroit News that the reduction in benefit weeks would save businesses between $600 million and a billion dollars annually. “It's an accomplishment that's huge for businesses,” he said.

Under the new rules, the reduction in state benefits will also reduce the federal benefits unemployed workers could receive. Democrats vowed to introduce legislation to restore the lost six weeks – but they’re in a hopeless minority in both houses of government. Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer (D-East Lansing) said “despite what the press releases are going to claim, this represents a net loss of unemployment benefits for the people of Michigan,” she said. “It hurts workers, it doesn’t help them. The Republican unemployment bill does two things. It’s a permanent net loss of unemployment benefits for workers and it protects businesses who act fraudulently. This has zero impact on jobs in Michigan. It hurts people who need help the most.”

Congressman Sander Levin (D-Southfield) said “Gov. Snyder’s decision to sign this reckless measure cutting the lifeline for Michigan’s unemployed will reverberate for years in Michigan. In signing this bill, the governor has tried to distract Michiganders from the full story, seeking to portray legislation that includes a drastic and permanent cut as a ‘protection’ for the unemployed. Republicans hijacked a simple technical change to extend 100 percent federally funded benefits this year and gave Michigan the dubious distinction of becoming the only state in the union with 20 weeks of state unemployment insurance. This would affect hundreds and hundreds of thousands of Michiganders in the future.”

The Michigan Department of Energy, Labor and Economic Growth is notifying affected residents that they will continue receiving their remaining 20 weeks of extended benefits. Claimants currently receiving Emergency Unemployment Compensation benefits will not be affected. Once they exhaust their emergency benefits they will be notified to apply for the extended benefits.

Trades on a roll at Severstal with pickle line, rolling mill

DEARBORN – On the ground of former Ford Motor Co. Rouge Steel property, Severstal North America, Barton Malow and the building trades are going full bore on projects to enhance the company's steel product lines.

In March, we published an article on the topping out of the structural steel of Severstal's massive hot dip coating line, which will be used for the production of automotive exposed hot-dipped galvanize and galvanneal coatings.

A healthy walk away from that project on Severstal's grounds, the building trades are even farther along in the construction process on a coupled pickle line and tandem cold rolling mill (PLTCM). The PLTCM will allow Severstal to meet "the highest quality needs of the automotive industry as well as other end-user markets." The new equipment will allow the mill to to perform steel pickling and rolling in one line, which is the newest and most productive cold rolling technology in the world. The mill will also provide Severstal Dearborn an expanded product capability, which will allow the steelmaker to increase its total output of cold rolled sheet from 1.65 million tons to 2.1 million tons per year.

"These projects are critical to furthering Severstal North America’s leadership position in the production of innovative, high-quality light flat rolled products and strengthening our commitment to the North American steel market,” said Sergei A. Kuznetsov, chief executive officer of Severstal North America. At the conclusion of this project, Severstal will operate three of the seven combined pickling/tandem mills that exist in North America.

The project was re-started last year after the steel business in late 2008 joined nearly every other industry into the nation's economic nose-dive.
What is a pickle line? Pickling is the first process a hot band steel coil undergoes when it arrives at a coating mill. There it is uncoiled and cleaned in a series of acid baths to ensure the proper surface for galvanizing.

The new PLTCM equipment will be constructed over 320,000 square-feet (plus a 180,000 square-foot staging area), links pickling and rolling in one line that spans nearly 1,600 feet. It will incorporate the newest and most productive cold rolling technology in the world. The result will be a more cost-efficient mill with significant improvements in product quality capability for shape, gauge, surface characteristics and mechanical properties. At the conclusion of this project, Severstal North America will operate three of the seven combined pickling/tandem mills that exist in North America.

Severstal North America is the fourth largest steelmaker in the United States and specializes in a full range of the light flat-rolled products.

Barton Malow is acting as general contractor for both the Pickle Line Tandem Cold Mill and Hot Dip Coating Line projects. The company is performing all civil, concrete, re-steel, mechanical installation of all equipment, as well as boilermaker work for the PLTCM project. Accelerated 10 weeks during construction, the $150 million project will be completed in just 14 months.

THE NEW PICKLE LINE will allow Severstal space to expand its steel product offerings. This area will include equipment that will allow Severstal to “pickle” steel, or give it an acid bath, in preparation for the galvanizing process.

WORKING ON A main steam pipe at Severstal is Rod Rippe of Pipe Fitters Local 636. Behind him is fellow fitter Ted Westphal. They’re working for Progressive Mechanical.

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Report finds (surprise!) state’s bridges in bad shape

A March 30 report by Transportation for America (TFA) analyzes the sorry state of America's bridges, and finds Michigan's spans among the sorriest.

"Our country is facing a backlog of deficient bridges that need repairs and maintenance to stay open and safe, with needs far greater than what we’re currently spending," the group said. "If you’ve been paying attention to stories about our infrastructure at any time in the last few years, it won’t come as a surprise to you that our transportation infrastructure isn’t in the best shape."

The Transportation for America study ranked Michigan No. 13 among the states in bridge quality – and that means 13th worst.

The group calls itself a coalition of housing, business, environmental, public health, transportation, equitable development groups. Their report hardly breaks new ground: at least once a year road builders, civil engineers or other coalitions release reports outlining the state of the states' roads and bridges. Michigan has been near the bottom among the states in nearly every report – interstate truckers placed our highways among the bottom among the states two years ago.

In Michigan the TFA found:

According to the Federal Highway Administration, 69,223 bridges – representing more than 11 percent of all bridges in the U.S. – are deemed “structurally deficient.” Using 2009 numbers, the administration says some $70.9 million is needed to make repairs, and the backlog is lengthening, or course, as bridges age.

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AFL-CIO, chamber link up for infrastructure bank bill

WASHINGTON (PAI) – The AFL-CIO and its normal enemy, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, joined together March 16 to back a bipartisan bill establishing a national infrastructure bank.

The bank would provide $10 billion in federal “seed money” to leverage $600 billion in private investment to build new airports, rail lines, roads and other projects.
An independent board would run it. Its combined funding would pay for water, transportation or energy projects worth at least $100 million each and of “national or regional significance,” without political criteria, a fact sheet says.

The emphasis on private investment in the Build Act is designed to overcome Tea Party-inspired resistance to any spending, sponsors said. Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, and Mark Warner, D-Va., are pushing the bank.

AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka had no formal statement at the introductory press conference, but told Press Associates March 17 he believes bipartisan support will pass the new legislation. If it is set up, the bank would fund projects that would employ thousands of building trades workers. Right now, 1.883 million construction workers (21.8%) are jobless.

Rebuilding the nation’s crumbling infrastructure and reviving manufacturing by building “green job” factories are two key planks in the AFL-CIO’s program for restoring U.S. jobs and prosperity. The infrastructure plank is almost the only issue where the federation and the Chamber of Commerce agree. Chamber President Thomas Donohue was also at the press conference.

“This is a bipartisan moment to make a once bipartisan issue bipartisan once again,” Kerry said. The legislation setting up the bank will let it “create good jobs, strengthen our competitiveness, and do more with less.

“This bill breaks a partisan stalemate to get America back in the game. When you’ve got a Massachusetts Democrat, a Texas Republican, the Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO preaching from the same hymnal, you’ll find a sweet spot that can translate into a major legislative step forward,” Kerry declared.

Tea Party-inspired Republicans who dominate the House may be another story. Democratic President Barack Obama endorsed a five-year $556 billion extension of present transportation construction programs – roads, bridges and mass transit – funded by the federal gas tax. News reports say the Tea Party wants, at most, half of that. Independent engineers estimate the U.S. needs $2.2 trillion in infrastructure spending over the next five years just to keep present systems in adequate condition.

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Republicans’ lies about jobs demand a response Instead, we get the silence of the Dems

By Robert Reich

“And if all others accepted the lie which the party imposed – if all records told the same tale – then the lie passed into history and became the truth.”
– George Orwell, 1984 (published in 1949)

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was in town March 21 (specifically, at Stanford’s Hoover Institute where he could surround himself with sympathetic Republicans) to tell this whopper:

“Cutting the federal deficit will create jobs.”

It’s not true. Cutting the deficit will create fewer jobs. Less government spending reduces overall demand. This is particularly worrisome when, as now, consumers and businesses are still holding back. Fewer government workers have paychecks to buy stuff from other Americans, some of whom in turn will lose their jobs without enough customers.

But truth doesn’t seem to matter. Republicans figure if their big lies are repeated often enough, people will start to believe them.

Unless, that is, those big lies are repudiated – and big truths are told in their place.

What worries me almost as much as the Republican’s repeated big lies about jobs is the silence of President Obama and Democratic leaders in the face of them. Obama has the bully pulpit. Republicans don’t. But if he doesn’t use it the Republican’s big lies gain credibility.

Here are some other whoppers being repeated daily:

“Cutting taxes on the rich creates jobs.”

Nope. Trickle-down economics has been tried for 30 years and hasn’t worked. After George W. Bush cut taxes on the rich, far fewer jobs were created than after Bill Clinton raised them in the 1990s.
To his credit, President Obama argued against Republican demands for extending the Bush tax cut for those making more than a quarter million. But as soon as Republicans pushed back he caved. And the President hasn’t even mentioned that the $61 billion Republicans are demanding in budget cuts this fiscal year is what richer Americans would have paid in taxes had he not caved.

“Cutting corporate income taxes creates jobs.”

Baloney. American corporations don’t need tax cuts. They’re sitting on over $1.5 trillion of cash right now. They won’t invest it in additional capacity or jobs because they don’t see enough customers out there with enough money in their pockets to buy what the additional capacity would produce.

The President needs to point this out – not just in Washington but across the nation where Republican governors are slashing corporate taxes and simultaneously cutting school budgets. President Obama says he wants to invest in American skills, but many states are doing the opposite. Florida Governor Rick Scott, for example, says his proposed corporate tax cuts “will give Florida a competitive edge in attracting jobs.” They’ll also require education spending be reduced by $3 billion. Florida already ranks near the bottom in per-pupil spending and has one of nation’s lowest graduation rates. If Scott’s tax cuts create jobs, most will pay peanuts.

“Cuts in wages and benefits create jobs.”

Congressional Republicans and their state counterparts repeat this lie incessantly. It also lies behind corporate America’s incessant demand for wage and benefit concessions – and corporate and state battles against unions. But it’s dead wrong. Meager wages and benefits are reducing the spending power of tens of millions of American workers, which is prolonging the jobs recession.

President Obama and Democratic leaders should be standing up for the wages and benefits of ordinary Americans, standing up for unions, and decrying the lie that wage and benefit concessions are necessary to create jobs. The President should be traveling to the Midwest – taking aim at Republican governors in the heartland who are hell bent on destroying the purchasing power of American workers. But he’s doing nothing of the sort.

“Regulations kill jobs.”

Congressional Republicans are using this whopper to justify their attempts to defund regulatory agencies. Regulations whose costs to business exceed their benefits to the public are unwarranted, of course, but reasonable regulation is necessary to avoid everything from nuclear meltdowns to oil spills to mine disasters to food contamination – all of which we’ve sadly witnessed. Here again, we’re hearing little from the President or Democratic leaders.

Look, the President can’t be everywhere, doing everything. There’s tumult in the Middle East, we’re suddenly at war in Libya, Japan is struggling with the aftermath of disaster, and surely Latin America is an important trading partner.
But nothing is more central to average Americans than jobs and wages. Unless the President forcefully rebuts Republican’s big lies, they’ll soon become conventional wisdom.

(Mr. Reich is a public policy professor at the University of California-Berkeley. He was Labor Secretary under President Clinton).

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NEWS BRIEFS

Michigan sees small work upswing

Don't look now, but Michigan has a comparatively positive, sustained construction employment streak going on.
Michigan gained 6,700 construction jobs from February 2010 to February 2011. That's a 5.5 percent increase, ranking us No. 8 in construction employment percentage improvement during that 12-month period, according to a March 28 report by the Associated General Contractors based on Labor Department numbers.

That overall improvement in the Great Lake State came despite a 1.5 percent drop in construction employment from January 2011 to February 2011 – which has lousy weather as a cause written all over it. The month to month employment trend has mostly been positive in Michigan since last summer.

Of course these are historically still lousy times for overall construction across the nation. But Michigan was one of 19 states that added construction jobs during the past 12 months, and one AGC official said “these are certainly some of the best state-by-state numbers the industry has seen in quite some time.”

AGC officials cautioned that with total construction spending still declining and the prices contractors pay for most construction materials still rising, the construction industry remains “fragile at best.”

“It is hard to see how the broader economy will be able to grow significantly while the construction unemployment rate remains above 20 percent,” said Stephen E. Sandherr, the AGC’s chief executive officer. “If we can find ways to stimulate private-sector demand, cut red tape and address aging infrastructure, we will put millions to work and boost overall economic growth.”

Fatalities higher in right-to-work states

A study released last month from the University of Michigan's Institute for Research on Labor, Employment, and the Economy concludes that unionization in the construction industry lowers fatality rates, while anti-union right-to-work (RTW) laws have the opposite effect, resulting in higher fatality rates.

The study compared industry (which can include people on job sites who are not building trades workers, such as drivers), and occupational (people in the building trades) fatality rates in RTW and non-RTW states, and found the rate of industry fatalities is 40 percent higher in RTW states, and the occupational fatality rate is 34 percent higher in RTW states.

The study also noted the millions of dollars spent annually by unions on safety training and accident prevention, and found that even within RTW and non-RTW states, the fatality rate decreased as the percentage of union workers increased.

The study concluded: "Construction unionization is associated with lower industry and occupation fatality rates. Moreover, the positive effect that unions have on reducing fatalities appears to be stronger in states without RTW laws."

The study's message to policy makers was: "States attempting to reduce construction-related fatalities should consider encouraging trade union growth and repealing RTW laws."

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