Michigan GOP ready to move on labor issues

Catholic Church called out over workers’ rights

East Lansing, Steel City

L-58 works to steer charging station installs to the IBEW

UA Local 174 puts industry’s best foot forward – with seven tractor trailers

Construction adds jobs, but industry is still stinging

NEWS BRIEFS

Michigan GOP ready to move on labor issues

LANSING – With the revenue side of the state’s budget resolved after having the process occupying much of their time over the last two months, Michigan’s Republican legislators are ready to resume their anti-labor mischief.

The number of anti-worker, anti-union bills introduced this year by Republican lawmakers exceeds 40, according to the Michigan AFL-CIO. We reported in our last issue that a bill to outlaw project labor agreements on state funded construction projects is not far from passage, and another one to overturn the state Prevailing Wage Act likely isn’t far behind.

Now we learn that the “nuclear option,” as organized labor leaders in Michigan have called it, is going to get a push – although it likely won’t get far – in the form of the promotion of a right-to-work bill.

MIRS News Service in Lansing reported on May 4 that former Republican lawmaker Jack Hoogendyk of the “Center Right Coalition of Michigan” has sent out an e-mail seeking to garner support for a right-to-work bill in our state. It was sent at a time when Republican lawmakers in New Hampshire were regrouping to gain enough votes to overcome their Democratic governor’s veto to make the Granite State the nation’s 23rd right- to-work state.

“A movement is afoot, led by common-sense grassroots activists, to put a Right to Work bill before the legislature,” Hoogendyk wrote, according to MIRS. “There are several dedicated lawmakers willing to stand up and support such a bill. But there is a question whether there are at least 56 members in the House and 20 in the Senate, (the minimum needed) to get the bill passed.”

Hoogendyk continued: “A carefully devised strategy is being developed that will include the need to show as much grass roots support for Right to Work in Michigan as possible. This letter is a call to leaders of every Tea Party, 912, anti-tax, limited-government, pro-liberty organization in the state.”

Two bills have been introduced in the state Senate that would allow the creation of right-to-work “zones” in Michigan, Senate Bill-0120 and Senate Bill 0116. Both are similar to, and align with, House Bill 4054.

The RTW zone concept, which allows local cities and counties to adopt their own right-to-work law, is seen as a way for Republican lawmakers to avoid the even greater rancor that would be expected from a full-blown, statewide right-to-work law. However, there are roadblocks for the legislation: Gov. Rick Snyder has said he wouldn’t pursue passage of “divisive” issues like right-to-work, and Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville doesn’t seem inclined to further the legislation, either.

“I think passing a right-to-work bill in Michigan is going to be an uphill battle,” said Michigan Laborers Legislative Director Jonathon Byrd. “Right-to-work is seen as extreme, and Republicans in the state legislature are not as extreme as Hoogendyk.

While it remains to be seen how far right-to-work legislation will move in Michigan, two anti-worker whoppers have already been adopted. One law makes Michigan the first in the nation to permanently reduce the state’s unemployment benefit week level from 26 weeks to 20 weeks. The other allows financially failing school districts and municipalities to be placed under an emergency financial manager appointed by the governor, who is basically a dictator able to abrogate union contracts and hire and fire workers at will.

And Byrd said while the legislation to outlaw project labor agreements and anti-prevailing wage legislation is still in the hopper, the building trades’ next likely battle will be to help garner support for construction of the second Detroit River bridge.

A new bridge would create thousands of building trades jobs in the U.S. and Canada. The level of support for the new bridge in the state House and Senate remains unclear – deep-pocketed Ambassador Bridge owner Matty Maroun wants to build his own bridge, and he’s a major political contributor.

“I think it’s the next big fight for the building trades,” Byrd said. “It has fast legs, and the governor is pushing it.”

TOP

Catholic Church called out over workers’ rights

By Mark Gruenberg
PAI Staff Writer

WASHINGTON (PAI) – Retired AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney, one of the Catholic Church’s most prominent laymen, along with a top U.S. bishop on social justice issues, are challenging their church to live up to its own ideals and become much more active for workers’ rights.

In closing speeches on May 3 at a 2-day conference on the relationship between the church and labor, sponsored by the Catholic University of America, Sweeney and Bishop Stephen E. Blaire of Stockton, Calif., both laid out the condition of workers in the U.S.: Declining incomes, cutbacks in benefits and rights under siege by politicians.
Then they challenged their church, which honored the 120th anniversary of the first papal encyclical to speak out strongly for workers’ rights, to do something about it.

The statements by Sweeney and Blaire, chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, are important: The labor movement is disproportionately Catholic and Jewish. Immigrants – most of them Catholics from Latin America and Asia – are its obvious target for new members.

Yet the teachings of Catholic Social Thought, particularly the workers’ rights teachings with their outright endorsement of unions, are notably absent from Catholic schools and universities. And speakers said the church issues pro-worker statements in the U.S., including one the week before, but does not publicize them.

Further, prominent Catholic institutions feel free to ignore Catholic teachings and act like other employers in relations with their workers, with no penalty. Catholic legislators and governors also feel free to ignore church teachings, Sweeney said.

Yet the church has stood up for workers, from that first encyclical by Pope Leo XIII to recent statements by Pope Benedict XVI, said Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the papal council on social justice. But Turkson admitted the church’s pro-labor message, in the past, was often buried by its Europe-centered stand against Socialism.

Sweeney and Blaire responded that the U.S. church as an institution hasn’t been prominent enough, verbal enough or done enough for workers. Other speakers pointed out individual bishops, cardinals and priests have spoken out for workers. They cited present Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, and the late Msgr. George Higgins and the late Cardinals Joseph Bernardin and Albert Stritch, all of Chicago.

And the church itself is divided on workers’ rights, speakers said. Bishop Blaire cited a recent example: The Archbishop of Milwaukee strongly backed Wisconsin’s public workers’ rights to collective bargaining. Blaire backed him up with another public statement from the U.S. Conference of Bishops, but several local Wisconsin bishops wanted the church to stay neutral as GOP Gov. Scott Walker warred on workers.

Sweeney was even sharper about the church’s low profile in labor’s fight. “The impact of unrestrained capitalism and uncontrolled free trade has changed the relationship between owner and worker, to the detriment of the worker,” he stated. “They are struggling with a system that has transferred wealth and power from those who have a little to those who have much.

“For 30 years, the anti-union Right Wing has been waging war on workers,” he declared, reeling off a list of ills workers face, from Walker’s destruction of Wisconsin workers’ rights to the stagnation of workers’ incomes and decay of their benefits. If that war succeeds, “the effect will be profound,” Sweeney warned. “Yet you hardly hear mention of Catholic Social Thought” in discussion of what’s happening to workers.

“We need even more from the American church. If the American labor movement is to survive, we need to renew and strengthen the partnership between the church and labor,” he declared. The church needs a louder voice “to confront the greed of the giant corporations that have become the ruling class.”

That voice must reach down to the laity, by teaching the Catholic stand for workers’ rights, the dignity of people and their work, in every diocese, he said.

Conferees generally agreed with Sweeney’s and Blaires’ comments about Catholic social thought, its pro-union principles, potential impact, and calls for action.

But an informational brochure at the conference symbolizes the problem Sweeney, Blaire and others face in trying to get the church more active for workers. It was the text of a bishops’ statement, worked out two years ago with a committee of prominent laymen – including Sweeney – about how U.S. Catholic hospitals, schools and other institutions should treat their workers.

The statement demanded neutrality, lack of lying in organizing campaigns and recognition of unions, among other things. And it had no enforcement power.

East Lansing, Steel City

Michigan State University forecast in its 2010-2011 appropriation request to the state that it has “extensive facility needs,” to the tune of about $116 million over the next five years.”

But the current expenditures are looking healthy, too. The four projects below alone represent about $129 million in construction activity on campus. Iron workers have obviously been busy, and that’s a good omen for work prospects for the rest of the area trades for the remainder of the year. Photos via Michigan State University

Plant Science expansion MSU’s $43 MILLION Plant Science expansion will add about 80,000 square feet of space to the facility, creating laboratory research and support space. The four-story building, set to be complete next year, will connect the Plant Biology Laboratories and the Plant and Soil Science Building in the Central Academic District.

Cyclotron Building Phase II expansion THE CYCLOTRON BUILDING’S Phase II office addition, in the Central Academic District, involves the construction of a four-story structure plus a penthouse. It’s being erected next to the Phase 1 addition. The first floor will contain a lecture hall and a large conference room with priority use by the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory/Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (NSCL/FRIB). Floors two through four will be a combination of fixed and open office space that addresses office needs for up to 100 visitors. This $8 million project is in anticipation of the real prize: nearby construction of the $550 million Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, which is expected to start in 2013.

Wells Hall Addition THE DECISION to demolish the creaky 111-year-old Morrill Hall offers MSU the opportunity to provide upgraded replacement office space for its inhabitants, who primarily hail from the English and History departments. Those offices will go into space made possible by an addition to Wells Hall, currently under construction above, as well as renovations to the old Horticulture Building. MSU is spending about $38 million on the new office space. The project will add three stories and about 88,000 square-feet of space above the B-wing of Wells Hall, located on the north side of campus. MSU opted to have Morrill Hall demolished when the Wells Hall addition is complete. Originally dorm space for women, Morrill is a wood-framed structure deemed unfit for renovation and a makeover into a modern office building.

Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum THE DESIGN of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum looks to have more angles than a protractor. Located at Grand River Avenue and Farm Lane, the $40 million, 46,000-square-foot museum will be constructed on three levels. It will be adjoined by an outdoor sculpture to the east and a plaza to the west. The building will include unique gallery spaces, and an education wing, a museum shop, visitor cafe and gathering space, storage and administrative spaces.

TOP

L-58 works to steer charging station installs to the IBEW

By Marty Mulcahy
Managing Editor

WARREN – Thomas Edison was notoriously self-confident, but even he didn’t know back in 1880 when he started his Edison Illuminating Co. how wildly successful it and its successor power companies would become.

Along those lines, no one is certain what the future holds for another industry in its infancy: power delivery to – and installation of – electric vehicle charging stations. But one thing is sure: union electricians in Michigan are currently at the forefront of writing the specifications and creating the curriculum to teach the installation of plug-in stations for those electric vehicles. And going forward, electricians who are certified in the installation of vehicle charging stations are likely to be first in line to get the work.

“The training to install vehicle charging stations can easily be adapted into our curriculum,” said IBEW Local 58/NECA Training Director Gary Polulak. “And what we’re doing is absolutely going to bring real work opportunities for the electricians and for other trades who dig trenches and cement work.”

Powering Polulak’s confidence is the newly formed Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Training Program (EVITP). It’s a non-profit, volunteer, collaborative effort designed to deliver a “structured platform to facilitate training and certification for the installation of electric vehicle supply equipment across the residential, commercial and public markets,” said Bernie Kotlier, the program’s national co-chair.

Putting together a standard for teaching and installing electric vehicle charging stations is similar to some of the basics Edison had to consider when he first installed street lights. Where should they be placed? How tall? How do you waterproof them? How do you make them safe? How do you get power to them without extensively tearing up existing streets and sidewalks?

Electrical industry partners in Michigan and California have been leading the way in writing the standards for electric vehicle power supply installation, since both states are such major stakeholders in the production of battery-powered vehicles. “Along with what they’re doing in California,” Polulak said, “we’re leading the way here at Local 58 in Michigan in putting together the EVITP training program.”

The IBEW’s coursework for the installation of vehicle charging stations that Local 58 instructors helped develop involves 16-21 hours of training. It includes the technical aspects of commercial, residential and public installations. But it also involves things like customer relations in a residential setting and knowledge of utility policies.

Electricians will be given certification for completing the course work, and some contractors already have a leg up on others when it comes to certifying their workforce and bidding for the work.

“GM is going to want to see certifications before the stations are built on their property,” said Jennifer Mefford, director of business development for the Southeast Michigan National Electrical Contractors Association and IBEW Local 58. The relatively small amount of additional education for electricians to get the certification means from region to region, the training “can appropriately support the market,” Mefford said, without burdening the capacity of apprenticeship schools.

The certifications for IBEW electricians will soon spread around Michigan and the nation. The EVITP has developed a curriculum for installing the charging stations utilizing a “train-the-trainer” model that has served the IBEW and its partners at the National Electrical Contractors Association well over the years. Last month, more than 50 master electricians from 25 markets met in Illinois and took part in 21 hours of training, which included hands-on, classroom and skills testing over three days.

Upon successful completion of the course, those instructors return to their home markets and train additional instructors, who will in turn share their knowledge with journeymen and apprentice electricians. Local 58’s Training Center was scheduled to host a train-the-trainer program for Michigan IBEW instructors May 19-20.

This scenario will really hit the fan July 31 through Aug. 5, when the charging stations installation curriculum will be offered for the first time to about 2,000 IBEW instructors who will take part in the annual National Training Institute/National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee for the Electrical Industry in Washtenaw County.

A sampling of the nationwide groups collaboratively setting up the standards for vehicle charger installations include General Motors, DTE Energy, Southern California Edison, General Electric, Leviton, the National Fire Protection Association, the International Association of Electrical Inspectors – and the IBEW-NECA National Joint Apprenticeship Training Committee.

“Our organization is collaborating locally and nationally with automakers, utilities, charging station manufacturers and the electrical inspector community to ensure a smooth launch of this industry,” said IBEW Local 58 Business Manager Joe Abdoo.

The electrical industry’s NJATC has adopted the EVITP standards and is working with the U.S. Department of Energy to ultimately create unified, nationwide building codes for the delivery of power and installation of the charging stations.

While no one can predict the future of charging stations, an expanding market is being created every day. Local 58 members have installed 20 commercial charging stations in Southeast Michigan. An estimated 15,000 battery-powered Chevrolet Volts are going to be made this model year. Next year, production is expected to ramp up to 20,000. And the Volt is hardly the only plug-in vehicle – there are currently about 15 plug-in vehicles on the road today, including the Nissan Leaf.

IBEW Local 58 Business Representative Shawn Crump, who drives a union-provided Chevy Volt, said the industry is already working on the next generation of vehicle chargers. Instead of plug-ins, batteries would be charged by a mat placed under a vehicle, similar to the way cell phone batteries can be wirelessly charged.

“There is a tremendous potential for growth in this area, and we want people in the industry to look to the IBEW and our contractors as the source for doing work on charging stations,” said Crump, who is also an NJATC trustee.
The federal government has an ambitious goal of putting one million plug-in vehicles on the road by 2015.

LOCAL 58 APPRENTICESHIP instructor Marty McLean, left, along with apprentices John Schenavar and Nathan Plunkett, do what’s logical when installing a new fixture: read the directions. Working with Centerline Electric, they’re installing a new “ChargePoint” charging station in the parking lot of the Local 58 Training Center.

TOP

UA Local 174 puts industry’s best foot forward – with seven tractor trailers

TOP

Construction adds jobs, but industry is still stinging

The construction industry added 5,000 jobs last month while the industry’s unemployment rate declined from 20 percent in March to 17.8 percent in April, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The report, issued May 6, showed construction unemployment was still about double the national average. An analysis by the Associated General Contractors of America said “the figures continue a year-long trend of little change in construction employment after years of steep declines,” and predicted the stagnation is unlikely to change soon.

“The construction industry may have stopped bleeding jobs, but there is no sign that employment levels are set to bounce back,” said Ken Simonson, the association’s chief economist. “With declines in public sector investments likely to offset increases in some private sector construction activity, we are unlikely to see significant increases in construction employment for the foreseeable future.”

The construction economist said the nonresidential construction sectors added 10,000 jobs in April, while the residential sector lost 5,400 jobs. The largest gains came from the heavy and civil engineering construction, likely reflecting the start of construction on a number of stimulus and other publicly funded projects that halted during the winter.

AGC officials said that construction employment is likely to remain relatively stagnant through much of 2011 as federal, state and local governments cut investments in infrastructure and other construction projects. They said that expected increases in multifamily, manufacturing and power construction would help offset the public sector declines, but might not be enough to lead to significant increases in construction employment.

“Construction will keep suffering double-digit unemployment rates as long as federal officials continue to cut infrastructure maintenance and upkeep instead of addressing out-of-control entitlement spending,” said Stephen E. Sandherr, the association’s chief executive officer. “The lesson here is you can’t neglect your way to greater economic prosperity.”
The overall U.S. unemployment rate rose in April to 9.0 percent from March's 8.8 percent.

TOP

NEWS BRIEFS

EPI rips GOP plan to shift jobless money

Washington (PAI) – A Republican plan to turn unemployment benefits into a block grant that states could use as they wish could cost workers jobs, the Economic Policy Institute says.

The GOP scheme, unveiled May 6, would let the states use the jobless benefit money for a variety of purposes, including paying back the sums they borrowed from the federal Unemployment Trust Fund during and since the Great Recession.

In turn for that flexibility, the sum the feds would send to the states for jobless benefits would be capped – and subject to congressional appropriations every year.

EPI senior economists Ross Eisenbrey and Heidi Shierholz found multiple problems with the Republicans’ plan, which the GOP-run House has yet to act upon. But sponsors are pushing for quick approval, for state and federal budget reasons.

Current unemployment law, including the two years’ worth of extended benefits Congress approved in December 2010, will cost an estimated $32 billion from this July through next July, EPI says. The block grant would be $1 billion less.

More importantly, they said, it would let the states end payment of extended jobless benefits – taking $40 billion out of the pockets of both the jobless and of firms whose goods and services they buy. “Putting cash in the hands of unemployed workers generates more economic activity than any other option,” Eisenbrey and Shierholz wrote in their issue brief on the GOP scheme. Extending aid to the jobless “results in more consumption of goods and services produced by private-sector businesses, generating more economic activity by their suppliers and contractors.”

Alternative uses for the money would produce fewer jobs or none at all:

• If a state uses unemployment block grant money to repay the feds for jobless funds it borrowed, there would be no new jobs created. That would also happen if the state dumped the federal block grant money into its state unemployment trust fund, replacing state money, but didn’t spend it. With no change in that state’s trust fund and no change in its jobless benefits, there’s no economic spinoff creating new jobs.
• But if the state used the federal money to pay workers’ jobless benefits, while giving employers a break from their unemployment tax payments, there would be a positive impact, creating 198,000 jobs nationwide if all states did that. If the states used the federal money for job search services, 186,000 jobs nationwide would be created.

More protests at PulteGroup

Seven people were arrested in Romulus on May 11 after they sat in a street to stop a bus they believed was carrying PulteGroup directors and executives, who were headed to their annual meeting at an airport hotel.

They were among the peaceful demonstrators protesting PulteGroup’s acceptance of $880 million in tax cuts. Instead, the AFL-CIO says, the money came to Pulte thanks to the Worker, Homeownership and Business Assistance Act of 2009. This Act was intended to create jobs and extend benefits to the unemployed. Instead, PulteGroup is spending the cash on debt buy-downs and land, while increasing the ranks of the unemployed by laying off employees.

“I believe Pulte’s acceptance of $880 million taxpayer dollars is unethical and should be illegal,” said Rev. Charles Williams II. “And if it takes me getting in their way of business as usual to make the Board of Directors do the right thing, then I’m willing to do that. We’re calling on Pulte shareholders and our federal legislators to make Pulte do the right thing – use the money to create jobs, or give it back.”

Some 200 union members, community activists and other allies remained outside the Detroit Metro Marriott Hotel, holding signs demanding answers and chanting: “Where are the jobs? Where is the money?”

The Sheet Metal Workers and Painters and Allied Trades International Unions have joined the AFL-CIO in following PulteGroup executives across the country. Bloomfield Hills-based PulteGroup is one of the nation’s largest home-building companies. (The AFL-CIO contributed).

TOP