NOV. 20, 2009:NWLP
11/17/09
9:47 AM
Page 5
SEIU’s Stern leads White House visitor list
WASHINGTON, D.C. (PAI) —
Service Employees President Andrew
Stern leads a long list of heavy hitters
who visited the White House in the first
part of this year to talk issues with Pres-
ident Barack Obama and his top aides.
Stern visited the White House on 22
occasions from Jan. 20 through July 31,
For all those on the list, the visits in-
cluded public ceremonies, such as when
Obama had many union leaders over to
the White House and declared that
“unions are part of the solution” to U.S.
economic ills — and private meetings.
SEIU said in a statement that Stern’s
visits covered health care and the stim-
ulus law.
“Coming off an eight-year period
when the voice of workers fell on deaf
ears, the list demonstrates the White
House desire to hear from working peo-
ple,” SEIU said.
Trailing Stern on the 500-visitor list
were Obama transition team director
John Podesta (17 visits) and National
Organization for Women President Kim
Gandy (15). Richard Trumka, then the
AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer and now
its president, visited seven times.
Big Business was not shut out of the
White House. Corporate visitors in-
cluded Bill Gates, the co-founder of Mi-
crosoft, and CEOs Lloyd Blankfein of
Goldman Sachs, Vikram Pandit of Citi-
group, Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan
Chase, Rex Tillerson of the ExxonMo-
bil, David O’Reilly of Chevron and Jef-
frey Immelt of GE.
LCSA’s Yule party
slated for Dec. 19
Geek Squad election withdrawn
Labor’s Community Service Agency
will hold its 13th annual “Presents from
Partners” holiday toy drive. The annual
event culminates in a toy distribution
party for underprivileged children.
To participate, drop off a new, un-
wrapped toy to the Northwest Oregon
Labor Council or Labor’s Community
Service Agency between now and Dec.
17. The offices are located at 1125 SE
Madison St., Portland.
The Presents from Partners Holiday
Toy Party will be held on Saturday,
Dec. 19, from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Genesis
Community Fellowship, 5425 NE 27th
(27th & Killingsworth), Portland.
Hopes that local Geek Squad work-
ers might unionize will have to wait.
Members of a unit of 24 home theater
installers working at Oregon and
Southwest Washington Best Buy stores
signed cards seeking to join Interna-
tional Brotherhood of Electrical Work-
ers (IBEW) Local 48. Local 48 peti-
tioned the National Labor Relations
Board (NLRB) Sept. 8 to hold an elec-
tion, and the federal agency scheduled
one Nov. 5. They would have been the
first Best Buy workers in America to
unionize.
But the day before the election, the
union withdrew the petition.
NOVEMBER 20, 2009
Local 48 organizer Terry Reigle said
Best Buy anti-union maneuvers diluted
union support and made the outcome
too close for comfort. Attorneys for the
company persuaded the NLRB that a
group of 13 computer techs — work-
ers who had not sought out the union
— should be included in the proposed
bargaining unit. And weekly manda-
tory-attendance anti-union meetings
held as late as Nov. 3 succeeded in cre-
ating doubts among some union sup-
porters.
Reigle said pro-union Geek Squad
workers were supportive of the deci-
sion to pull the petition.
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
IN MEMORIAM
FLOYD EARLS, a re-
tired financial secretary of
Exterior and Interior Spe-
cialists Local 2154 and
business agent of the de-
funct Oregon State District
Council of Carpenters, died
Oct. 29 at age 85.
Earls retired in 1989 af-
ter a career that began
when he joined a United
Brotherhood of Carpenters
local in 1953 in San Bernardino, Cali-
fornia.
He moved to the Portland area in
1954.
Floyd William Earls was born on
June 29, 1924, in Spur, Texas, which is
west of Lubbock. He grew up in the
Riverside area, near San Bernardino,
CA. He attended high school in nearby
Redlands. He served in the Civilian
Conservation Corps in Southern Cali-
fornia and later worked for the U.S.
Forest Service.
Earls joined the U.S. Army in 1942
and served in the Combat Engineers in
Europe in World War II.
Earls joined Carpenters Local 1020,
which was mostly a shipwrights local.
However, he worked as an installer of
Sheetrock. Later, he and other
Sheetrockers joined Carpenters Local
2154, eventually renaming
it Exterior and Interior
Specialists Local 2154.
Earls was elected as
one of the business agents
of the Portland District
Council of Carpenters in
1979, but still retained his
post with Local 2154.
When the Oregon State
District Council of Car-
penters was formed, it
took over the Portland District and
Earls became a business agent of the
State Council (the state council is now
the Pacific Northwest Regional Coun-
cil of Carpenters).
Earls served as a trustee of the Ore-
gon Carpenters Health & Welfare and
Pension Trust Funds and chaired the
Carpenters Apprenticeship and Train-
ing Committee.
He was installed into the Northwest
Oregon Labor Council Retirees Labor
Hall of Fame in November 2006.
Floyd was preceded in death in
2007 by his wife Irene. They were mar-
ried 57 years.
He is survived by a son, Floyd Jr.,
who is a member of Local 2154; a
daughter, Jan Troxler; plus three grand-
children and seven great-grandchildren.
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