Sass ends long career at
Machinists Lodge W24
Dan Sass is set to retire this month,
ending a long career as secretary-treas-
urer of Machinists/Wood-
workers District W24.
Sass, 64, was elected sec-
retary-treasurer of then-Ma-
chinists District Lodge 24 in
July 1991. He was tapped to
fill the remainder of the term
vacated by Jay Bormann, who
resigned to take a job with the
international union.
In 2011, the Machinists and Wood-
workers merged, which created District
W24. Sass was tinkering with the idea
of retiring at the time the merger talks
unfolded, but decided against it, he
said, because he was in the middle of
his term as S-T, and he wanted to see a
smooth merger transition.
Sass’ term expires in December.
Chris Taylor, secretary-treasurer of
Lodge 1005 employed at Freightliner,
was tapped to complete the term, al-
though going forward it will be a part-
time position.
Sass joined Machinists Lodge 1432
in 1971. In his early years he worked
as a warehousemen at Kaiser Jeep,
American Motors/Chrysler, and Boyd’s
Coffee. From 1982 to 1991 he ran his
own auto repair shop in Portland while
maintaining his union membership.
He served Local 1432 as secretary-
treasurer for 10 years. He also held
posts as auditor, trustee, recording sec-
retary and as a delegate to the district
council.
For many years he served as
secretary-treasurer of the Ore-
gon Machinists Council, and
he represented Lodge W24 on
the Machinists Non-Partisan
Political League (MNPL) Na-
tional Planning Committee. He
was a trustee to the IAM
Health and Welfare Plan and
the Nelson Trust, and he served as an
adviser to the District W24 401(k) plan.
He also represented the Machinists
Union on the Executive Board of the
Northwest Oregon Labor Council.
Until this year, Sass has been master
of ceremonies at the Machinists annual
veterans pin awards dinner. He started
doing it in 1991. The event, which
draws several hundred members, re-
tirees and spouses, includes a huge raf-
fle. Sass purchases all of the raffle
prizes at a unionized Fred Meyer store.
In his role as secretary-treasurer,
Sass helps coordinate the annual Ma-
chinists Golf tournament to raise
money for Guide Dogs of America. In
2002, he received the “Gift of Sight”
award at the annual William Win-
pisinger Charity Banquet in Las Vegas.
(The late-Winpisinger was general
president of the Machinists Union.)
More than 1,000 people from around
the nation attended the banquet to
honor Sass and Harley-Davidson CEO
IBEW attorney
Norm Malbin
rests his case
Dan Sass (right), has been a regular at the annual Labor Day picnic at Oaks
Park, where he sold raffle tickets to raise money for the Machinists Non-
partisan Political League. Sass is retiring this month as secretary-treasurer
of the Machinists District W24. He has served in that capacity for 23 years.
Jeffrey Bleustein.
Sass also is a regular at the Labor
Day picnic at Oaks Park, where he sells
raffle tickets for the union’s political
action fund, MNPL.
A native of North Dakota, Sass has
lived in Portland since 1969.
Sass says in retirement he intends to
play more golf and spend time with his
wife Kim and granddaughter Lacey.
His daughter Angela manages the Ma-
chinists/Boilermakers Federal Credit
Union. His youngest daughter Saman-
tha is a college student studying to be a
nurse.
Norm Malbin, a tenacious advocate
for working people, retired July 4 after
21 years as an in-house attorney for In-
ternational Brotherhood of Electrical
Workers (IBEW) Local 48.
During that time, he helped Local 48
fight labor abuses in the electrical con-
tracting industry, and helped hundreds
of members with their own private le-
gal problems. He also did occasional
work for smaller IBEW locals in Ore-
gon, like Local 280 and Local 932.
Malbin is also known throughout the
local labor movement for having devel-
oped an annual labor law conference.
The conference has trained hundreds of
union stewards, officers, and staff over
the last 18 years — both to know what
rights workers have under the law, and
how to fight for them.
“I would not have ever represented
management,” Malbin says. “I chose to
walk on this side of the street.”
Malbin, 65, is the son of physician
Morris Malbin, who provided medical
care to Kaiser Portland shipyard work-
ers and their families during World War
Two. After the war, Malbin’s father was
one of a handful of doctors who contin-
ued that practice, with the support of lo-
cal unions, which later became Kaiser
Permanente.
Norm went to college at the Univer-
sity of Denver, driving a truck for Rus-
(Turn to Page 8)
SEIU 503 political director departs after decades of service to labor
Arthur Towers, the long-serving political direc-
tor at Oregon’s biggest union, left Service Em-
ployees International Union (SEIU) Local 503
July 18 to work for the Oregon Trial Lawyers As-
sociation (OTLA).
Towers, 54, said recent health issues led him to
consider a less stressful job. His focus at OTLA —
consumer protection — will keep him plenty busy,
but Towers said it will be less 24-7 than defending
57,000 public employees in the state capitol.
His departure ends two decades of involvement
with labor.
Towers grew up in Wisconsin, Rhode Island,
and Missouri, and was drawn to politics at an early
age. He dropped out of Washington University in
St. Louis to work on political campaigns, including
a successful 1978 fight against an anti-union
“right-to-work” ballot measure. For Towers, it was
a clearcut workers’ rights issue: His father, an Eng-
lish teacher, had been fired from a job at University
of Wisconsin-Whitewater for supporting an un-
successful campaign to unionize with the Team-
sters.
Towers worked for 18 months at Missouri Pub-
lic Interest Research Group (MoPIRG), six years
at the Missouri Coalition for the Environment, and
then as a consultant on ballot measure and advo-
cacy campaigns around the country. In 1994, that
work brought him to Oregon for the first time — to
campaign against Measure 15, a constitutional
amendment that would have required the state to
fully fund schools (and leave other priorities like
public safety and senior services to fight over what
was left.) He got to know then-SEIU Local 503 ex-
ecutive director Alice Dale, and back in St. Louis,
AUGUST 1, 2014
ARTHUR TOWER
he went to work for SEIU Missouri/Kansas State
Council in 1997. When Tim Nesbitt was elected
president of the Oregon AFL-CIO in 2000, Towers
replaced Nesbitt as executive director of SEIU
Oregon State Council, which coordinates state-
level politics for SEIU Locals 503 and 49. Three
years later, Towers went to work for Dale as polit-
ical director of SEIU Local 503.
Towers looks back at a number of successes
during his labor career. In 2000, Oregon became
the first state in the country to use a ballot measure
to extend collective bargaining rights to home care
workers. Adding home care workers — and later
providers of child care, foster care, and care for the
developmentally disabled — SEIU Local 503
more than doubled from its 2000 membership of
25,000.
“When they got started, they weren’t even con-
sidered workers; they were considered domestics,”
Towers said. “It’s been exciting to see the fruits of
our labor help low-income working women rise
from minimum wage to $13 an hour.” Towers also
helped the home care worker campaign develop
leaders, who became effective advocates for im-
proved care.
Another high point, Towers said, was the work
SEIU did to preserve public services during the
state budget crisis in the Great Recession that be-
gan in 2008. Local 503 helped state agencies be-
come more efficient by legislation mandating a re-
duction in the number of managers, and it helped
pass 2010 Measures 66 and 67 to temporarily in-
crease taxes on the wealthy and corporations.
A personal low point was the 2013 special ses-
sion, when the governor Local 503 had helped to
elect brokered a second round of cuts to public em-
ployee pensions, while passing new tax breaks for
large corporations.
During the legislative session, Towers oversaw
a staff of six, plus a contract lobbyist, keeping track
of multiple committees and up to 150 budget line
items. Just about every facet of state government
affects Local 503 members, Towers says, from
pension rules to health care policy to revenue and
budgets.
Towers said one of the things he’s most proud
of is helping to build up a program for members to
come to the Capitol and visit legislators. Every two
years, hundreds come to the Capitol to tell their
story. Local 503 organizes 15 lobby days, bring-
ing in groups of 20 to 100 members. Members get
a little bit of training, and then they have a real di-
alogue with legislators, Towers said.
“They hear from agency directors all the time,
but they almost never hear from frontline work-
ers,” Towers said.
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
Though leaving labor, Towers says he won’t be
a stranger: OTLA is frequently an ally, working
with labor on worker’s compensation and other is-
sues. Towers said his focus on consumer protec-
tion means he’ll be taking on the big banks, big
oil, big insurance.
“Trial lawyers fight for the injured, victimized
or defrauded,” Towers said, “and the same people
who harm workers also defraud consumers.”
Towers is succeeded as Local 503’s political di-
rector by Melissa Unger, who was executive di-
rector of SEIU Oregon State Council.
...Rick Henson
(From Page 4)
fights and not be afraid of them, because the things
we’re fighting for are worthwhile.”
In retirement, Henson has a long list of to-dos,
including rehabbing a 32-foot boat, and working
on fences, rock walls, and terraced hillsides on his
property. He’ll also join his wife, Pat Riggs-Hen-
son, in the AFSCME Retirees chapter. Riggs-Hen-
son, a longtime activist in AFSCME Local 2831,
retired in 2010 after 31 years at Lane County and
now serves as an elected member of the Spring-
field Utility Board. Together 30 years, they have
four adult children (one deceased), five grandchil-
dren and two great-grandchildren. They’ll con-
tinue to be involved in the Lane County Labor
Council and in local community campaigns.
Portland-based AFSCME staff rep JaNell Ear-
ley will transfer to Eugene to take over Henson’s
assignments. Earley most recently worked with
Local 88 (Multnomah County).
PAGE 5