NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | April 3 , 2015 | PAGE 5
Union officials join Sen. Merkley
in walk across Tilikum Crossing
Senator touts bridge as example of needed infrastructure investment
O
regon U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley walked across the new Tilikum
Crossing with TriMet and union officials March 30 to celebrate
the completion of this phase of the Portland-Milwaukie Light Rail Tran-
sit Project. Merkley heralded the nearly all-union project, which came
in on time and under budget, as an example of the investments America
should be making in the next generation of infrastructure. The transit
bridge over the Willamette River will open to the public on Sept. 12.
Union officials joining Merkley on the tour were Barbara Byrd, sec-
retary treasurer of the Oregon AFL-CIO; Willy Myers, executive sec-
retary of the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council; Robert Ca-
marillo, president of the building trades council and a union rep for Iron
Workers Local 29; and Bob Carroll, a union rep for IBEW Local 48.
“This distinctive bridge and this light rail line give Portland a new
landmark, but more importantly they both put people to work now and
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (left) tours the new Tilikum Crossing with officials from TriMet and Portland lay the groundwork for the metro area’s future economic growth,”
area labor unions. With him are TriMet general manager Neil McFarlane (center) and Willy Myers, Merkley said. “I wish more of my colleagues in Washington would re-
alize that we can’t keep shortchanging infrastructure and delude our-
executive secretary of the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council.
selves into thinking we’ll still have a world-class economy. Here in
Oregon, we’re doing it right — creating jobs, investing in our future, and doing it on time and under budget.”
Last summer, after learning that the entire 7.3-mile light rail project would come in roughly $10 to $40
million under budget and that the federal government intended to recoup those savings, Merkley contacted
the U.S. Department of Transportation in hopes that the Federal Transit Administration’s (FTA) would allow
for part of the savings to be used for further improvements to the project. In response, the FTA allowed TriMet
to keep an additional $3.6 million. From that money, $2.6 million will fund
Pete Bruha and Trent Jones, additional station shelters, $300,000 will go towards rail switch heaters, and
members of Laborers Local 320, $705,000 will go towards overhead contact system ice caps. These additions
got a surprise visit from Oregon to the project will make traveling in cold weather conditions easier and more
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley. The two comfortable for TriMet workers and commuters and reduce system delays.
“We are so excited for these expansions to the project,” said TriMet Gen-
laborers employed by Kiewit
eral
Manager Neil McFarlane. “These extra funds will provide some impor-
Construction said they’ve been
tant
improvements to our system that will make for a better riding experi-
working steady on the bridge
ence.”
for the last two years.
Progressive broadcaster Hightower opens new front to save USPS
By Mark Gruenberg
Press Associates Inc.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (PAI)
— Progressive broadcaster Jim
Hightower is opening a new
front in the multi-union, multi-
organization fight to save the
U.S. Postal Service from its pri-
vatizing management and Wall
Street interests.
In a March 24 nationwide
conference call with activists,
Hightower and Postal Workers
President Mark Dimondstein
outlined avenues people can use
to save the embattled agency
and the union jobs of Postal
Workers, Letter Carriers, Mail
Handlers and Rural Letter Car-
riers threatened by shutdowns
and the privatization push.
The new avenues include
starting a petition to the White
House, where 100,000 signa-
tures will force President Barack
Obama to address the issue.
Another is joining the 70-orga-
nization effort, www.agrandal-
liance.org to fight for better, ex-
panded service, not cuts.
“Get to your city councils and
your mayors — and not just in
places where post offices are
closing — to say what the post
office means to you,” High-
tower said.
“To get a letter to the middle
of nowhere costs 49 cents. As
soon as we get into the privati-
zation-profit model, it could cost
$5 — or maybe not get sent
there at all. And if you write
down the wrong address, they
send it back, for free. Where
else can you get all that?”
Dimondstein said the Postal
Service takes in $68 billion a
year in revenue, “and Wall
Street wants it.”
The campaign comes as Con-
gress’ ruling Republicans, with
some Democratic help, prepare
to renew legislation to close
more local post offices, elimi-
nate Saturday services, kill
door-to-door service for new
customers, and replace well-
paying unionized postal em-
ployees with low-paid,
no-benefits, nonunion
workers.
USPS management
claims it needs to make
those moves, on top of
mail distribution center
closings that began in Jan-
uary — and that elimi-
nated overnight delivery
even within major cities
— to close a multi-billion-
dollar yearly deficit.
Hightower and Dimondstein
pointed out that USPS actually
ran a $1.4 billion surplus on op-
erations for the year that ended
Sept. 30, and another $1.4 bil-
lion surplus for the first three
months of the current fiscal
year, through last Dec. 31.
The deficit comes from a $5.5
billion yearly pre-payment of
future retirees’ health care costs
that USPS must fund under a
2006 postal “reform” law
pushed through a lame-duck
GOP Congress and signed by
then-President George W. Bush.
Jim Hightower
The unions have been lobby-
ing for elimination of the pre-
paid health care, but lawmakers
have so far turned a deaf ear.
Hightower also said activists
and citizens should join another
union campaign — to allow the
nation’s 31,000 post offices to
become banks for underserved
and unserved urban and rural ar-
eas. Doing so would provide
competition for the big banks,
who hate that, he said. It would
also provide banking services
for the 38 percent of the U.S. zip
codes — covering more than a
quarter of the population
— with no bank branches.
The post office is well
set up to bring in more
revenue that way, Di-
mondstein said.
The campaign for post-
offices-as-banks and to
eliminate the health care
prepayment is part of an
overall postal reform
package that the Letter Car-
riers, the Postal Workers and
other postal unions have been
pushing for several years. They
also would let post offices serve
as notaries and ship alcoholic
beverages.
Hightower and the union
leader also urged listeners to
support House Resolution 54, a
non-binding measure that says
lawmakers want to keep six-day
service. The unions calculate
that eliminating Saturday pick-
ups and deliveries could cost ap-
proximately 80,000 middle-
class jobs.