SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
VOLUME 116, NUMBER 13
INSIDE
Instafab update
Myers to PDC
Union meetings
Free classifieds
2
3
6
10
PORTLAND, OREGON
JULY 3, 2015
Fast-tracking trade
deals signed into law
PERSONA NON GRATA
CONGRESSIONAL SUPPORTERS OF FAST TRACK
will not be invited to attend or speak at this year’s
big Labor Day picnic at Oaks Park. On June 22, del-
egates to the Northwest Oregon Labor Council —
which sponsors the picnic — voted to withhold in-
vitations to those who voted for fast tracking free
trade agreements. That includes U.S. Sen. Ron
Wyden, and U.S. Reps. Earl Blumenauer, Suzanne
Bonamici, and Kurt Schrader — all Democrats.
By Don McIntosh
Associate Editor
A week after unions celebrated
a setback for Fast Track (also
known as Trade Promotion Au-
thority), the seeming victory
came unzipped in a series of
parliamentary maneuvers. Fast
Track is a bill that makes it eas-
ier for NAFTA-style deals—like
the proposed Trans-Pacific Part-
nership—to pass Congress.
Democrats in Congress gen-
erally oppose the NAFTA-style
deals, while Republicans over-
whelmingly support them. The
deals give special rights to cor-
porate investors, and are
strongly opposed by labor and
environmental groups. Eleven
NAFTA-style agreements have
been approved so far, and they
are believed to have accelerated
the offshoring of U.S. jobs.
When the deals have passed,
it’s usually because a minority of
Democrats joined the majority
of Republicans in voting for it.
This year, to provide political
cover for 14 Senate Democrats
who wanted to vote for Fast
Track, the Senate combined it
with a vote to reauthorize Trade
Adjustment Assistance (TAA), a
program that pays to retrain and
relocate workers who lose their
jobs because of foreign trade.
The combined bill passed 62-37
on May 22.
In the House, the Republican
leadership scheduled separate
votes June 12 on the two items.
Republicans tend to oppose
Trade Adjustment Assistance, so
Republican leaders counted on
Democratic votes to pass it. In-
stead, Minority Leader Nancy
Pelosi led Democrats to vote
against the Trade Adjustment
Assistance bill—to prevent pas-
sage of the package as a whole
(House and Senate versions of a
bill have to match in order to be-
Turn to Page 9
Shirley Block wins top office at Amalgamated Transit Union
TriMet road supervisor Shirley Block was elected pres-
ident of Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 757
June 23, defeating incumbent Bruce Hansen and two
other challengers, Henry Beasley and Cris Orlando. In
mail ballots counted by the union election committee,
Block received 1,156 votes (48 percent) to 849 votes
for Hansen (36 percent), 324 for Beasley (14 percent)
and 58 for Orlando (3 percent). All told, 2,387 of the
union’s roughly 4,800 members voted.
Block is the first woman, and the first African-Amer-
ican, to be elected to the top office of Local 757 since
its founding in 1917. She’s also the first African-Amer-
ican unionist to be elected to a top union office in the
Portland area in more than a decade.
At Local 757, president is also a full-time business
representative, and oversees a staff of seven and two
other full-time officers: vice president and financial sec-
retary.
Block ran on a slate with incumbent vice president
Jon Hunt and incumbent financial secretary Mary Lon-
goria, both of whom were re-elected. Hunt won with 47
percent of the vote, outpolling Dan Martin and Christo-
pher Day. And Longoria got 61 percent of the vote
against challenger Anna Hicks.
Block, 62, grew up in Florida and Michigan, the
daughter of hard-working migrant laborers. With a nurs-
Shirley Block in front of Schoppert Hall, ATU Local 757
headquarters in Northeast Portland.
ing license at Wayne State University, she worked in
Detroit’s Henry Ford Hospital before moving to Port-
land in 1974 for the weather. She worked as a nurse,
then got a job as TriMet bus operator in 1981. She also
married, had a daughter, divorced and remarried, and
raised 11 foster children. Her daughter works at TriMet,
as did her husband, now retired.
In the 34 years Block has worked at TriMet, she’s
been a bus operator, fare inspector, field operations co-
ordinator, and road supervisor. She’s also served several
terms as a member of the union Executive Board.
Within the union, she’s known as an outspoken critic
of TriMet management, regularly calling them out in
her monthly column in the union newsletter. Her cam-
paign for union president focused on countering attacks
on union health and retiree benefits. Block said her un-
happiness with the TriMet contract settlement—partic-
ularly some union concessions on health care—
prompted her to run for office.
Now she says she’ll work to re-establish unity and
head out to meet members far from the union’s Portland
headquarters. Local 757 represents transit workers
throughout Oregon and Southwest Washington, includ-
ing bus drivers, mechanics, cleaners, and other workers
at TriMet, Lane Transit District, C-TRAN, and a num-
ber of smaller transit districts, as well as several units
of school bus and paratransit workers. More than a
dozen collective bargaining agreements will need to be
renegotiated in the next three years, including the
TriMet contract, which expires Nov. 30, 2016.
For his part, Hansen says he’s proud of the number
of employees reinstated and grievances settled during
his one term. And relations with TriMet have thawed
somewhat since he took office. Hansen, 46, says he will
return to his job as a TriMet bus operator and remain
active in the union.