PAGE 8 | May 20 18, 2016 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
PIPELINE TO GOOD JOBS
Members of Congress tour Local 290 training center
TUALATIN, OREGON — Lo-
cal 290’s Training Center got a
visit May 9 from two high-pow-
ered guests: Congresswoman
Suzanne Bonamici (D-Oregon)
and Congressman Bobby Scott
(D-Virginia). Scott, the most
senior Democrat on the U.S.
House Education and Work-
force Committee, was visiting
Portland-area programs related
to his committee’s mission,
hosted by Bonamici, who also
serves on the committee.
The two members of Con-
gress and their staffs came to
United Association of Plumbers
and Steamfitters Local 290 to
see what a state-of-the-art union
apprenticeship training center
looks like, and were given a tour
by Local 290 training director
Clare Shropshire and her hus-
band, Local 290 business man-
ager Al Shropshire. The enor-
mous facility — funded entirely
by union members and employ-
ers — has 30 classrooms and
millions of dollars worth of tech-
nical equipment. Bonamici and
Scott saw parts of it, including
classrooms for training on med
gas piping, HVAC systems,
back-flow control devices, and
orbital welding equipment.
Local 290 members install,
maintain and repair pipes, not
just in construction but in all
kinds of high- and low-tech in-
dustrial applications, from paper
mills to hospitals and semicon-
ductor chip plants. About 400
apprentices are currently en-
rolled at the Tualatin training
center and six satellite campuses
around Oregon and Northern
California. It’s a five-year train-
ing program that combines
Left: UA Local 290 training director Clare Shropshire explains an orbital
welder to Suzanne Bonamici and Bobby Scott, with a little help from busi-
ness manager Al Shropshire. Above: In a backflow classroom at the UA
290 training center, apprenticeship instructor Chris MacQuarrie handles
an old lead pipe. Today, not only pipe but solder and brass fittings are
lead-free. But lead pipes are still commonly in use in older buildings.
8,000 hours of paid on-the-job
training with 1,080 hours of job-
related classroom training —
two three-hour classes per week,
tuition-free. At the end of it all,
the apprentices become journey-
men plumbers and steamfitters,
and earn wages of $42.83 an
hour plus $23.42 an hour in ben-
efits.
What can Congress can do to
help the training center succeed,
Bonamici wanted to know. Just
make sure young people get a
good K-12 education, replied Al
Shropshire. Local 290’s training
Teamsters fight beer mega-merger
America has laws against mo-
nopolies. Will they be enforced?
Belgium-headquartered An-
heuser-Busch Inbev last No-
vember announced plans to
merge with UK-headquartered
SABMiller. The merged com-
pany—with 60 percent of the
American beer market—would
be able to use its dominance in
production and distribution to
curb competition. To get ap-
proval for the merger from fed-
eral antitrust regulators, SAB-
Miller proposes to sell its stake
in the Miller Coors joint venture
to its partner, Molson Coors.
But David Laughton, head of
the Brewery Workers’ Confer-
ence of the Teamsters Union,
says Miller Coors didn’t even
wait for the merger before anti-
competitive practices began:
Two days before merger talks
were announced, Miller Coors
announced plans to close its
Eden, North Carolina, mega-
brewery in September 2016,
eliminating 349 union jobs. The
closure would eliminate 4 per-
cent of U.S. beer production ca-
pacity, and would harm com-
petitor Pabst, which contracts
with other companies to make
all of its beer brands. Though
Eden is the main brewery mak-
ing Pabst, Miller Coors said it
wouldn’t sell the brewery to
Pabst, just close it, and then
would almost triple the price it
charges to brew Pabst beer.
“It’s no secret that the beer in-
dustry in the U.S. is not behav-
ing competitively,” said antitrust
lawyer Allen Grunes in a confer-
ence call hosted by the Team-
sters. “The industry has had a
history of price coordination and
has had price increases even in
the face of volume decline.”
Laughton says the closure is
about contracting supply and
raising prices, not a result of de-
clining demand or excess capac-
ity: Highly-automated Eden is
Miller Coors’ ultra-efficient
“crown jewel,” and has operated
seven days a week, mostly 24-
hours-a day, for the last 10 to 15
years.
You need a lawyer
who understands how
your union disability
benefits and your
Social Security
disability benefits
will fit together.
program requires only a high
school diploma or equivalent,
but applicants need good read-
ing comprehension and familiar-
ity with basic math — especially
algebra and trigonometry.
That — and tell people not to
overlook careers in the trades —
Clare Shropshire added.
“Most parents assume their
kids should be on a college path,
and don’t think about the
trades,” she said, “but we have
applicants with bachelors’ and
masters’ degrees. These are
good jobs.”