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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 4, 2016)
PAGE 4 | November 4, 2016 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS ...Election night From Page 1 history. If it passes, Oregon no longer will have the nation’s third-largest class sizes and shortest school year. The state might also benefit from spillover effects. One legislative legal opinion says Measure 97 would result in $250 million a year in additional road mainte- nance funds. (To the extent that gas companies are taxed, the Oregon Constitution may be in- terpreted to require those funds be spent on roads.) And that doesn’t count the hundreds of millions of dollars of infrastruc- ture investments that the meas- ure would enable: The state’s capacity to issue bonds depends on its income, and Measure 97 would increase its income. Meanwhile, in Washington, the big deal ballot measure is I- 1433, which would raise the state minimum to $13.50 by 2020 and guarantee up to seven paid sick days to all workers. Washington is one of five states to vote on the minimum wage Nov. 8. Arizona, Colorado, and Maine will vote on measures to raise it to $12 by 2020, and the Arizona measure, like Washing- ton’s, also mandates paid sick leave. And in South Dakota, vot- ers will get a chance to veto a Legislature-passed law that low- ered the minimum wage for workers under 18. In Alabama and Virginia, anti-union groups have placed right to work measures on the ballot—to make union dues strictly voluntary in order to de- fund and weaken unions. Finally, there’s the choice of president, and what a choice. Donald Trump, a billionaire who hasn’t paid taxes in decades, is proposing a massive tax cut for the rich. He made American-made a cornerstone of his campaign, but his private label clothes are made in China, and he used Chinese steel and undocumented labor to con- struct his buildings. Hillary Clinton, backed by almost the entirety of the labor movement, is an 11th hour critic of NAFTA- style trade deals, but she’s called for greater infrastructure invest- ment, and is proposing to raise the minimum wage and guaran- tee paid family and medical leave for the birth of a child. Whichever of them is elected will make lifetime judicial ap- pointments, and determine who’s in charge of federal agen- cies that are vital to the wellbe- ing of working people, includ- ing those that enforce workers’ union rights, occupational safety, and wage and hour laws. UNION DEMOCRACY Greg Pallesen elected president of AWPPW THIS NEWSPAPER BROUGHT TO YOU BY AMERICA’S LABOR MOVEMENT In ballots counted Oct. 26, Greg Pallesen won election as presi- dent of Association of Western Pulp and Paper Workers (AW- PPW). AWPPW, headquar- tered in Port- land, repre- sents 4,500 workers at pulp and pa- per mills in Oregon, Washington, Greg Pallesen Idaho, Cali- fornia and Virginia. Formerly independent, it’s now an au- tonomous division of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters. It’s a union that’s been hit hard by the steep decline of the pulp and paper industry in the Pacific Northwest. Pallesen, 61, has been vice president and political director at AWPPW for 13 years. He’s an outspoken critic of NAFTA- style trade policy, which he holds responsible for multiple closures of pulp and paper mills. Pallesen first became a mem- ber of AWPPW Local 580 in 1986, as an electrician at Wey- erhaeuser’s Longview pulp and paper mill. That mill was sold earlier this year to Japan Nippon Paper Industries. In the race for president, Pallesen outpolled AWPPW Lo- cal 153 president Kurt Gallow, a millwright at the Kapstone pa- per mill in Longview. Pallesen succeeds John Rhodes, who’s retiring after 14 years as president. Members also elected a new vice president, Bill Spring of Local 5 in Camas, Washington; a new secretary-treasurer, Rick Craft of Local 747 in Nampa, Idaho; and area reps, relief reps and trustees. All new officers will be sworn in to five-year terms at the union’s Jan. 26 gen- eral membership meeting.
