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February 3, 2017 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
Byram new executive director of Labor’s Community Services
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Paula
Eryn Byram is the new execu-
tive director of Labor’s Com-
munity Service Agency
(LCSA). She succeeds Vickie
Burns, who retired last month.
Byram has worked part-time
as LCSA’s office manager/out-
reach specialist since 2012. She
interviewed for the director’s
job, along with three other final-
ists. A hiring committee com-
prised of five members of the
LCSA Executive Board recom-
mended Byram, and the full 16-
person Executive Board con-
curred.
LCSA is a non-profit organi-
zation that operates under the
auspices of the Northwest Ore-
gon Labor Council, in partner-
ship with United Way of the Co-
lumbia-Willamette. The agency
works with an array of commu-
nity-based and governmental or-
ganizations throughout Oregon
and Southwest Washington to
provide social service programs,
dislocated worker assistants, ed-
ucation, information, referral
services, and other needs.
Byram, 42, brings real energy
to the agency. She knows the ins
and outs of the operation, hav-
ing worked with Burns for the
last five years. Two years ago,
Byram created Team Labor, a
program that brings union mem-
Eryn Byram
bers and labor allies together to
volunteer for selected public
service projects. The program
came about as a result of
LCSA’s successful Presents
from Partners (PFP) toy drive
and holiday party. PFP started
small, but over the years has
grown tremendously. Last De-
cember more than 100 union
members volunteered to help.
“I would like to see Team La-
bor grow the way Presents from
Partners did,” Byram said.
Her goal is to bring an army
of union members and commu-
nity allies together once a year
to work on one big project. As
an example, Byram points to
last October’s one-day home re-
pair event that helped six Her-
itage Village mobile home park
households from being evicted,
in partnership with Rebuilding
Together Washington County.
Born and raised in Pittsburgh,
Byram lost her father in a car ac-
cident at age 10. Her family
moved to Flagstaff, Arizona
when she was 13. By age 19,
Byram was happily traveling
solo around the country, camp-
ing out of the back of her truck,
stopping occasionally to work at
a national park, restaurant or
bar.
She landed in Portland in
2000, where she met her future
husband — a valet at the Hilton
Portland Executive Towers. He
helped her get a job at the ho-
tel’s Porto Terra Tuscan Grill. It
was a union job, and in 2005
Byram became a member of
HERE Local 9.
Byram excelled as a union
member. At her first union
meeting she stepped up to be a
shop steward. She studied the
contract, attended all the shop
steward training classes, and as-
sisted her co-workers when
needed. If a question arose, she
always had a copy of the union
contract in her apron to refer to.
“It was my calling,” she said.
Byram got involved with the
bargaining committee in July
2008. Negotiations were diffi-
cult, and resulted in a boycott.
Byram’s enthusiasm and skill
set had caught the eye of then-
business manager Karly Ed-
wards, who hired Byram to or-
ganize the boycott. It was so
successful that the Hilton’s top
brass agreed to all of the union’s
demands, including wage in-
creases and insurance coverage
for housekeepers.
“It was a worker-led cam-
paign, and we boycotted the
crap out of them,” Byram said.
“To this day, they are the highest
paid housekeepers in the state.”
After the boycott, Byram re-
mained with Local 9, first as an
internal organizer, then as a
community organizer, and fi-
nally as administrative assistant.
She left Local 9 and went to
work part-time at LCSA in Jan-
uary 2012. In that job she joined
Office and Professional Em-
ployees Local 11. Byram had
met Burns, the executive direc-
tor, at a Resource Navigator
training for Local 9. LCSA of-
fers the training for free to
unions. The course instructs
staff on how to help their mem-
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