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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 17, 2017)
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | February 17, 2017 | PAGE 7 Apprentices can benefit from energy infrastructure projects Photos courtesy of Keep Washington Competitive Energy infrastructure projects are not only an important source of family wage jobs for con- struction workers, they provide real-world projects that help train apprentices and sharpen the skills of journeymen and women. That’s what lawmakers, port commissioners, and business and union leaders heard during a recent tour of the NECA-IBEW Electrical Training Center in Northeast Portland. The center, considered one of the nation’s best apprenticeship training fa- cilities, is responsible for train- ing thousands of electrical work- ers for projects in the Portland metropolitan area, and in South- west Washington. The tour was arranged by Keep Washington Competitive, a coalition of business, labor, agriculture, and trade represen- tatives that support energy infra- structure projects. The focus was the need for more skilled labor on both sides of the Columbia River, and how energy infra- structure projects can help meet that need. Among those taking the tour were Brian Wolf, president of the Port of Vancouver Board of Commissioners; Mike Bomar, executive director of the Colum- bia River Economic Develop- (Photo Above) NECA-IBEW Electrical Training Center Executive Director Rod Belisle (left) shows one of the hands-on classrooms during a tour of the NECA/IBEW Electrical Training Center in Northeast Portland. To the right, Gary Young, IBEW Local 48 business manager, looks on. (Photo Right) Port of Vancouver Commission President Brian Wolf (right) talks with Vancouver Energy’s Jared Larrabee at the NECA/IBEW Electrical Training Center. Standing to the left is Nate Stokes, field rep co- ordinator for Operating Engineers Local 701. Buffet-owned Precision Castparts busts union drive in California Precision Castparts, the Port- land-headquartered metals com- pany that’s is now owned by the world’s second richest man, paid a union-buster last year to defeat a union campaign at a California subsidiary. According to a required fed- eral disclosure filed in Decem- ber 2016, PCC Structurals hu- man resources vice president Brian Keegan contracted with Labor Information Services, Inc., of Malibu, California to conduct anti-union meetings with employees of Permaswage. Permaswage is a PCC sub- sidiary in Gardena, California, that makes fluid fittings for aerospace companies; it’s also known as Designed Metal Con- nections. Machinists District Lodge 725 in Huntington, Beach, Cal- ifornia, was seeking to represent workers there, and on Sept. 17, filed a request for a union elec- tion. The National Labor Rela- tions Board set an election date of Oct. 21. Then “union avoid- ance” consultants Chuck Ahern and Miriam Navarro got to work, on Oct. 10. Nine days later, the union withdrew. It’s not the first time Precision Castparts fought unionization; some of its subsidiaries have union contracts, but at its Port- land main campus, the company defeated union campaigns in 1995, 1996, and 2013. Precision was bought in Jan- uary 2016 by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway holding company. Billionaire Buffett has garnered great press for express- ing concern about rising eco- nomic inequality, and some of his companies have unionized workforces. But he’s also spo- ken out against calls for a $15 minimum wage. Now, a Buffett company fought an effort by workers to unionize. ment Council; Matthew Hepner, executive director of Certified Electrical Workers of Washing- ton; Washington state Rep. Jim Walsh (R-19th); executives from Vancouver Energy, and con- struction union leaders from Oregon and Washington. Energy infrastructure projects, like the Vancouver Energy ter- minal being proposed at the Port of Vancouver, would provide significant training opportunities and apprenticeships for electrical workers and other skilled trades- men and women, said Jared Larrabee of Vancouver Energy. “The IBEW Training Center is a world-class facility for elec- tricians of all levels of experi- ence. But they need real-world experiences to fine-tune their skills,” said Gary Young, busi- ness manager of IBEW Local 48 and a Port of Portland commis- sioner. “We don’t expect other professionals to learn everything in the classroom. We want new doctors to actually see patients and develop their clinical skills. The same can be said for electri- cians and other people in the trades. We need them to work on real projects, and the reality is, major energy infrastructure proj- ects like Vancouver Energy pro- vide excellent training opportu- nities.”
