NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS |
April 7, 2017 | PAGE 9
...Portland managers want end to union-crafted CBA
From Page 2
budget and ahead of schedule,
with levels of minority and
women participation that ex-
ceeded goals.
Maurice Rahming, who
owns and runs IBEW-signatory
O’Neill Electric, is a minority
contractor and serves on a City
advisory board, the Equitable
Contracting and Purchasing
Commission. Rahming says the
City’s proposed new policy
takes all the elements that made
the CBA successful and dilutes
and removes them.
Dubbed the Community Eq-
uity and Inclusion Plan (CEIP),
the new policy was crafted out-
side of public view by a work
group of city managers. In Oc-
tober, they released a draft ver-
sion, which prompted a storm
of comment from labor unions,
contractors, and pre-appren-
ticeship groups. The final ver-
sion was released on a City
web site April 3, along with an
explanatory letter signed sim-
ply “Sincerely, Work Group.”
Rahming says it’s even more
unlike the CBA than the Octo-
ber draft. It removes unions
from any signatory responsibil-
ity or oversight role, cuts the
liquidated damages provision
in half to $250 a day, and sug-
gests that contractors can hire
apprentices referred by unspec-
ified community organizations
that aren’t state-registered ap-
prenticeship training organiza-
tions.
Pushing unions out could
limit the success of efforts to
diversify the construction
workforce. Data from the state
Bureau of Labor and Industries
(BOLI) suggests that most
“After all the time and ef-
fort we put into this, it’s a
slap in the face.”
— Michael Burch, Pacific NW
Regional Council of Carpenters
building trades unions today
are more successful at bringing
in women and minorities than
their non-union competitors,
says Steve Simms, director of
Oregon BOLI Apprenticeship
and Training Division.
“By and large our union-af-
filiated [apprenticeship] pro-
grams have a higher female and
minority participation rate and
… completion rate than most of
their open shop counterparts,”
Simms told the Labor Press.
“The absence of union lan-
guage and partnership is a
problem, because unions do a
better job of recruiting and re-
taining people of color in the
trades,” says Marshall Runkel,
chief of staff to Commissioner
Chloe Eudaly. Eudaly, elected
last year, made reform of city
contracting practices part of her
campaign.
“Why isn’t the City using the
CBA? It’s beyond me,” Burch
said. Before he went to work
for the Carpenters union, Burch
worked for Portland Youth
Builders, one of the pre-ap-
prenticeship training programs
that the City issued grants to
under the CBA. “We’ve been
after them to come up with a
strategic plan, which the CBA
turned out to be, for over 10
years, and now that they have
one, they’re doing everything
in their power not to use it.”
Trump reaches out to Trades
“I promise you America’s labor
leaders will always find an open
door with Donald Trump,” the
president told building trades
union leaders at a legislative
conference in Washington, D.C.,
April 4. Though delegates
mostly listened politely, boos
and chuckles broke out when
Trump claimed he’d had the
support of almost everybody in
the room in the 2016 election.
Trump received no endorse-
ments from building trades
unions. The speech can be seen
in its entirety at http://bit.ly/
2nGI9yB.
KGW returns to labor peace
From Page 1
the beginning it was about bust-
ing the union.”
Tegna negotiators said the
proposal was about giving the
station the right to use amateur
video shot by members of the
public.
SAG-AFTRA agreed to
Tegna’s non-exclusive jurisdic-
tion proposal; so did IBEW 48
— but only if all three unions
agreed to it. IATSE held out.
In the end, with the help of
federal mediator Julie Kettler,
IATSE and Tegna reached agree-
ment March 16 after Tegna
dropped the jurisdiction demand.
In turn, IATSE Local 600 agreed
that the station could broadcast
amateur video from members of
the public, as long as it maintains
its current staffing level of 17
camera operators.
IATSE’s new contract runs
through April 1, 2020, and pro-
vides for three 2 percent across-
the-board annual raises plus a
Union TV in Portland
Of five full-power broadcast television
stations in Portland, three have at least
some union-represented employees:
KATU (ABC) — IATSE 600
KOIN (CBS) — NABET-CWA Local 51
KGW (NBC) — SAG-AFTRA, IATSE
Local 600, IBEW Local 48.
$1,250 signing bonus equivalent
to a 1 percent retroactive raise
for the two years that workers
were without a union contract.
Camera operators’ current wage
is $30.61 an hour, while editors
make $26.86.
In the new IBEW contract,
members — who had gone with-
out raises in recent contracts —
got $1,000 signing bonuses and
immediate wage increases of
$1.80 to $2.50 an hour, to be fol-
lowed by 2 percent increases
each Aug. 29. The wage scales
now top out at $30.57 to $35.20
an hour, depending on specialty.
— Don McIntosh
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