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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (March 16, 2018)
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | March 16, 2018 | PAGE 3 A raising gang from Iron Workers Local 29 “set a world record” erecting a new roller coaster at Oaks Amusement Park in Southeast Portland. The Adrenaline Peak roller coaster opens on the midway March 24. For those who attend the an- nual Labor Day Picnic at Oaks Park, the old Looping Thunder roller coaster has always been a crowd favorite, but it closed last September after a 21-year run. Park officials say the new roller coaster is unlike anything Portland has experienced be- fore. It features a 72-foot verti- cal lift, past-vertical initial drop, a 97 degree loop, an Immelman turn and heartline roll. Maxi- mum speed is 45 mph. The new ride is a Gerstlauer Euro-Fighter roller coaster de- signed and fabricated by Gerst- lauer Amusement Rides of Ger- many. The coaster was shipped in containers to Portland, and Oaks Park hired WBF Construc- Ashton Oesterreich and James Marble unfurl union banner. tion Services of Seattle to erect it. WBF specializes in building amusement rides all over the world. A technician from Gerst- lauer, Martin Daexle, oversaw the installation. John Barlean, a 44-year iron- worker recently retired from Local 29, has been friends with the owners of WBF for years. Now working for WBF as a part time consultant, Barlean con- vinced the owners to use union ironworkers on the Oaks Park job. The company signed a one- project project labor agreement, and the move paid off big time. “It went great,” Barlean said. “This raising gang set a world record. No other crew in the world has erected that ride and had all the bolts torqued in two weeks.” The Local 29 crew—connec- tors Jens Ulven and James Mar- ble, foreman Kevin Reams, hook-on guys Mike Cosgrove and Aaron Harlan, and appren- tice Ashton Oesterreich — worked for 6 days the first week, Photos courtesy of Brenda Stephens, Oaks Park. Union Iron Workers erect new roller coaster at Oaks Park in record time and 5 days the second Pictured below left to right: James Marble, Mike Cosgrove, Aaron Harlan, Martin Daexle, week, completing the ride Ashton Oesterreich, John Barlean, Jens Ulven, on Feb. 16. Placing the and Kevin Reams. 1,050 feet of track with a 100-ton Link Belt rough terrain crane was Neal Davis, a member of Op- erating Engineers Local 701 employed by Camp- bell Crane. “It would take most crews 10 days just to erect the ride, and an- George Kolibaba, director of other week to torque the bolts,” operations at Oaks Park, told the said Barlean, citing the crews’ Labor Press that Gerstlauer and expert rigging skills and con- Martin “were really impressed necting skills in the air. with how fast it went up.” Protesters call Reagan’s induction into DOL’s ‘Labor Hall of Honor’ a ‘shame’ By Chris Garlock Metropolitan Washington Central Labor Council & Press Associates Inc. WASHINGTON, D.C. — “What’s a crying shame? Ronald Reagan in the hall of fame!” chanted two dozen American Federation of Gov- ernment Employee (AFGE) members and supporters on an impromptu picket line March 1 outside the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). The picketers braved wind and rain to protest the former Republican president’s induction into the Hall of Honor alongside labor giants like Frances Perkins, FDR’s Labor Secretary and the first female Cabinet member, and Cesar Chavez, the legendary United Farm Workers co- founder and leader. “Reagan was a disgrace,” said one DOL employee. “The union movement suffered be- cause of him.” “What he did to worker safety and health standards was abysmal,” said another. Protesters took turns leading chants, and one AFGE member even impersonated the former president, asking GOP Trump Administration Labor Secretary Alex Acosta to “take my name off this wall!” DOL political appointees named Reagan to the hall, which is not to be confused with La- bor’s Hall of Fame elsewhere. The Hall of Honor was estab- lished in 1988 to honor Ameri- cans whose contributions have elevated working conditions, wages, and overall quality of life for American families. The citation conveniently mentioned Reagan’s presidency of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), where he played two prominent roles. One was getting good contracts for SAG mem- bers. The other was “singing” about alleged Communists in the entertainment industry during the witch-hunting McCarthy era. His plaque cites only the first. It also does not mention Rea- gan is known for firing the Air Traffic Controllers in 1981 after they struck over unsafe work conditions. The PATCO strike left up to 14,000 people without jobs and, more importantly, gave a green light to corporate chief- tains to declare war upon work- ers and unions, which they have waged ever since. All that prompted Jordan Barab, former deputy assistant secretary of labor in the Obama Administration, to include the Reagan induction in what he called “Kill the Labor Movement Week,” following the Feb. 26 U.S. Supreme Court hearing on the Janus case, which would cre- ate national right-to-work for public employees. “Inducting Reagan into the La- bor Hall of Honor is equivalent to inducting Colonel Sanders into the Poultry Hall of Honor,” Barab said, adding that an email inviting DOL employees to attend the cer- emony didn’t make one mention of fired air traffic controllers, nor any fond memories of destroying OSHA’s cotton dust publications because the cover displayed a photo of a worker with brown lung disease, nor any mention of Reagan devastating OSHA’s en- forcement program.”
