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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (April 19, 2019)
SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900 NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS IN THIS ISSUE MULTNOMAH COUNTY TAKES ON WAGE THEFT Union reps could help the County enforce the law. | Page 4 SAY THEIR NAMES A list of workers who died on the job in Oregon in 2018. | Page 5 Meeting Notices p.6 UA Local 290 apprentice contest p.9 VOLUME 120, NUMBER 8 PORTLAND, OREGON Time to ban a slow-moving killer WORKERS MEMORIAL DAY remembering oregon workers who died on the job salem — The Oregon AFL-CIO will hold a memorial ceremony at the Fallen Workers Memorial on the Capitol Mall in Salem. The service will feature remarks from elected offi- cials, union leaders, and safety and health ad- vocates, and the reading of the names of the 50 workers who died on the job in Oregon in 2018. ■ When: Friday, April 26, noon ■ Where: Labor and Industries Building, 350 Winter St. NE, Salem Workers Memorial Day is observed every year on April 28. It’s a day to honor workers who have died on the job, to remember the suffer- ing experienced by families and workers in all trades, and to recommit to the fight for a safe and healthy work environment for all workers. portland — The Northwest Oregon Labor Council will hold a memorial service at its monthly delegates meeting. Delegates will raise an American flag in honor of each Ore- gon worker who died on the job last year. ■ When: Monday, April 22, 7 p.m. ■ Where: IBEW Local 48 Hall, 15937 NE Airport Way, Portland WORKER SAFETY Two years after a horrifying bridge accident, Abhe & Svoboda still hasn’t paid any fine By Don McIntosh It still stands out as one of the most spectacular construction accidents of recent memory: Beneath Portland’s Ross Is- land Bridge on the morning of Feb. 8, 2017, bridge painter Marco Dion Lilly tripped near an unsecured ladder opening and plummeted 37 feet, land- ing on his adopted son Christopher Montiel. Both suffered permanent and severe injuries and were lucky to have survived at all. The ensuing investigation by Oregon’s Occupational Safety and Health Administra- tion (Oregon OSHA) found that their nonunion employer, Abhe & Svoboda, had done just about everything wrong. No guardrail had been in- stalled around the hole. Work- ers on the upper platform wore fall protection harnesses but weren’t attaching them to anything. The scaffold had been constructed improperly. It had been an accident wait- ing to happen. APRIL 19, 2019 The daughter of a union plumber wants to end the occupational disease that claimed her father. By Don McIntosh Growing up in Astoria, Oregon, Ann Samuelson remembers her fa- ther as a man who worked hard. By day, Stan Grimberg built up his union plumbing business. By night, he took his gillnetting boat out on the Columbia River, earning enough to buy her a horse and pro- vide the family with a good life. One day when Samuelson was 22, her father was re-piping one of Astoria’s grand historic homes and found himself unable to catch his breath. He went straight to a doctor, who sent him to a hospital. They drained fluid from his lungs and found asbestos fibers in the fluid. Eighteen months later, Grim- berg was dead of what the doctor called “Steve McQueen’s disease” — mesothelioma, a cancer caused by asbestos. He was 53. Ann Samuelson says it’s past time for America to ban asbestos, the cancer- causing mineral that killed her father. That was June 6, 1982. Decades later, Samuelson began speaking about what happened to her father. “I used to not talk about it,” Samuelson said. “It used to scare me to think about it. You watch somebody die of that — it’s a hor- rible way to die. You suffocate, ba- sically. You’re emaciated, and you Turn to Page 8 TRADE Trump’s new NAFTA: Is America’s trade policy at a crossroads? From the underside of the Ross Island Bridge to the platform below, a painter fell 37 feet and landed on his own son. Yet, two years later, the company has paid no price. Oregon OSHA assessed a $189,000 fine in June 2017 for knowingly and repeatedly exposing its workers to injury and death, but Abhe & Svo- boda appealed, and the case is still open. Meanwhile, the company has continued to bid on other bridge work for the Oregon Department of Trans- portation (ODOT). That aggravates local painters union leaders like District Council 5 representa- tive Scott Oldham. “It seems to me at the very least there would be a suspen- sion of their bidding on proj- ects,” Oldham said. Since the accident, Abhe & Svoboda has bid on at least five other ODOT bridge proj- ects, though in each case other bidders won the work. Under Turn to Page 2 nafta working as intended Citing “changes in product demand” Mon- delez/Nabisco shut down an Oreo production line at its Portland bakery for two weeks in late March, temporarily laying off at least 30 members of Bakers Local 364. That inspired several members to visit the nearest Fred Meyer grocery, where they found Mexican-made Oreos on shelves. By Don McIntosh When Portland Congressman Earl Blumenauer learned he’d be the new chair of a House trade sub- committee, the first call he made was to Oregon AFL-CIO president Tom Chamberlain. Blumenauer has been considered a reliably pro- labor Democrat, except on one is- sue: trade. During 22 years in Con- gress, he voted for seven NAFTA- style trade agreements, supported permanent normal trade relations with China, and voted in favor of Turn to Page 7
