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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (July 17, 2020)
PAGE 2 | July 17, 2020 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS (International Standard Serial Number 0894-444X) Established in 1900 in Portland, Oregon as a voice of the la- bor movement. Published on a semi-monthly basis on the first and third Fridays of each month by the Oregon Labor Press Publishing Co. Inc., a non-profit mutual benefit corpo- ration owned by 20 unions and councils including the Ore- gon AFL-CIO. Serving more than 120 union organizations in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Office location: 4275 NE Halsey St., Portland, Oregon Mailing address: P.O. Box 13150, Portland, OR 97213 Phone: (503) 288-3311 Web address: https://nwlaborpress.org Editor & Manager: Michael Gutwig Senior staff reporter: Don McIntosh Office manager: Jill Lukens Printed on recycled paper, using soy-based inks, by members of Teamsters Local 747-M. SUBSCRIPTIONS: Individual subscriptions are $15 a year for union members, $23 a year for all others. Pay by credit card online at nwlaborpress.org/subscribe, or send a check to our mailing address (above) along with your name, address and union affiliation, if any. Group rates of 48 cents an issue per member — $11.52 a year are available for 25 or more subscriptions; call 503-288-3311 for details. CORRECTIONS: See an error? Please let us know at editor@nwlaborpress.org or by phone at 503-288-3311. PERIODICALS POSTAGE PAID AT PORTLAND, OREGON. CHANGE OF ADDRESS: If you move, let us know at nwlaborpress.org/subscriber-services or by mail at our mailing address (above). Be sure to provide your old and new addresses and the name/number of your local union. Please allow three weeks for the change to take effect. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS P.O. BOX 13150 PORTLAND, OR 97213-0150 New Temporary Hours: Mon-Sat 12-6 pm THIS NEWSPAPER BROUGHT TO YOU BY AMERICA'S LABOR MOVEMENT. SHOP LO- CAL. AND BUY UNION AND AMERICAN-MADE. Green jobs, but not for you Construction unions say state- subsidized clean energy work is going to nonunion out-of-state firms and out-of-state crews. By Don McIntosh Parked outside wind farm con- struction sites throughout North- eastern Oregon, Mike Alldritt sees the same thing again and again: a line of pickup trucks with Texas and other out-of-state license plates arriving on the job. Alldritt, who lives in a tiny Eastern Oregon community called Lexington, has been keep- ing tabs on renewable energy projects since April 2017, when he started as a business agent for the Iron Workers union. Since then, he says nearly all the work has gone to nonunion, out-of- state firms that bring in non- union crews from outside of Oregon. And it’s not just the ini- tial construction that Oregonians are losing out on, but periodic maintenance overhauls known as “re-power” work, in which fiberglass blades are replaced and rotors changed out. These are private projects, and can hire who they like. But what burns Alldritt and his fel- low building trades union repre- sentatives is that these projects In a video created by the Oregon Building Trades Council, Iron Workers Local 29 member Clint McCollum speaks out against renewable energy work going to out-of-state workers when Oregon taxpayers are subsidizing the work. benefit from Oregon tax subsi- dies. As of 2019, about a dozen utility-scale wind and solar proj- ects in Northeastern Oregon were saving over $30 million a year total thanks to the state’s Strategic Investment Program (SIP) property tax break, a 15- year property tax exemption. “We’ve supported these proj- ects for years, and when they fi- nally broke ground, they turned around and spit in our face,” Alldritt said. “People need to understand how important these jobs are to rural communities. Union jobs are good living wage jobs that provide a lot for Ore- gonians.” Oregon Building Trades Council Executive Secretary Robert Camarillo says projects that benefit from state tax sub- sidy should have to meet em- ployment standards—like re- quirements to hire local, pay prevailing wage, and take part in apprenticeship programs to train the next generation of workers. “They wonder why we get behind fossil fuel projects,” Ca- marillo says. “When [fossil fuel] developers come to town they sign a Project Labor Agreement. We don’t get that with renew- able energy developers.” To figure out what to do about Oregonians missing out on so much tax-subsidized re- newable energy work, Camar- illo convened an ad hoc task force: Staff and leaders of five building trades unions that could be employed on the projects meet via Zoom every Tuesday: Operating Engineers Local 701, IBEW Local 48, Laborers Local 737, Iron Workers Local 29, and Cement Masons Local 555. Task force members worked to create videos in which Eastern Oregon residents and union members say how they feel about the jobs going to out-of- state workers. The hope is that renewable energy developers— and state lawmakers—will come to see the value of local union labor. The campaign may be on the verge of getting results. Build- ing trades union officials have been meeting with representa- tives of Oregon’s biggest wind developer, Portland-based Avangrid Renewables. Avan- grid—majority-owned by the Spanish multinational Iber- drola—is getting nearly $8.5 million a year in SIP tax breaks for five large Oregon wind farms. After hearing from build- ing trades, Avangrid has agreed informally to have general con- tractors consider local union contractors on future projects.
