SHEET METAL | AIR | RAIL | TRANSPORTATION
January/February 2013
THE MEMBERS’ JOURNAL
❚ Special Center Insert —
SMART Expertise Since 1888:
A History of Our Union
❚ Michigan Battles On Against Right to
Work For Less —PAgE
—P gE 6
—PA
❚ Los Angeles Bus Organizing
—P gE 8
—PA
& BUS Training —PAgE
Centennial
Time Capsule
to Be Opened
O
n January 27, 1989, our 100th anniversary year reached
its final milestone when SMWIA General President Edward
J. Carlough and General Secretary-Treasurer Lonnie A.
Bassett dedicated this unique time capsule in Washington, DC. The
centennial time capsule was designed by Jim Roth, former president
and member of Local 12 in Pittsburgh, PA, and president of james
e roth, inc. in Cranberry Township, PA. The time capsule was hand
crafted by Jim and Robert Richard, a Local 12 journeyman.
General President Joe Nigro, in a video announcing our 125th anniversary plans, said that the time
capsule would be opened at the next meeting of SMART’s General Executive Council in mid-March. He
added afterwards, “It will be interesting to see what was included in the capsule 25 years ago, when
you consider all the advancements in technology since then. As was done in 1998, we will add to that
collection at the end of this commemorative year.” The video is available at www.smart125.com.
Time Capsule Facts
➤ The capsule is built of copper, stainless steel, and brass, with fiberglass insulation between the outer
and inner shell. Its total weight is approximately 50 lbs.
➤ The outer shell is 48 oz. (1/16”) quarter hard copper. The inner liner is 22 ga. stainless steel.
➤ The welding was done with the gas tungsten arc welding process (GTAW).
➤ The accent strips are stainless steel and yellow brass.
➤ The fabrication of the capsule took approximately 120 hours.
SHEET METAL | AIR | RAIL | TRANSPORTATION
THE MEMBERS’ JOURNAL
THE MEMBERS’ JOURNAL OF
THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION
OF SHEET METAL, AIR, RAIL AND
TRANSPORTATION WORKERS,
AFL-CIO & CLC
CONTENTs
NT
NTs
January/February 2013
1750 New York Avenue, N.W., Washington,
D.C. 20006-5386
2
The Members’ Journal (ISSN: 1528-2805) published
bimonthly by the International Association of Sheet
Metal Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART),
1750 New York Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C.
20006-5386.
General President’s Message
125 and Looking Ahead
3
General Secretary-Treasurer’s Message
Prepare With Confidence
Periodical postage paid at Washington, D.C.
and at additional mailing office. Subscription
prices: $7.50 per year per member. Change of
address coupons should be sent to SMART.
Postmaster: Send address changes to The
Members’ Journal, 1750 New York Avenue,
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Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to:
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email: [email protected]
Printed in U.S.A.
Vol. 103, No. 1 Jan./Feb. 2013
Joseph J. Nigro
General President
Joseph sellers, Jr.
General Secretary-Treasurer
General Vice Presidents:
riChard r. loyd
BruCe W. Word
paul W. ColliNs, Jr.
roNald h. WhaTley
daVid C ZimmermaNN
mark CurTis
paTriCk C. laNdgraF
derek eVaNs
Joseph p. poWell
paul e. hayes
malColm “mike” FuThey
roBerT kerley
JohN lesNieWski
JohN preVisiCh
James sTem
daVid Wier
Joseph sellers, Jr., editor
4
From Muse to Koch
The Early History of Right to work for Less
6
Michigan Battles On Against
Right to Work For Less
8
Los Angeles Bus Organizing
and BUS Training
9
Railroad News
6
10
10
Canadian Affairs Report
Energy Sector Giving the Canadian
East Coast a Boost
12
Centennial Celebration
Sheet Meta l Craft on Display
19
Focus On Funds
28
Local News
34
Let Us Always Remember . . .
12
Special Center Insert
In 2013, we will be bringing you an
abridged version of our history,
beginning with a look backward to
the very beginning of the SMWIA.
We hope you enjoy this series.
C HA PTE R O NE
Looking Backwards 1888 2 1970
1
General President
JOSEPH J. NIGRO
125and
Lookingahead
GENERAl PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
O
n January 25, 2013, we announced a year-long program to brand the expertise
of the newly formed International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and
Transportation Workers as “SMART,”
and we began commemorating the
125th anniversary of our union. We
start the journey into the next 25
years an even more diverse union,
with our brothers and sisters in the
railroad, bus and other transportation
operations. While we are recognized
and highly regarded for our building
and construction skills, we want to
use this commemoration to promote
our work to the architects, engineers,
building owners, and other end-users
of our services. We will do this by
showcasing the skill, professionalism,
craftsmanship and expertise of members in every industry we represent.
In 1988, the 100th anniversary of
the Sheet Metal Workers’ International Association celebrated our
craftsmanship with a major display
of sheet metal work. Frank Gehry’s
showpiece architectural design was
built and displayed in the nation’s
capital at the National Building Museum. In this Journal issue, historian
Grace Palladino writes about the
dedication that hundreds of sheet
metal workers and our union contractors showed in building Gehry’s
unique structure. The display was
seen by thousands of visitors, including the President of the United
States at that time, Ronald Reagan.
For more on the display and its back
2
story, you can view a compelling
video at www.smart125.com.
This issue also contains an abbreviated history of this International for
you and your family to read and keep.
Dr. Palladino summarizes our historical struggles to provide the protections
and benefits that have distinguished
this union over the years. Our history
serves up many reminders that the
pensions, health care, work hours, safe
working conditions, and representation we enjoy today did not come
easily. Our union forefathers and their
successors put their jobs and lives on
the line to improve the quality of life
for every succeeding generation of
sheet metal workers. What they accomplished is something we must not
take for granted.
One of our objectives this year is to
showcase the fine work and craftsmanship of our members over the years.
Using the anniversary theme, SMART
Expertise Since 1888, we will take the
lid off our industry’s best kept secret—
union technical talent and skill. We
will open our local unions and JATCs
to contractors, public officials, industry
stakeholders, and the public in order
to display the skills we bring to our industries. We also will use these events
to promote our work and role in the
global future of our industries.
In order to keep track of what
is going on, we will be publishing an events calendar that will be
promoted via social media and at
www.smart125.com. This site will
document future events and other in-
formation to keep you informed and
involved in this year-long program.
Our members have a lot to be
proud of. Over the years, we have
weathered the ups and downs in the
railroad, shipyard, and construction
industries. The world will continue to
change, as it always has, but we can
change with it by taking advantage of
new, emerging markets and trends.
The mark of a strong organization
is in how long it has withstood the
test of time. For 125 years, we have
stood on the forefront of the fight for
fairness, not just in the workplace
but also in the homes of the men
and women who built our nations.
We have helped ensure dignity in
retirement. We ended the workplace
exploitation of children and took
part in building the greatest middle
class the world has ever known. We
believe our strength over the 125-year
period can serve to remind all, within
and outside the labor movement, that
the spirit of togetherness—of solidarity—will do more to further our good
fortunes than anything else.
Every member of this great union is
welcomed on our journey into the next
125 years, with the confidence that
we will continue to stand with all our
brothers and sisters who hunger for “a
fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay.”
Fraternally now and for years to
come,
Joseph Nigro
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
General seCretarY-treasUrer
JOSEPH SELLERS
Prepare
WithConfidence
GENERAl SECRETARY-TREASURER’S MESSAGE
T
his has not been an easy time
for our members who have
been out of the paid workforce
for months or even years. Opportunities for more employment are
growing, and we are hoping to get
everyone back to work. It has to be
a great feeling to get back to work,
although it can be a bit daunting.
We stand ready to help you adjust to
full-time work again.
None of us expected the downturn
to be as long as it was. We weren’t
I know all of us have questions,
such as, “What can I as a member…
and we as a union, do to prepare?”
leading experts on the effects of
long-term unemployment point out
that our members who have been
out of work for a while may not feel
completely confident that they can
cope in the workplace. This is a very
common experience, and you are
not alone. Remember, though, the
diverse skills you developed in our
industry training programs have
One important key to success
is self-confidence. An important key to
self-confidence is preparation.
—ARTHUR ASHE, Tennis Champion
even sure the economy would get
back on track when solutions to avoid
the “fiscal cliff” were being tossed
back and forth by Congress. However, a first step has been taken on the
legislative front; things are picking up
in the housing industry; and manufacturing is beginning to expand.
With those prospects ahead, we
succeed as a union when everyone
is actively participating, working together to assure a prosperous
future. It’s our fraternal obligation
to be there for you and assist you
with any adjustment you may have
re-entering the workforce.
January/February 2013
prepared you for employment—now
and into the future.
Over the past year and a half, I
have had the opportunity to visit
many of our local unions in the U.S.
and Canada. I discussed what many
members think but won’t say: “Am
I ready to re-enter the workplace?
How are my skills and abilities?”
Those are questions we have heard
during other periods of high unemployment. Throughout our 125-year
history we have more than once
faced new techniques and new
technologies that create employment challenges. In the past 25 years
alone, we have seen new machines
utilizing sophisticated computer
software doing work with fewer
sheet metal workers.
In the past, we have addressed these
challenges by making sure our training programs were up to date and, in
many cases, anticipating new changes
to come. In effect, we’ve always had
an action plan in development. In
the revised 2012 HVAC and Sheet
Metal Industry Futures Update by the
Horizon Foundation, one of the key
considerations for success is the need
to “address the looming skilled labor
shortage by creating a more diverse
workforce and utilizing technologies
that alleviate certain deficiencies.”
Every local needs to be positioned
to assist our members in preparing
for the future of the sheet metal, air,
rail, and transportation industries.
You already know, as a highly skilled
worker, how to approach your work
tasks. If you feel you need to become
reacquainted with your skills, please
ask for support. If you feel depressed
or lack self-confidence, please ask
for support. We, as union officials
and fellow members, are here to help
you with these needs. A fellow sheet
metal worker taught me that “the
only reason to look down on someone is to give them a hand up.” Make
yourself visible to us. Reach out to a
Brother or Sister who you feel has the
right resources and compassion to
help. Inquire within your local about
what type of support exists and
where to get it.
➤
3
At a minimum, prepare yourself for
change. Work your mind and your
body… Physical exercise improves
mental health and reduces anxiety.
Make it personal, not impersonal…
“Job sites and social networking sites
such as Facebook can be helpful, but
they are not the only ways to connect,
and relying on them can perpetuate
the unemployment ‘hermit’ trap,” as
one expert put it. Reach out to your
local for a meeting. Talk to others at the
hall about networking. Update your
skills… Conduct a self-assessment of
your particular skills and whether they
are in sync with today’s and tomorrow’s requirements. Have your local
employers entered new or different
market areas? Have they changed
equipment or work processes? Do you
know how to weld or do HVAC service
work? Have you been by your local and
its training center to see what classes
are available to upgrade or refresh
your skills? Try some of these things to
prepare yourself for the changes that
have taken place since you last worked.
Rely on your local’s expertise to help
you match your skills with a job or see
to it that you get additional training. An
experienced mechanic told me to “carry
the ticket in your pocket; don’t think the
ticket should carry you.” Ask for help!
Be prepared in all ways! Many
employers or work sites will ask you
to take a drug and alcohol test. If you
have any concerns or problems with
stopping, ask your local Business
Agent for help and assistance. Don’t
place yourself in a position that you
will have difficulty getting out of.
Be innovative about your job
situation. I recently saw a video of a
blind person sitting on the street with
these words on a sign: “I am blind.
Please help.” He was only getting a
few coins when a woman knelt down
and wrote something on the back of
his sign. Immediately, more people
stopped to put coins in the can. When
the woman came back, he asked what
coming together to address them. For
those of us fortunate enough to have
remained working in this difficult
economy, it means reaching out to
help those who have had to bear the
burden of being out of work. The
best way to express our gratitude
and solidify our union’s character
and values is to make certain that
every member who needs our help
gets our help. We are here to support your local leadership, and we
“What can I as a member…
and we as a union, do to prepare?”
she had done to his sign. She said, “I
just changed the words to read: ‘It’s a
beautiful day and I can’t see it.’”
You can stay positive and feel confident about your skills and craft by talking about the projects you’ve accomplished and what you have learned.
Although we may not get out of this
tough economy overnight, you can be
assured of President Nigro’s commitment to do everything he can, each and
every day, to find every possible work
opportunity for every member. Your
perseverance through these difficult
times has inspired and strengthened
every union officer’s resolve to make
full employment a reality.
We stand together as one union.
That means understanding, first,
our individual challenges and then
will only stay strong and prosper if
we are working together. So please,
speak up and seek out our support!
As noted earlier, we are celebrating
our 125th anniversary this year. Our
founding date is January 25, but we
will devote the entire year to branding our newly merged SMART union
with this theme: SMART Expertise
Since 1888.
We have resolved to make 2013 a
year of full employment in all of our
areas of expertise, with an expansion
of our membership, in good health,
in prosperity, and in solidarity.
Fraternally,
Joseph Sellers, Jr.
From muse To koCh:
I
The Early History of Right to Work for Less
n 1936 a little known oil industry lobbyist named Vance Muse
founded a group called the
Christian American Association with
financial help from Texas oil companies and Wall Street CEOs.
Muse was the first to champion the
4
“Right to Work” phrase that we have
come to know today. A staunch conservative activist, Muse was known
to champion causes that included his
full throated opposition to women’s
suffrage, the integration of black and
white Americans, and the elimina-
tion of the policies set by Roosevelt’s
New Deal. To people like Muse, the
decades-long struggle to end child labor—which he fought to continue—
was an attack on capitalism itself.
Stating the reason for his attacks on
labor, he referenced his distaste for raThe Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
Thank you,
organized labor
Did you know that labor unions made the following 36 things possible?
1.
Weekends without work
20.
Wrongful termination laws
2.
All breaks at work, including your lunch breaks
21.
3.
Paid vacation
Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967
(ADEA)
4.
Family & Medical Leave Act (FMLA)
22.
Whistleblower protection laws
5.
Sick leave
22.
6.
Social Security
Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA)
—prohibits employers from using a lie detector test
on an employee
7.
Minimum wage
22.
Veteran’s Employment and Training Services (VETS)
8.
Civil Rights Act/Title VII —prohibits employer
discrimination
22.
Compensation increases and evaluations (i.e. raises)
8-hour work day
22.
9.
Sexual harassment laws
22.
Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
22.
Holiday pay
22.
Employer dental, life, and vision insurance
30.
Privacy rights
31.
Pregnancy and parental leave
32.
Military leave
33.
The right to strike
34.
Public education for children
35.
Equal Pay Acts of 1963 & 2011 - requires employers
pay men and women equally for the same amount
of work
36.
Laws ending sweatshops in the United States
10.
Overtime pay
11.
Child labor laws
12.
Occupational Safety & Health Act (OSHA)
13.
40-hour work week
14.
Workers’ compensation (workers’ comp)
15.
Unemployment insurance
16.
Pensions
17.
Workplace safety standards and regulations
18.
Employer health care insurance
19.
Collective bargaining rights for employees
sourCe: http://bigcorporationusa.
blogspot.com/2011/06/thank-union35-ways-unions-have.html
cial equality in the workplace. We will
not reprint his comments, but you can
find them in a ground-breaking article
by Mark Ames at www.nsfwcorp.
com/dispatch/right-to-work.
For many today it’s hard to believe, but during the 1940s, when
Muse began his Right to Work for less
crusade, unions were rapidly growing in Texas and state union density
was at 32%. His initial efforts were
January/February 2013
blocked by pro-labor members of the
Texas Senate, but with financial backing from Wall Street and several oil
tycoons, he eventually prevailed.
In all, 14 states passed Right to
Work for less legislation by 1947,
when conservatives in Congress
successfully passed the Taft-Hartley
Act, allowing states free reign to pass
these attacks on working people if
they so wished. His efforts and many
of his tactics were adopted by an upand-coming oil tycoon and crusading
libertarian named Fred Koch— who
led the fight for Right to Work for less
in Kansas. Koch’s billionaire sons,
David and Charles Koch, inherited
his legacy and were on the frontlines
of the fight to pass Right to Work for
less in Michigan, as well as attacks on
working people in Wisconsin, Ohio,
and other parts of the U.S. ■
5
MichigAn BATTLES On
Against right to Work
For Less
MOBIlIzATION CONTINUES
A
s many of you now know, Michigan’s Governor
signed a Right to Work for less bill this past December after two years of promising not to take
on this divisive issue.
Michigan residents immediately mobilized against this
bill. On December 6, the bill was announced in the morning, voted on that afternoon by the Michigan House and
Senate, and then signed a mandatory five days later by
the Governor. (Michigan law requires a mandatory five
day wait on new legislation.)
Even in that short time frame, thousands of Michigan
residents flooded the State Capitol in lansing. Members
from locals 80, 292, and 7 were joined in solidarity by
members from Chicago local 73, Ohio locals 24 and 33,
and many, many others.
Right to Work for less proponents—like the Governor and
the small contingent of Tea Party members who rallied for
the bill—claim to be fighting “forced unionism.” But under
6
current federal law, no worker is required to join a labor
union. Right to Work for less laws grant no rights to anyone
and create no work. On the contrary, they allow employers
and the politicians they bankroll to keep workers unorganized, unrepresented, and underpaid. This has been the
case in every state that has passed this legislation.
Supporters of this legislation argue that enactment
leads to economic growth by creating a more businessfriendly environment. Study after study has found this
claim to be untrue. A 2011 joint study by the University
of Oregon and the University of California at Berkeley
found that “right-to-work” laws have not positively
impacted job growth. In fact, the study found that unemployment had doubled in Oklahoma since the 2001
enactment of Right to Work for less and that new business
arrivals had actually declined.
The study also found that the lower wages and economic insecurity of workers in Right to Work for less
states could make business less inclined to relocate because of declining tax revenues and consumer demand.
The Michigan bill, which makes Michigan the 24th
Right to Work for less state in the nation, was not well
received. In fact, Michigan’s Governor Snyder saw his
approval rate plummet from 60% support among Michigan voters to barely above 30%, as outrage set in across
the state.
The Governor and the Michigan Republican leadership
took this step after realizing that the state legislature’s
lame duck session represented their last best chance
to pass the bill. Many of the party’s most conservative
members were due to leave by the New Year, after being
rejected by voters in the recent November elections. To
add insult to injury, the Governor and state GOP leaders inserted language into the bill to prevent its repeal
through a popular referendum vote. A recent poll finds
that over 2/3 of Michigan voters would overturn the law
if given the chance.
Because of this bill, non-union workers in Michigan
will be legally allowed—for the time being and only after
the expiration of current contracts—to work side by side
with union members, while having all representation,
grievances, and negotiation of benefits paid for by their
union co-workers.
Michigan workers must not allow this bill to be the law
of the land for long. Already, twenty-five legal challenges
to this bill, introduced while the public was locked out of
the State House, are pending. Workers and allied groups
are also gearing up for the 2014 election, when many of
Michigan’s Right to Work for less supporters, including
the Governor, will be up for re-election.
This was not a fight that the working people of Michigan started, but it is one that they will do everything to
put an end to, once and for all. ■
January/February 2013
7
Los Angeles Bus organizing
and Bus Training
BUIlDING UNION SOlIDARITY
O
n December 8, 2012, a training class was held
at the offices of los Angeles General Chairman
James Williams. The class included all officers and
committee persons who represent 5000 SMART members
working for the lA Metropolitan Transit Authority.
The group is off to a great start and has already established
a Membership Training Program Steering Committee.
local leadership and the members were very satisfied
with the efforts of the SMART Organizing Department.
General Chairman Williams requested that the
department begin training members as soon as possible,
while also involving his officers in the training. The
Organizing Department hopes to be able to implement
mobilization training beginning on February 2 and to
continue training through the end of 2013. ■
8
S
ince the General President put me in charge of coordinating organizing between all of our divisions
last year—and specifically to push for more bus organizing—I knew we needed the members involved if we
were going to succeed. We had many good organizing
campaigns already materializing in California; however,
member involvement seemed small on the transportation
side. When we stated receiving calls for more education
and help from the bus locals in Los Angeles, I knew it was
the perfect time to start internal organizing and involve
more members to help us succeed in organizing California
bus properties. We started putting together a program for
the bus members similar to the COMET (Construction Organizing Membership Education Training) program on the
building trade side. We call the new program BUS (Building Union Solidarity).
Building a strong internal organizing program is like
building a house: you must start with a strong foundation.
You do not start home construction with the roof, and
the same goes with internal organizing. You cannot start
organizing members or other workers unless you have
your union house in order and can deliver on the promise
of unionism. You might say you have to clean your house
before you invite people in. Already, the members who
attended the first class left the class yearning for more
and with a great spirit of unionism. We hope to have
classes every month in the Los Angeles area in 2013 and
put over 1000 members through them. Working together
with the membership, we will be unstoppable!
—James White
SMART Director of Organizing
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
assistant to the General President, transPortation affairs
direCtor, railroad and shiPYard Workers
TONY IANNONE
railroad News
FOSTERING COMMUNICATION AND SOlIDARITY
A
s many of you know by now, former Railroad and
Shipyard Department Director larry Holbert has
been elevated to the position of International Representative and will be reporting directly to General President Joe Nigro. In turn, the General President assigned me
to take over for larry. It is fortunate that General President Nigro has assigned both larry and Charlie Fraley to
work with us on the Railroad District Council, representing railroad mechanical and engineering members. They
both bring a deep knowledge base and commitment to
serving the members of this union.
Since November, the General Chairmen, the International
Officers, and I have held a number of conference calls
which resulted in a plan to streamline operations and adopt
some cost cutting measures. There will be some changes in
our overall structure.
The next couple of months will require some patience
and trust. Your General Chairmen will be contacting
locals so we can visit with the membership and update
you, while giving each member an opportunity to participate in the efforts to make our union stronger. Each of
you has a stake in what we do.
We will remain open to both old and new ideas. We
commit to this process with humility and a sincere
willingness to listen to everyone and gather your
input. We are not on a strict timetable, but we should
complete our presentations at each local union within
the next six months. Rest assured, we can do this while
maintaining a high standard of representation for our
members and without the need for additional funds
from the membership.
With this in mind, it is extremely important to note that
communication between members and elected officers is
essential if we are to succeed.
We are dedicated to re-energizing the spirit of union
values and the basic principle inherent in union solidarity: that union members take care of one another. If you
have an idea on how to improve our operations, we want
to hear. Please give us your input.
Contact your local representative, your General Chairman, or if you can’t reach them, then contact me at [email protected].
Also, make sure you sign up at smartunionaction.org.
to get regular updates from the Department and the International. To ensure you get updates from this department, select Member-Mechanical and Engineering from
the drop down menu.
Thank you, and I look forward to serving you. ■
Thank you, Brothers & Sisters
RAIlROAD MEMBERS RECEIVE DISASTER RElIEF
local 396 members at new
Jersey transit. left to right,
local Chairman Joe Persaud,
trustee James Melando,
check recipient Celestino
Faganis, Recording Secretary
Dominic Santopietro,
General Chairman John
McCloskey, check recipients
Madji Mohamed and
James Connallon, and local
Chairman/executive Board
Officer andrew McMaster.
January/February 2013
local 149 members at long island Railroad.
left to right, local Chairman Mike albino,
check recipient Jim Hepburn, and General
Chairman John McCloskey.
9
direCtor
JAMES JACkSON
energy sector Giving the
Canadian East Coast a Boost
CANADIAN AFFAIRS REPORT
F
or years, quite a few of our
members living on Canada’s
east coast have had to earn a living away from home. Job opportunities within their respective home locals
were few and far between, making
travel a necessity in order to provide
for themselves and their families.
Thankfully other locals across the
country that were more fortunate
when it came to work opportunities
were able to accommodate our members with jobs during these times.
As is always the case when our
brothers and sisters were travelling
away from home and were guests in
another local union—not always a
local of this International—they did
us proud.
By always showing up on time,
working in a safe and productive
manner, showing the skills and
craftsmanship they learned at home,
opportunities for them to return for
other work were most always available. As has been said in the past,
“eight hours work for eight hours
pay” benefits everyone, from company owner to contractor to member.
The tides have turned, so to speak,
on the east coast, and now those members are seeing ample work opportunities within their locals or nearby. The
mining and energy sectors are really
starting to take off, and that is having
a domino effect in the commercial and
institutional sectors as well.
In the province of Newfoundland
and labrador (local 512), the end of
2012 saw about $30 billion in major
capital spending was either planned
10
or underway, with the mining, oil,
and gas industries leading the way
at $13 billion. This is followed by
utilities at $7.7 billion, industrial/
manufacturing at $3.6 billion, and
transportation at $1.7 billion.
local 512 members are also
enjoying the benefits of a booming
construction industry. The local has
had full employment over the past
year and has had over 100 travelers employed in their jurisdiction.
Presently, there are approximately
ing projects still to come. The lower
Churchill Hydro Electricity project
has begun, with a price tag of $7.7
billion. Also in local 512’s jurisdiction, the commercial and institutional
sectors are very busy with projects
such as the St. John’s long Term
Care facility ($175 million) and the
Carbonear long Term Care facility
($140 million).
As a result of this growth in work,
many members who are working on
these projects will have the opportu-
“. . . we must answer the call to ensure
that those who are elected to decision-making
positions are the ones who are going to
work on behalf of the working class....”
150 HVAC/Sheeters employed at the
Vale Inco long Harbour Processing
Plant (a $3.6 billion project), with
hiring expected to continue into 2013
and to peak at approximately 300
sheet metal workers. local 512 has
fifteen members employed at the Hebron Project, a gravity base structure
and accommodation module with a
$8.3 billion price tag. The Iron Ore
Company of Canada continues with
its $750 million renovation project in
labrador City, with twenty-five local 512 members employed presently.
There is much exploration going on,
with the possibility of several min-
nity to be home in the evening with
family, instead of being away for
weeks and months at a time.
local 56 (Cape Breton), which has
held its own with employment for a
while, is expected to see a slowdown
in the coming months and throughout the year. The membership there
may have to begin travelling to other
locals. At least with the work coming
up in the surrounding jurisdictions,
those who choose to travel will be a
little closer to their roots than they
may have been in the past, thus
allowing them a chance to be home
more often.
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
local 437’s New Brunswick and
Prince Edward Island members will
see a change in employment opportunities going forward, with two major
projects nearing completion: the Point
lepreau Nuclear Power Plant Refurbishment project ($2.3 billion) and the
Sussex Potash plant ($1.7 billion). The
local should maintain relatively good
employment numbers, mainly due to
the institutional and commercial sectors becoming steadier with projects
like the Campbellton Hospital, numerous school renovations and new
school projects, hotels, and the normal
shutdown work at the oil refinery and
power plants. Capital spending for
New Brunswick is at $500 million.
local 409, Nova Scotia, has some
major commercial and institutional
sector work coming up, which should
result in good employment numbers
for the membership there as well.
With the abundance of natural
resources that need to be developed
on the east coast, we are hoping that
investment continues—and continues to offer employment opportunities for our members.
Fortunately, to date, the owners and contractors for these major
undertakings have largely decided to
complete their projects with building trades members under a variety
of agreements. Most of these agreements differ only minimally from the
current collective agreements that
our members work under and sometimes even enhance what is currently
in place. As with all agreements,
there are pluses and minuses, and
they are never perfect for everyone.
However, we have to accept that if
we do not have these agreements
in place to ensure the projects use
building trades members, our members could face the prospect of not
working on these projects at all.
What the owners want and what
we provide in return is an on-time
January/February 2013
and on-budget project with no disruptions in the process. In my view,
working under project agreements
and living up to them is a good
investment for our membership as it
ensures job opportunities today and
into the future.
Any major work stoppage or
disruption could have devastating effects on us and on all members in the
building trades. Our competition in
the construction industry is banging
at the door, trying to get an inside
track with those who currently use
our skills and craftsmanship. We cannot give them any ammunition they
can use to take away our work.
As we get into the New Year, let me
express my appreciation to those locals that reached out to provide work
opportunities to members from other
locals, to fill the projects they were
unable to staff. It must be understood
though, that the screening and hiring
process is stringent and in some cases
requires a variety of testing in order
to get to the job site. If you indeed
do get an opportunity to travel for
work, please be patient with those
who are trying to get you there, as
many times their hands are tied from
the time the referral is issued until the
entire process is complete. Although
your first contact may be with your
own local, they are not usually the
ones who do the dispatching and are
instead a messenger between you,
the local that put the call out, and the
hiring contractor. So, again, patience
is important, but you can be assured
that your representatives will do
everything they can for you.
looking forward to a year of opportunity for everyone.
Fraternally,
James Jackson
Director of Canadian Affairs
images from the Sussex Potash Site, a 2½-year, $1.7 billion project, completing in early 2013.
11
CentennialCelebrat
SHEET METAl CRAFT ON DISPlAY
“We will celebrate our gains and
remember the setbacks from which we learned.”
— GEORGE TAPlING, local 73 Business Manager (Chicago, Il) and SMWIA General Vice President, at the 1986 Convention
The date: March 19, 1987. The place: The National Democratic Club, in
Washington, D. C. The occasion: The Centennial Celebration Kickoff press
conference, a golden opportunity to boost the SMWIA brand. Come January
1988, the union would be 100 years old, and IA General President Edward
J. Carlough intended to make the most of it. With a crowd of senators,
congressmen, and media representatives on hand to cheer the past and hail the
future, the SMWIA spread the word, “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”
A
t the time, the IA’s 100th
Anniversary Committee,
appointed back in 1985, was
ready to launch a first-class celebration designed to “reflect the rich
heritage of the sheet metal trade,” as
the chairman put it, and to answer
the question “What does being a
sheet metal worker mean to me
and to the generations of workers
to come?” There were plans for a
Centennial conference to be held in
Toledo, Ohio (where the union was
launched in 1888), to pay tribute to
the founders’ fight for the 8-hour
day, fair wages, and safe working
conditions. There were also plans to
endow a gallery at the newly established National Building Museum, in
honor of former IA president Edward
F. Carlough, and to award the first
college scholarship from the Florence
Carlough Scholarship Foundation, in
honor of his wife.
But the most challenging plan
grew out of the Centennial’s theme,
“Generations of Sheet Metal Crafts-
12
manship.” larry Cassidy, President
Carlough’s executive assistant, and
Bill Fillippini, administrator of the
National Training Fund, were working on a sheet metal exhibit for the
Building Museum that would open
on Centennial Day, January 25. “I
was thinking small,” Cassidy remembered. But Fillippini and museum
curator David Chase were not: Chase
envisioned a world-class exhibit
designed by the world-class architect,
Frank Gehry, an idea that Fillippini
quickly embraced.
Celebrated for his breathtaking
sculptural building designs, Gehry
had an uncanny ability to use ordinary materials, like sheet metal, in
extraordinary ways—an ability that
shaped his plans for the Centennial
project. True to form, the architect
sketched out an ultra-modern “sheet
metal building within a building”
that would occupy one-third of the
museum’s cavernous Great Hall.
It was a “sheet metal dream” that
would employ “every phase of
sheet metal work”—a 65-foot spiraling geometric structure of copper,
polished brass, galvanized steel, and
terne plate that would contain 35,000
square feet of sheet metal and 20,000
pounds of structural steel before it
was finished.
The concept was compelling but
expensive. Given the uniqueness of
the structure and the highly skilled
labor it would require, contractors
estimated that it would cost between
$600,000 and $1 million to erect Gehry’s fantasy. But since the high-profile
project would promote the versatility
and artistry of the sheet metal industry, contractors were soon on board.
“It was a joint management-labor
effort,” Fillippini said, one that embodied the National Training Fund
motto, “Together we do it better.”
Sheet metal workers donated their
skill; contractors donated materials
and payroll; and both donated their
time. The IA, SMACNA, the NTF,
and local unions rounded out the
effort, providing around $175,000 in
funding. Without such cooperation,
it “would have been a very tough
nut to crack,” as one contractor put
it. Project manager Bob Martinez, an
NTF regional coordinator at the time,
was equally proud of the “magnificent” cooperation between management and labor. “I got everything I
asked for,” he said.
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
ation
the finished Frank Gehry-designed,
SMWia-built exhibit in
the national Building Museum.
Erecting the structure was a challenge in itself—an experience that
proved to be as exhilarating as it was
exhausting for the 600 journeymen
and apprentices who were “eager to
turn blueprints into a soaring wonderland,” as one observer described
the work. From the time construction
started in November 1987 to the “topping off” the following March, union
members worked 10- to 12-hour
days, sometimes 7 days a week, for
the price of a bed at the Best Western
and a $100 per diem paid by their
local unions.
January/February 2013
They did it for reasons that only
another “tin knocker” could understand: the chance to erect a truly
original, truly challenging structure.
And they performed their work under truly challenging conditions. For
instance, because the Building Museum was housed in a 19th-century
structure—the U.S. Pension Building,
which was listed on the National
Register of Historic Places—scaffolding was not permitted. Instead, the
crew had to go outside, climb down
a catwalk, and use pulleys and ropes
to hoist materials up—from 90 feet
above the ground. They also experimented with rock climbing equipment, since cranes could not be erected in the space. And they had to find
ways to cope with the fact that the
asymmetrical “sheet metal colossus”
was a free standing structure—cables
and supports could not be used to tie
it to the building, and a new, expensive rug meant that it could not be
fastened to the marble floor, either.
Consequently, the structure rested
on plywood floors and “swayed and
quaked” under construction. “At
the 60- foot level, the tower began
to rock,” Martinez recalled. So he
persuaded Gehry to lighten up the
framework by replacing steel beams
at the top with light-weight tubing.
The design itself posed practical problems that the workers had
to resolve, like figuring out how to
tie the metal skin to the structure.
“The plans were a nightmare,” the
crew agreed, since Gehry apparently
did not believe in square corners. “I
don’t think there’s a true vertical or
horizontal in this thing except for the
floor,” one worker noted. “All the
specifications call for 88.5 degrees
here, 92.5 degrees there.”
Another appreciated Gehry’s architectural wit. “Some of the elements
are just in-jokes, like that idiot radius
over there,” he explained. “If
➤
13
you worked with sheet, you’d know
from the specs that it would be just
about impossible to do that without
getting an ugly ripple.” But that was
as it should be, the crew agreed,
proud to put their layout and welding skills to the test. “It was meant to
be a challenge, and we did it,” as one
worker put it. “This guy [Gehry] is
really mean, but we’ve stayed right
with him.”
A justifiable pride in craftsmanship
was part of the thrill, and so was the
opportunity to show the public what
highly trained, skilled mechanics
No way. This thing you’re looking
at . . . tells the world: ‘We’re some
proud guys. Maybe we don’t have
a sheepskin like you’ve got, buddy,
but we got some other things. In fact,
this thing you’re looking at, it’s our
goddam sheepskin.’” Not the most
elegant statement, perhaps, but one
that captures the essential value of
skilled work, and skilled workers, to
the industry.
When “Sheet Metal Craftsmanship: Progress in Building” opened
on January 25, 1988, Frank Gehry’s
spiraling structure demonstrated the
Erecting the structure was a
challenge in itself—an experience that proved
to be as exhilarating as it was exhausting for
the 600 journeymen and apprentices
who were “eager to turn blueprints
into a soaring wonderland”
could do. “Usually, we finish a job,
the only thing anybody can see we’ve
done is the grilles in the ceiling.
All our duct work is hidden,” one
worker explained. “That’s the point,”
he added. “But nobody can see how
hard we worked, what kind of skills
were needed for the job. Well, this
thing is right out here,” he said. “It
says to the world: ‘Hey, sheet metal
is a very hard job. It must take some
damn skilled work to put up something like this.’”
His buddy agreed. “You’ve got to
know about algebra, about geometry.
. . . You just can’t walk in off the street
and get a pair of snips and a tinner’s
hammer and say ‘Hey, okay, I’m a
. . . tin knocker, put me on the job.’
14
versatility and beauty of sheet metal
as a building material. But within
its rooms the sheet metal workers
told the craftsmen’s side of the story:
The rooms served as galleries that
displayed a collection of artifacts and
tools that traced the history of the
craft. “We had 150-year old facades
from Ellis Island,” Fillippini recalled.
“Ancient tools were sent in from all
over the country, including the oldest
known tin snips.”
There were shears and soldering
irons, cornices and cupolas, weather
vanes and a 200-year-old sheet lead
plaque from Philadelphia’s Independence Hall. Sections of an 18thcentury copper roof and photographs
of 19th-century galvanized steel
storefronts were displayed alongside
20th century HVAC systems, stainless
steel kitchen cabinets, and decorative
arts like the multi-colored abstract
palm tree fabricated by members of
local 2 in Kansas City, MO. There
was even a production shop manned
by apprentices from local 100, in
Washington, D.C., who crafted metal
trays to give out to visitors. “They
could watch you build something out
of a flat piece of metal,” one participant remembered, a process most
people had not seen before.
“The message of all this is that
sheet metal means much more to
architecture than things like airconditioning ducts,” the New York
Times pointed out, “that it has been
used as much for esthetic purposes
as functional ones.” According to
the Washington Post, the exhibit
also suggested “that the sheet metal
industry, by dint of a tremendous
nationwide training program established and administered jointly by
the union and the contractors . . .
has proven enormously resourceful
in adjusting to new demands, new
technologies, and new markets.”
Better yet, the funding for this training program had never involved
either federal or state financial assistance. “It’s a model other building trades would do well to follow,”
the paper concluded. “Skilled union
sheet metal workers seldom go
unemployed.”
President Carlough could not
have said it better, although he did
his best at the various celebrations
that marked Centennial Day in 1988.
There were tours of the newly-erected
National Pension Fund building in
the morning and a press conference
at noon, with senators, congressional representatives, and AFl-CIO
president lane Kirkland on hand to
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
above, an early sketch of the
project by Frank Gehry.
open the sheet metal exhibit. There
was an Evening Gala in the museum’s Great Hall where Senator
Alan Cranston and Building Trades
Department President Bob Georgine
gave rousing speeches—and some
1,200 guests danced the night away.
There were over 1,500 Centennial
brass mugs handcrafted by Ralph
Hickernall, an 80-year-old retiree
from the Ohio Valley Council. And
there was a Centennial countdown
featuring the same “Big Apple” that
rang in the New Year at New York
City’s Time Square—which was built,
January/February 2013
maintained, and lowered each year
by members of local 137. “Everything’s been great,” one local officer
remarked. “They’re sure doing it
right for this.”
By the time the Centennial officially
ended with the dedication of a time
capsule to be opened in 2013, “Sheet
Metal Craftsmanship” had generated
“publicity beyond expectations,” as
Bill Fillippini put it. Some 40,000 museum visitors had toured the exhibit,
including President Ronald Reagan.
Press coverage had been almost universally positive, with cover stories in
professional journals like Architecture
and Architectural Record. leaders
of the Associated General Contractors and the Specialty Contractors
Association now understood how
sheet metal could be used, and so did
over a hundred student leaders of the
American Institute of Architectural
Students, who were feted with a
reception and tour of the show.
They also had a better understanding of what union contractors and
union workers bring to the industry:
the membership’s extraordinary skill
and generosity; the leadership’s ability to rally the troops, raise funds, and
execute a complex operation; the productive relationship with SMACNA;
and innovative training programs designed to prepare union members for
the next hundred years. The fact that
sheet metal workers from all over the
U.S. and Canada possessed the same
high level of skill and had no trouble
working together on an extremely
challenging project, spoke volumes. If
the SMWIA enjoyed very good press
in 1988, it was largely because union
members had proved that they were
up to the job. “They asked us to think
big and we did,” Bill Fillippini explained. “It was a proud moment for
the sheet metal industry, the union,
and the members.” ■
— GRACE PAllADINO, Historian
15
AND FOR THE
Congressional Record
Peter J. Visclosky, M.C.
Extension of Remarks
January 28, 2013
Mr. Speaker: It is my distinct honor to congratulate the members of the International
Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART), as they celebrate
the 125th anniversary of the union’s founding. The members and officers of SMART are to
be commended for their dedication and recognized for the union’s history of remarkable
achievements.
The International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers, formerly
known as the Sheet Metal Workers’ International Association and the United Transportation
Union, (UTU), is a truly inventive, progressive, and strong union made up of skilled craftsmen
throughout the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. Representing railroad, shipyard, and
production employees in the industry, SMART works tirelessly to ensure safe working conditions,
living wages and benefits, and growth opportunities for its employees.
Since its founding in 1888, SMART has been one of labor’s most ambitious and diligent
organizations. Throughout history, union leaders and members have been through many
struggles and triumphs seeking to bring about hope for workers seeking fair wages, hours, and
benefits while contributing to the structural development and building of the United States.
Since the late 1920’s, members and officers have contributed to the welfare of the country at
home and abroad. From their assistance with the production of Charles lindberg’s airplane, the
Spirit of Saint Louis, designed for his historic flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to the building and
sustaining of America’s Navy in our nation’s shipyards, as well as the union’s support in the
World Trade Center tragedy, SMART’s membership is worthy of the highest praise.
Northwest Indiana has a rich history of excellence in its craftsmanship and loyalty among its
tradesmen. The members and officers of SMART are outstanding examples of these qualities.
They have demonstrated their loyalty to both the union and communities internationally through
their hard work and selfless dedication.
Mr. Speaker, I ask that you and my other distinguished colleagues join me in honoring the
past and present hardworking members and officers of the International Association of Sheet
Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers and to congratulate the organization on the 125th
anniversary of its founding. They have committed themselves to making a significant contribution
to growth and development in Northwest Indiana, throughout the United States, and abroad.
This letter was submitted to the Congressional Record by Congressman Pete Visclosky, D-IN (1st
District). The Congressional Record is the most widely recognized published account of the debates,
proceedings, and activities of the U.S. Congress.
16
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
January/February 2013
17
Dear brothers and sisters,
January 17, 2013
I’m writing to congratulate you on the 125th anniversary of founding of your Union. Personally,
and on behalf of the millions of working men and women of the AFL-CIO, I want to thank you for
your collective leadership and all you have done for the labor movement and for working people
in America.
It’s easy to believe, as we face an uncertain future, that our times and challenges are particu-
larly difficult. And while we do face hardships and tough obstacles, anyone who reads your past
issues will see that America’s working people have done so before, and responded with energy
and innovation. Your courage comes through in those old articles, and the stories therein tell of
the good lives and good jobs you built for your members and your communities.
Our union movement is not so much an institution as a community of working people bound
by our shared values and commitments and inspired every day by everyday heroes—ordinary
people doing extraordinary things. That’s what a union is. That’s what a union does. That’s what
you are, and what you do. It would be impossible for me to catalog all of your contributions and
accomplishments, yet I’d like to name a few.
Your history highlights the evolution and adaptability of our movement. You transitioned from the
craft of tin and cornice workers of 1888 to the skilled workers of today who are indispensable to
the modern world. You build systems for nuclear power plants and pharmaceutical manufacturers. You balance air systems and have broken ground in green energy technology.
As a union, you care for each other. You broke ground by creating pension benefits in the Building Trades in 1952, and yours was the first organization to provide members with supplemental
unemployment insurance.
You are a proud and strong union with a rich history, and a bright future. God bless you. I look
forward to reading your journal for years to come. Keep telling your stories.
Sincerely,
Richard Trumka, President AFL-CIO
18
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
A History of the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers'
International Association:From SMWIA to SMART
1888 2 2012
he abridged version of
this history, which will
be published throughout the year in this and the next
five issues of the Journal, begins
with a look backward to the very
beginning of the SMWIA, then
picks up the story in the 1980s.
From there, it follows the union’s
efforts to confront the challenge of
nonunion construction, protect and
raise living standards for its various
membership groups, and anticipate
and even help create new work opportunities for skilled sheet metal
workers. If it does not tell a story of
continuous “progress and achievement,” as many union histories
tend to do, it does attempt to give
a frank appraisal of the leadership’s
vision, policies, and goals and how
T
these changed over time; the
memberships’ willingness to
buy into IA programs designed to
grow market share; and the effectiveness of joint labor-management
ventures to keep up with changes
in technology, in the composition
of the work force and the structure of the industry, and in the
perceived value of a union-trained
work force. In the process, it addresses issues that are as old as the
SMWIA itself: the tension between
local autonomy: and IA authority,
the failure to organize outside of
city centers, the competing interests of building trades and production workers, the rise and fall of
different branches of the trade,
and the difficulty of sustaining an
international organization through
times of economic depression,
corporate and political hostility,
and internal conflict.
Because this history follows three
different IA administrations over the
last thirty years, it is, in a sense, a
study in leadership: It pits visions of
what the union could and should be
against the everyday realities of internal politics, practical economics, and
competing interests. It examines the
difficulty of implementing change—
even when the stakes are high—in
an organization that values tradition
and local autonomy. And it weighs
the benefits of satisfying short-term
demands against the costs of ignoring the future, a risky calculation for
any sitting president but one that
cannot be ignored for long if the
union intends to survive. 2
Gr ac e Pall ad i no, Historian, Former Editor of the Samuel Gompers Papers
This document is an excerpt from a fuller history of the
SMWIA. The author, a historian, wrote the article based on
research of primary and secondary sources as well as numerous
interviews. The perspectives and opinions are those of the author’s
and not necessarily those of the Union, its officers, the editor
or the publisher. Every attempt was made to convey accurate
information; however, inadvertent inaccuracies may have
occurred. The copyright to the article is held by the author. 2
■
■
SMWIA-SMART Timeline
■
General and Labor History
Timeline
■
■
1860
■
1866 National Labor Union formed
■
1868 UTU predecessor, Order of Railroad
Conductors and Brakemen (ORC&B)
is established as the Order of Railway
Conductors of America
■
■
1870
■
1873 UTU predecessor, the Brotherhood of
Locomotive Firemen & Enginemen (BLF&E)
is established as the Brotherhood of
Locomotive Firemen
■
■
1880
1881 American Federation of Labor (AFL)
predecessor Federation of Organized
Trades and Labor Unions formed
■
1883 UTU predecessor, the Brotherhood of
Railroad Trainmen (BRT) established as
Brotherhood of Railroad Brakemen
1888 Wind turbines for grid electricity
invented
1888 January 25: Tin, Sheet Iron, and
Cornice Workers’ International Association
established in Toledo, OH. President
Archibald Barnes; Secretary A.W.
Chatfield; Treasurer Robert Kellerstrass
1889 Eiffel Tower inaugurated in Paris
“We can review the past, but we cannot change it and should we glance back over its pages . . . we would doubtless see
many misspent hours, many a broken purpose many a rash word spoken, but it’s not always best to look mournfully into
the past; it is wiser on making the transition from one year to another, to look
forward into the future, to form new resolutions and arrange better plans.”
C H APT E R O NE
—General President H. H. Brauch, 1897
Looking Backwards 1888 2 1970
U
nion sheet metal workers take
pride in their craft—and they’re
not afraid to show it. “We’re the
only trade that fabricates what we install,” a distinction that makes them “the
most highly skilled craft in the whole
building industry.” Their fittings are “all
laid out from a flat piece of metal,” they
explain. “Each piece is cut, each piece is
laid out, each piece is figured before it’s
even bent or rolled or shaped. So a sheet
metal worker” is an artist, they boast, as
well as a mechanic.
The range of their work is impressive.
They erect gleaming copper domes and
towering cathedral steeples. They design
and install complex, and increasingly
22
“green” and “clean” HVAC systems. They
program and operate computerized metalworking equipment and cut, drill, and
form parts with computer-controlled saws,
lasers, shears, and presses. They do precision welding at power plants, stainless-steel
work in commercial kitchens, and even
maintain the glittering New Year’s Eve ball
that drops every year in Manhattan’s Times
Square. Sheet metal workers are employed
in railroad shops and shipyards, in manufacturing plants, production shops, and on
construction sites. They fabricate and erect
signs and billboards. They do retrofit work,
service work, and test, balance, and maintain systems they install. They work as
estimators, project managers, and detailers
who use the latest building-informationmodeling software to generate “smart”
building plans. “There’s so many facets to
sheet metal work,” one retiree noted, “that
if you have any kind of mind at all, you
can use it and enjoy your work.”
Proud of the skill they bring to the job,
and the training opportunities that make
it all possible, union sheet metal workers
are also proud to be employed on some
of the largest, most demanding jobs
around—what one journeyman called
“complex, long-term, high-dollar builds
… that only a handful of companies …
[can] even man properly, let alone run.”
But that pride doesn’t come easily—it
is earned on the job every day, as one
Go to SMART125.org to follow the year-long commemoration of this anniversary.
■
■
■
■
■
■
1890
■
1890 Tin, Sheet Iron, and Cornice Workers’
International Association affiliates with the
American Federation of Labor (AFL)
■
1894 UTU predecessor, Switchmen’s Union
of North America (SUNA) is established
■
1896 Olympic Games revived in Athens
■
1896 Tin, Sheet Iron, and Cornice Workers’
International Association becomes the
Amalgamated Sheet Metal Worker’s
International Association (IA)
1896 First Canadian local chartered in
Toronto, Ontario
long-time union leader explained. “Sheet
metal workers work hard,” he said. “If
they don’t work hard, they don’t work.
It’s a fact of life,” one that was as true
in 1888, when sheet metal workers first
established an international union—the
Tin, Sheet Iron, and Cornice Workers’
International Association—as it is today.
In those early days, though, ten or
even twelve hour days set the standard,
and safety issues were rarely discussed. In
fact, in Chicago, where skyscrapers were
just beginning to rise, it was not unusual
to look up and see a tin roofer “clinging
to swinging scaffolds high … above stone
pavement,” as one newspaper reported,
“or hanging on with one hand to a …
cornice while he works with the other.”
Worse, this dangerous job was hardly
well paid. “Our employers figure our
time so closely,” one roofer explained,
“that I believe if a man should fall … to
the street he would be docked for the
time he occupied in falling.”
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■
1899 First charter granted to the union by the
American Federation of Labor
1900
1901 Membership at 5,581 with 108 local
unions
1902 Willis Carrier, a mechanical engineer
from Buffalo, New York, designed the
first air conditioning unit. Early units were
very large, very expensive, and extremely
dangerous because the ammonia used as
coolant was highly toxic.
1902 Death Benefit program established
No wonder these workers in the U.S.
and Canada were putting down their
tools and organizing local unions. And no
wonder the local leaders who launched
the International Association (or IA)
limited membership to bona fide craftsmen who had served an apprenticeship.
These union pioneers wanted to be more
than industrial “hands.” They wanted to
be recognized as valuable partners in the
industry. By forging a network of versatile
and valuable mechanics, ready, willing,
and able to support each other in a fight,
the IA intended to push wages up, cut
hours down, and improve working conditions in urban and rural markets alike.
At first, progress seemed inevitable. By
1890 (the year the union affiliated with
the American Federation of Labor), the
IA represented some 2000 journeymen
in thirty locals, and within two years that
number had doubled. Better yet, almost
every local union had won the 9-hour
day and raised wages to around $2.50 a
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1903 Wright Brothers first controlled heavierthan-air flight
1903 Name changed to the Sheet
Metal Workers’ International Alliance;
headquarters moved to kansas City, MO
in 1904
1904 St. Louis World’s Fair introduced nearly
20 million visitors to the modern marvel
known as “manufactured air.”
1906 San Francisco Earthquake
1906 Carrier patented “dew point control”
air conditioning system
1906 IA contributes $5,332.20 contributed
for San Francisco earthquake victims
day, a fair rate at the time. “Everything
was harmonious, all working together for
the common good,” the IA’s first general
president, Archibald Barnes, remembered
those early years. And so he predicted
“a bright future” for the new organization—as long as the membership focused
on improving conditions, assisting brothers in distress, and resolving industrial
conflicts through arbitration, not strikes.
“Build up a union … then see what can
be done in the line of hours and wages,”
he counseled. “Experience proves that
with thorough organization and just demands, no strike will ever be necessary.”
Yet the road to industrial justice proved
far rockier than Barnes expected. In the
1890s employers were more likely to lock
out union workers and blacklist organizers than welcome them as industrial
partners—and they often relied on armed
guards in order to get their point across.
“We were called ‘Socialist’ and ‘Anarchist,’
in those days,” a local leader explained.
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1906 Coppersmith’s International Union joins
the IA
1908 AFL Building Trades Department
charters Alliance
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1910
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1913 U.S. Department of Labor created
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1914 World War I begins
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1916 Implementation of daylight saving time
negotiated between RED and the newly
established U.S. Railway Administration
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1918 U.S. government takes over the
railroad industry; Railway Board of
Adjustment established; national agreement
“When one of our members was progressive, he lost his job … or sometimes the
employers would … fine … any[one]
who would hire a certain union member,”
thereby forcing that member to leave
town. “The first members were considered
outlaws, and an organizer might as well
have been Satan himself,” another leader
recalled. “It was well nigh impossible [for
an organizer] to get into the shops,” a situation that would not change significantly
until 1935, when the Wagner Act finally
legalized labor’s right to organize.
In the meantime, only the most aggressive, economically-valuable, and wellorganized local unions would survive, a
fact that got in the way of thorough organization. Local unions strong enough
to be effective in the dog-eat-dog world
of competitive industry were usually
protective, too—that is, they fought hard
to win the best wages and conditions for
local members, and they fought equally
hard to build a “wall” around their territory to keep others out.
42
1912 IA affiliates with the AFL’s Railway
Employes’ [sic] Department (RED)
1913 Membership at 18,500
1919 Coppersmith members affected by 18th
Amendment on Prohibition
1919 Alliance establishes Employment
Committees to aid returning WWI veterans
in finding jobs
1919 General President Hynes endorses
“Plumb Plan,” calling for railroad
nationalization
From the local union’s point of view,
this defensive strategy made sense.
With no full-time organizers, no legal
rights, and nothing but their own
determination to stand together in a
fight, local members sacrificed time,
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1920
1920 19th amendment to the US Constitution
ratified, giving women the right to vote
1920 U.S. railroads returned to private
industry; Railroad Labor Board established
1921 General Executive Council includes a
member from the railroad industry
1922 400,000 railroad shop workers
strike; federal injunction quashes union
strike support activities; strike ultimately is
defeated
1924 Name changed to Sheet Metal
Workers’ International Association
The fact that new technologies, new
materials, and new employees were
changing the nature of sheet metal work
also got in the way of thorough organization. Thanks to the introduction
of steam-powered presses, lathes, and
“The introduction of labor-saving machinery
opened the door to a new class of workmen: semi–
produced materials for
money, and very often their family’s
security to build an organization strong
enough to raise standards. So they were
not about to share their work or good
conditions with outsiders, whether
those outsiders were union brothers
or not. From the IA’s point of view,
however, even the strongest local union
was not strong enough if workers just
beyond its boundaries remained unorganized and available to replace local
members in a strike.
wheeling machines, household goods,
cutlery, and cans were now mass produced in factories, not hand-crafted in
the tinsmith’s shop—and factory hands
were not eligible for union membership.
A similar change was underway in the
sheet iron branch of the trade. On the
one hand, the introduction of galvanized
sheet iron created new opportunities for
journeymen who fabricated and installed
roofs, cornices, skylights, and ceilings, as
well as warm air furnaces and ventilation
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1925 Willis Carrier air conditions Rivoli
Theater in New York City
1925 Pacific Coast Conference of Sheet
Metal Workers agrees to affiliate with the
SMWIA; membership at 24,000 with 441
local unions
1926 Railway Labor Act
1926 IA helps organize the Railway Labor
Executives’ Association (RLEA) to develop
industry-wide policies and coordinate
lobbying efforts
1927 Members from Local 206 in San
Diego, CA, build a major portion of what
became the “Spirit of St. Louis,” the plane
pipe. On the other, the introduction of
labor-saving machinery, including sheet
iron folders, or brakes, and cutting, rolling, and seaming machines, opened the
door to a new class of workmen: semiskilled specialists who produced materials
–skilled specialists who
the trade.”
for the trade. Because these workers had
not completed an apprenticeship, they
were not eligible for union membership.
If the Tin, Sheet Iron, and Cornice
Workers intended to control the trade,
these new workers would have to be
organized, a move the membership accepted in 1896. “Realizing the tendency
of our progressive age, where modern
machinery simplifies nearly all the crafts,
and to a great extent makes apprenticeship unnecessary,” the IA reported, “the
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Charles Lindbergh flew across the Atlantic
in May 1927
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1928 Discovery of penicillin
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1929 Wall Street stock market crash
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1930
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1931 Davis-Bacon Act
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1932 Franklin Delano Roosevelt elected 32nd
U.S. President
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1932 Norris-LaGuardia Act enacted
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constitution of the tinners has been
changed so as to admit all who work at
sheet metal work into their unions. …
Henceforth, the Tin, Sheet Iron, and
Cornice Workers’ International Association … will … be known as the
Amalgamated Sheet Metal Workers’
International Association.”
Conflict and Compromise
Almost a century later the IA would
celebrate this change as a remarkable
sign of trade unity. At the time, though,
unity was in short supply. It was one
thing to broaden membership categories,
another to harness the economic power
of a diverse group of workers when some
were more powerful than others. Members employed in the building trades, for
instance, were in a better economic position to enforce the 8-hour day than those
employed in factories or furnace shops.
Conflict between rural and urban locals also threatened unity. Because work
was scarce in the countryside, members
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1933 Dark economic times; publication of
Journal suspended in favor of financing the
death benefit fund
1933 Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen
organizes interstate bus operators
1934 National Mediation Board (NMB)
established by amendment to the RLA
1935 National Labor Relations (Wagner) Act
1935 Standard Form of Union Agreement
endorsed at Chicago convention of SMWIA
1935 Social Security Act
1935 Committee for Industrial Organization
(CIO) formed
of small rural locals expected their busy
urban brothers to welcome travelers, so
they favored a low dues, low initiation
fee policy. But big city locals had a different plan. They favored high dues and
high initiation fees to support full-time
business agents who policed union jobs
and enforced union contracts—and they
required travelers to pay their way if they
wanted to enjoy these benefits. Ultimately these conflicting policies severely
tested the IA’s notions of brotherhood.
In theory, the IA existed to balance strong and weak local unions.
Per capita taxes would defray organizing costs; general assessments would
finance strike benefit payments; and
urban and rural “brothers” would share
the wealth. Yet reality proved quite different. Although general vice presidents
were elected to serve as organizers, their
opportunities were limited since they
still worked full time with the tools.
And while strike benefits were designed
to help locals in distress, those benefits
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5
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1936 RLA expands to include the airline
industry
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1936 Walsh-Healy Act
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1938 Fair Labor Standards (Wage Hour) Act
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1939 World War II begins with Nazi
invasion of Poland
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1940
■
1941 Pearl Harbor attacked by Japan
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1942 During WWII, a number of members
were engaged in secret work associated
with development of an atomic bomb.
were also limited, since the IA had no
power to enforce the assessments that
financed them. “It is very embarrassing, indeed,” General President Henry
Brauch admitted, “but what can the IA
do?”—a position that hardly satisfied
local unions in need. “We cannot live
on promises,” one leader wrote in the
midst of a strike for the 8-hour day. If
the IA could not enforce its laws and
provide practical help, what was the
point of joining the organization?
How to resolve these differences and
establish the Amalgamated Sheet Metal
Workers in fact as well as in name was a
major question in the late 1890s—one
that would eventually led to secession
(when big city locals decided to go it
alone), civil war (when those locals
organized a rival IA), and reconstruction
(when both groups formed the Amalgamated Sheet Metal Workers International Alliance in 1903). The peace
treaty that saved the union was based on
the concept of local autonomy. Big-city
locals would maintain their right to set
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1946 SMWIA membership doubled from
pre-World War II numbers
1947 Taft-Hartley Act
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1950
■
1950 korean War begins
1947 SMWIA and SMACNA negotiate the
Standard Form of Union Agreement (SFUA)
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1947 SMWIA and SMACNA establish the
National Joint Apprenticeship Committee
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1948 Journal publication revived after 15year lapse
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1949 First National Apprenticeship Contest
held in Washington, DC, at SMACNA
Convention
1949 First 40-hour week for U.S. railroad
industry
policies and membership fees “to suit
their surroundings,” a compromise that
reflected economic reality at the time.
The fact was the IA needed big-city locals
more than those locals needed the IA.
And as long as they were able to control
their work, they expected the IA to stay
out of their way.
With that battle decided, other changes
were underway. Over the next few years,
the general president would become a
full-time, salaried officer/organizer; IA staff
would include a full-time general organizer
and at least four special organizers; district
councils would be set up wherever they
were needed to settle local disputes; and
the IA would reserve the right to amalgamate (or merge) local unions when
necessary. Now per capita taxes, not local
assessments, would finance a strike defense
fund, and a formal dues stamp system
would be implemented to protect the
membership—and the IA—from careless
or corrupt financial secretaries.
The next few years would also see a
shift in union ranks. In 1906, the Cop-
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1951 President Harry S. Truman signs
railroad union shop bill
1951 First use of nuclear power to produce
household electricity in Arco, ID
1951 First 40-hour work week on Canadian
railroads
1952 First pension checks issued by Local 28
in New York City, NY. This program is a
first of its kind in the building trades.
1954 Supreme Court decision ends
segregation in public schools
persmiths’ International Union, whose
jurisdiction included the fabrication and
installation of sheet metal pipes, vats and
tanks, joined the IA. Around the same
time, railroad shop workers were also
becoming an important new membership group. But can makers and other
“...the 1920s also
shift for the sheet metal
air-conditioning
low-wage factory workers, did not fare
so well, despite the IA’s effort to organize
“provisional” locals that charged lower
dues and initiation fees. Although twelve
provisional locals would be launched
in 1918, only one was still in business
by 1924. Employer hostility, seasonal
employment, and especially the unskilled
nature of the work made it almost impossible to hold these unions together.
In the meantime, though, shipyard
workers had come into the IA, around
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1954 First General Vice President in Charge
of Railroads appointed
1955 Copper box for AFL cornerstone
fabricated by Local 102 (Washington, DC)
member Charles Heinz, employed at Paul
Stromberg shop
1955 IA shopmen join in striking Louisville
and Nashville Railroad and winning
hospital and medical care benefits
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1957 First use of keyboard-controlled
personal computer (IBM) by one person
1957 IA begins tracking industry products
manufactured under collective bargaining
agreements
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1957 IA publishes Union Label directory
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1958 First use of the “Peace Symbol”
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1959 Vietnam War begins
1956 Supreme Court upholds union
representation in railroad union shops,
overruling a state right-to-work law
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1960
■
1960 Political Action League (PAL) launched
1956 Organizing Department established
at IA
the time of the First World War, and
by 1924 so had independent unions of
chandelier, brass, and metal workers.
Now representing 75 percent of the U.S.
and Canadian skilled sheet metal work
force, or about 26,000 members in 1924,
the IA was ready to adopt what one
broiled in a costly jurisdictional war with
the Carpenters to install metal doors,
window sashes, and trim (that had once
been made of wood). Canadian workers
were battling more radical unionists in
the One Big Union movement. And employers were taking advantage of a recent
marked the beginning of an industrial
trade when Willis Carrier sold his invention for
to movie theater operators in 1922.”
member called a “more up-to-date, progressive name”: the Sheet Metal Workers’
International Association.
the industry expands
With a new name, an updated structure,
and a more diverse membership, the IA
was ready to move forward in the 1920s.
But no one expected smooth sailing.
Railroad shop workers were recovering from their disastrous 1922 national
strike. Building trades workers were ema History |
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1955 AFL-CIO merger
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economic recession to advance what they
called the “American Plan”—the latest
incarnation of the open-shop movement.
But the 1920s also marked the beginning of an industrial shift for the sheet
metal trade when Willis Carrier sold his
invention for air-conditioning to movietheater operators in 1922. By 1925 the
system was cooling New York City’s Rivoli
Theater, and within a few years air conditioners were being installed in restaurants,
railroad cars, and department stores.
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1961 SMWIA and SMACNA establish the
Sheet Metal Apprentice and Training
Foundation, which in turn publishes The
Sheet Metal Craftsman, the first industry
training manual
1961 SMWIA and SMACNA establish
Joint Industry Fund via SFUA to finance
educational and public relations
campaigns
1962 SFUA developed for production
workers
1963 SMWIA becomes first union to offer its
members accident insurance, protecting
members at work and at home in cases of
accidental death.
“At the beginning, they were all small
jobs,” according to Edward F. Carlough,
a member of New York City’s Local
28 who would go on to serve the IA as
general secretary-treasurer (1951-59)
and general president (1959-1970). They
were custom-designed, custom-manufactured, field-installed systems, with most
of the assembly and erection of components done on site. “The firm I happened
to be working for got a share of restaurants and theaters, so I went through the
whole line of air conditioning, learning
the … business, which was a salvation to
the sheet metal industry at the time,” he
said. This new branch of the trade not
only put union members to work. It gave
sheet metal workers, the only trade that
could take a flat piece of metal and lay it
out “in elbows and double elbows, and
fittings,” an opportunity to prove that
they were “one of the finest, if not THE
finest of any craft” in the building trades,
said Carlough.
But new work opportunities were
only the starting place as far as Carlough
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1965 Missile silo fire and explosion kills 13
sheet metal workers
1966 National Pension Fund established
for SMWIA members in construction and
production occupations.
1969 Construction Users Anti-Inflation
Roundtable established to undermine
labor and labor’s hold on apprenticeship
training and skilled workers (support nonunion construction contractors and “merit
construction”)
1969 United Transportation Union
established, merging four previously
independent unions: the Brotherhood of
Railroad Trainmen (BRT), the Brotherhood
of Locomotive Firemen & Enginemen
was concerned. In fact, as proud as he
was of his craft, the young mechanic
was still very dissatisfied with certain
conditions—or the lack of them. “I
didn’t like that we had no pensions … in
our local unions,” he said. “I ran some
of the biggest jobs that came into New
York City,” including Radio City Music
Hall, part of a $250,000,000 project
that began going up in 1930, right at the
start of the Great Depression. At a time
when so many others walked the streets
unemployed, Carlough was relieved to
be working on such a high-level job. But
he could not help wondering how his
family would fare once he was too old to
climb scaffolds, a worry that stayed with
Carlough throughout these dark years.
“It was trying times,” he remembered.
Almost half of New York City’s 250 sheet
metal shops had shut down, so there was
“very little work at the time,” a complaint that would be echoed all over the
U.S. and Canada. Expenditures for the
construction industry dropped by 50%
between 1930 and 1932; 35% of building
82
(BLF&E), the Order of Railway Conductors
& Brakemen (ORC&B), and the Switchmen’s
Union of North America (SUNA)
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1969 U.S. lands on moon
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1970
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1970 International Association of Railroad
Employees, a majority African-American
union, joins with the UTU
1971 National Maintenance Policy
Agreement established to promote
labor-management cooperation in the
construction trades.
trades workers were unemployed by 1935;
and the IA was cutting expenses in order
to survive. IA salaries were cut 25% between 1933 and 1936, and another 10%
in 1937, and publication of the monthly
Journal was suspended in 1933 in favor of
financing the death benefit fund.
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1971 Article 10, Section 8 of SFUA adopted,
establishing arbitration and mediation
procedures between SMWIA and
SMACNA
1971 National Training Fund established
to set national standards for apprentice
training
1972 IA establishes Government Affairs
Department
1973 Watergate scandals
1973 SMWIA establishes SASMI (wage
stabilization) program to help underemployed
members affected by the recession.
1975 Vietnam War ends
Battalions, and fought to protect the
military installations they built. The fact
that SMWIA membership more than
doubled between 1938 and 1946—from
24,372 to 52, 932—reflected the vast
expansion of sheet metal work during
the war.
“...do the job we are expected to do,...
organize the unorganized within the jurisdiction
Workers' International
Sadly, it took the outbreak of the Second World War to revive the economy
and put union members back to work.
Sheet metal workers were employed in
navy yards, airfields, and on railroads.
They played crucial roles in defenserelated construction, including top-secret
projects at Oak Ridge, TN, Hanford,
WA, and Los Alamos, NM, where the
atomic bomb was in development. They
served in the military, often as members
of the Seabees, the Naval Construction
And once the war was safely over, these
work opportunities continued to grow.
Indeed, the 1950s proved to be exciting
but critical years for highly skilled sheet
metal workers. With the revival of industry and the expansion of defense-related
construction, they were busier than ever
erecting metal roofing, decking, and siding; installing all types of chutes, hoppers,
fans, blowers, pipes, and fittings; erecting
sheet metal aircraft hangers, garages, and
service stations; performing copper work
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1975 Canadian Council of Sheet Metal
Workers established
1975 Engineering News Record names
General President Edward J. Carlough its
Construction Man of the Year
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1975 Local 30, Toronto, Ontario, sheet metal
workers praised for extraordinary work on
CN Tower
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1976 Bicentennial of the Declaration of
Independence
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1979 Voluntary 2¢ PAL check-off initiated
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in breweries and railroad cars; and fabricating and assembling wind tunnels and
missile and propulsion systems.
At the same time, air-conditioning
was becoming a necessity, not a luxury,
in commercial, industrial, and residential
structures, making sheet metal workers
of the Sheet Metal
Association.”
an “indispensable factor” in the building
and construction industry. This was
all “heavy, heavy, construction work,”
as one member put it, that generated
hours and hours of fabrication time.
“We were making duct work,” a member
explained, but “we would also make the
dampers that had to go into the system.
. . . We would make galvanized louvers
and things like that. We’d make the
entire job.” And that was a boon to journeymen and employers alike: because
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1980
1981 National Energy Management Institute
(NEMI) established
1982 Resolution 78 approved to help union
sheet metal contractors bid specific jobs
under flexible contract conditions
1983 publicity campaign against Brown &
Root (B & R) launched, to expose the high,
hidden costs of non-union construction
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1983 International Job Bank launches
1983 SASMI adds Production & Industrial
program
construction work was seasonal, fabrication work kept shops busy throughout
the year. When winter weather put a
stop to “outside work,” for instance,
journeymen could spend their time
“inside” fabricating products like roof
ventilators and louvers. “We put them
in stock,” a journeyman explained. “So
when a job would be available we would
have them already made. That used to be
our winter’s work,” he added. “If we had
not fabricated, we would have lost a lot
more time than we did.”
Organizing
Production Workers
At the same time, though, large-scale
sheet metal companies were taking over
this work. For instance, Burt Manufacturing, in Akron, OH, produced
prefabricated roof-top ventilators that
were cheaper to install because they
were cheaper to produce: Burt’s shop
employees did not earn building-trades
wages. Traditionally, in such situations,
“outside” workers would refuse to handle
| January/February 2013
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1983 U.S. District Council of Railroads
formed to coordinate activities of 47
railroad locals
1983 Office of Canadian Affairs opened
1985 Youth to Youth program launched to put
apprentice members in the field as union
organizers
1985 National COLA Fund is established to
pay cost-of-living adjustments to retirees
1985 The Railroad Yardmasters of America
(RYA) affiliate with the UTU
1986 Challenger and Chernobyl disasters
such products, a strategy that forced
contractors to deal with union firms
only, and one that members of Akron’s
Local 70 promptly employed in 1945.
But that strategy proved risky after 1947
when the Taft-Hartley Act outlawed secondary boycotts. To complicate matters,
Burt’s shop workers were members of
the United Steel Workers, an industrial
union affiliated with the CIO. When
the AFL and CIO made plans to merge
in 1955, Edward F. Carlough, for one,
strongly protested. He feared that the
Steel Workers would win this, and other,
jurisdictional fights and push sheet metal
journeymen out of fabrication work.
The case dragged on through the
1950s and was not decided until 1960,
in the Steel Workers’ favor. By that time,
though, the IA had developed a more
promising strategy: in 1954 General
President Robert Byron assigned Edward
F. Carlough to assist a newly-appointed
organizing committee and “do the job we
are expected to do,” that is “organize the
unorganized within the jurisdiction of
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1986 Sheet metal workers praised for
restoration work on the Statue of Liberty for
its July 4 centennial celebration
1986 National boycott of Toyota Motor
Company initiated for their proposed nonunion and highly subsidized Georgetown,
kY, assembly plant construction
1986 Railroad Workers Department expands
into Railroad and Shipyard Worker
Department
1986 Sheet Metal Occupational Health
Institute Trust (SMOHIT) established to
address asbestos exposure in sheet metal
workers.
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the Sheet Metal Workers’ International
Association.” The plan made sense to
Carlough. “We erect every fan that goes
into our business. … So I started saying ‘Why can’t we make them, too?’” a
question he raised at the 1955 Business
Agents’ meeting. “I got up in front of
… 400 people,” he remembered, “and I
told them the story about what we have
to do to try and consolidate our whole
industry [and] not leave other people to
do our work.”
Within a year the membership had
agreed to finance a 2-year national
organizing campaign to charter new
production locals that would “in no way
interfere with or infringe upon the work
performed by members of construction
locals,” Carlough promised. Manufacturers of fans, blowers, and air-conditioning
and heating units of all kinds, as well as
hospital equipment, metal furniture, and
water and oil tanks, would be organized
on a production shop basis. Manufacturers of dampers, electrical boxes, louvers,
ventilators, radiator enclosures, and
10 2
1987 National Labor Relations Board
(NLRB) passes Deklewa decision, allowing
contractors to simply let union contracts expire
1987 Stock market crashes
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1988 Sheet Metal Workers’ International
Association celebrates 100th anniversary.
1988 Florence Carlough Scholarship Fund
established as predecessor to the Sheet
Metal International Scholarship program
with 816 awards since 1988.
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1990
■
1990 Construction Organizing Membership
Education Training (COMET) launched
kitchen equipment would be organized
on an industrial or construction shop basis—and paid building trades rates. With
a new Organizing Department ready
to go in 1956—the most important
undertaking in the history of the International so far, according to Carlough—the
SMWIA began organizing the industry “like it should be organized,” he
said. Thanks to new shop workers, IA
membership grew from almost 88,000 in
1954, to more than 102,000 in 1958, to
111,000 in 1962, a 26% increase in less
than 10 years’ time.
the Rise of the
Business Round table
However, building trades locals did not
follow suit. Whether they were hardened
by the boom-and-bust cycles of the
construction industry or the tough fights
to win middle-class wages and benefits,
they were no more inclined to “organize
thoroughly” in the 1950s and 60s, when
work was plentiful, than big-city unions
had been when the IA first started out.
1993 SMWIA Education Department
established to provide courses for IA staff
and local officers
1993 More than 100,000 Canadian trade
unionists march on Parliament Hill in
Ottawa to protest NAFTA
1994 Production Workers Department
established
1996 SMWIA launches first website: www.
smwia.org
1996 Mutual Gains Bargaining program
initiated
1996 SMOHIT reports some 35,000 sheet
metal workers and contractors examined for
asbestos exposure in preceding 10 years
From their point of view, it made no
sense to open doors to new members
who would then compete with longtime
members for work when times got tough
again. So they tended to limit apprenticeship training to family members and
friends, a practice that strengthened local
“My father was
two of my brothers are
ties in times of trouble. After all, members
were more likely to walk off a good job or
pay dues and assessments when it was all
in the family. “The union was stronger in
those days,” a journeyman who came up
in the 1950s remembered. “Most of the
members were committed to the union
first and foremost.” Another, who came up
a few years later, agreed. “My father was
a sheet metal worker, two of my brothers
are sheet metal workers, so I grew up in a
culture of the building trades,” he said. In
Go to SMART125.org to follow the year-long commemoration of this anniversary.
■
■
■
■
■
1997 First mutual gains bargaining (MGB)
seminar held in New Orleans
1998 National Training Fund renamed
International Training Institute (iTi)
Conference held (later known as Partners
in Progress Conference)
■
1999 Disaster Relief Fund established
1999 Show Me the Label educational
campaign launched
■
■
1999 Best Practices Task Force established to
increase industry marketing
■
■
■
2000
2000 First SMWIA-SMACNA LaborManagement Partnership Bi-annual
his neighborhood, all of the trades—plasters, carpenters, pipe fitters, sheet metal
workers—tended to respect each other’s
work jurisdiction and would never dream
of crossing a picket line.
Yet the same ties that empowered local
unions on the job site and in the com-
2000 Railroad and Shipyard Department
urges a merger with a railroad union at a
strategic planning session
SMART
a History |
CHaPteR i
■
2001 9/11 terrorists attacks
2001 IA joins forces with IBEW, UA,
Boilermakers, Insulators, and Ironworkers
in the Mechanical and Allied Crafts (MAC)
2001 Immediately after the fall of the World
Trade Center, members working on sites
across Manhattan rushed to join their
fellow building trades members at Ground
Zero in the search for survivors
Fed up with time lost to work stoppages—that numbered almost a thousand
a year between 1966 and 1969—and
fearful that rising building-trades rates
would trigger a rise in manufacturing
wages, major corporations, national
contractors, and construction industry
a sheet metal worker,
sheet metal workers, so I grew up in a culture
of the building trades.”
munity were slowly but surely weakening
their strength in the industry. First, exclusive local unions lost public and political
support, in the 1960s and 70s, because
“outsiders” (including African-Americans,
women, and other minority groups) had
no access to apprenticeship training or
well-paid union jobs. Second, a series of
militant and successful strikes around
the same time ultimately priced union
construction out of the market, at least
as far as private industry was concerned.
■
executives decided to take action. In
1969, they launched the Construction
Users Anti-Inflation Roundtable (which
merged with the Business Round Table
in 1972), intending to undermine local
union power, increase productivity, control wage rates, and ultimately break the
union’s hold on apprenticeship training
and skilled manpower.
Worse, they planned to achieve
their goal by promoting nonunion or
so-called “merit” construction. That
| January/February 2013
■
■
■
■
2003 SMWIA joins the Industrial Union
Council (IUC), 14 unions representing
workers in manufacturing
2004 SMWIA charters Local 41, the first
SMWIA Local Union in San Juan, Puerto
Rico
2004 IA and Painters union co-endorse a
Unity Resolution, renewing the 1996 BCTD
Solidarity Compact
2005 Change to Win Unions leave AFL-CIO
2005 MAC launched as a division of the
BCTD
2005 First moves toward merger with UTU
initiated
strategy was more promising in the
1970s than ever before, thanks to the
availability of a wide range of prefabricated materials, new labor-saving
technologies, and a steady supply of
semi-skilled workers who had been shut
out of unions for years. The fact that the
post-war construction boom had collapsed in 1973 also boosted nonunion
chances—skilled journeymen with
mortgages to pay and families to feed
did what they had to do to survive; that
is, they provided the skilled manpower
that nonunion firms had lacked in the
past. Now engineering and construction
firms like Brown & Root and Daniels
Construction, that had gotten their start
in the nonunion South, were outbidding
union contractors “no matter how well
established,” as IA General Vice President Frank Bonadio reported in 1973.
For men like Edward F. Carlough,
who came up at time when there was
no substitute for skilled union labor,
this development was hard to believe. A
strong defender of craft union principles
2
11
■
■
■
■
■
■
2005 National Labor College begins
awarding degrees to SMWIA members
2005 New HVAC certification program
offered to members
■
■
■
2006 Union Sportsmen’s Alliance created.
2006 Congress passes the Pension Protection
Act (PPA)
2006 Benchmark software developed to
complement BIM (Building Information
Modeling)
2006 Live Up to the Promise video calls for
standards of conduct
and jurisdiction rights, a staunch supporter of joint apprenticeship training
programs, and a firm believer in middleclass living standards for working-class
mechanics—including health, welfare,
and pension benefits—his experiences in
the Great Depression, the Second World
War, and the post-war expansion of the
sheet metal industry had shaped his
priorities and tempered his leadership.
But now that the game—and the players—had decisively changed, he decided
that he was not the right man to lead a
new generation of sheet metal workers
through the current crisis.
Instead he recommended that his son,
Edward J. Carlough, chart a new course
for the union. Organizing director since
1960, young Carlough had proven to be
fearless in the field and tireless in the office, setting high standards for well-organized, aggressive campaigns that brought
large manufacturers like Carrier and
GE-Hot Point into the SMWIA fold.
In fact, when he took over as General
President in 1970, the union counted
12 2
2006 Benchmark BIM training software
initiative launched
2006 UTU re-affiliates with AFL-CIO
2007 2007 Global financial crisis
■
2008 SMWIA adopts Code of Excellence.
■
■
2007 SMWIA-UTU (SMART) merger
agreement negotiated, approved by
SMWIA GEC, ratified by UTU membership
■
■
■
2009 Recognizing the future impact of green
technologies, the SMWIA joins the BlueGreen Alliance.
2009 Code of Excellence endorsed by
SMWIA and SMACNA
over 150,000 members—a 35% increase
since 1962.
With long hair and “mod” clothes, as
the Washington Post reported, Edward J.
Carlough was closer in age to the membership than he was to other building
trades leaders. In fact, at age 37, he was
one of the youngest union presidents
around. But that was an asset, as far as
he could see, and proof that the IA was
determined to change with the times.
“I’m not going to minimize the problems that … all of us have to face,” he
told delegates to the 1970 convention,
“problems in organizing, in jurisdiction, problems with the government,
the problems of change, which I think
is going to be particularly difficult in
the days ahead. … We not only have to
educate [our members] in the skills of
the trade,” he said, “we have to educate
their hearts and their minds in the feeling of the trade union movement and
our union in particular.”
And that’s what Carlough set out
to do. A visionary when it came to
■
■
■
2010
2011 Merger of the United Transportation
Union into the SMWIA confirmed by
arbitration to form the International
Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and
Transportation Workers (SMART)
2012 World population reaches 7 billion
2012 SMART joins massive labor and
progressive community actions against
multi-state attacks on Workers’ Rights
2012 Workers’ Rights attacked in several states
developing programs and policies, he was
determined to improve training, cut crew
costs without cutting wage rates, and
generally make the union more valuable to the members and the members
more valuable to the industry. But as he
and the IA leaders who followed him—
Arthur Moore, Michael Sullivan, and
Joseph Nigro—would learn over time,
defeating nonunion competition requires
change from the bottom up as well as the
top down.
If the SMWIA hoped to move forward
in the future, it would have to resolve
some longstanding issues that were as old
as the union itself: the conflict between
local union autonomy and IA authority;
the reluctance of some local unions and
contractors to grow the membership and
expand their business; the difficulty of
keeping up with an ever-changing social,
technological, and political world; and
the pressing economic requirement to
demonstrate every day that well-trained,
well-paid, productive SMWIA members
add value to the job. 2
Go to SMART125.org to follow the year-long commemoration of this anniversary.
FOCUS on FuNds
FUNDS UPdate
THE COMBINED NEWSLET TER FOR ITI, SMOHIT AND NEMIC
In this issue...
Volume 7, No. 1 · WINTER 2013
Chronic disease among
construction workers . . . . 2
ITI goes back
to basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Details on 2013
TABB Conference . . . . . . 8
ITI’s Benchmark™
& SMWIA Skills
Integral to Successful Debut of Formula One Track in Texas
Winter 2013 1
January/February 2013
19
FOCUS on FuNds
FUNDS UPdate
Volume 7, Number 1
FUNDS UPdate is the combined
newsletter for the International Training
Institute, Sheet Metal Occupational
Health Institute Trust and the National
Energy Management Institute Committee
8403 Arlington Blvd.
Suite 100
Fairfax, VA 23031
703-739-7200
safety matters
Researchers Say OSHA Understates Fall Accidents
C
omparing emergency
room statistics against
OSHA estimates of
non-fatal fall-related construcAssistant to the General President Marc
tion injuries, researchers for
Norberg has been assigned to oversee
the Center for Construction
operations of SMOHIT on an interim basis
Research and Training (CPWR)
until a permanent director is named.
found an anomaly: while the
A 37-year veteran of the trade, Marc
Bureau of Labor Statistics was
previously served as Business Manager
reporting such injuries declining
of Wisconsin Local 18.
emergency room data showed an
increase. The Labor Department
relies on estimates based on representative employer reports; emergency room admissions reflect actual data.
The study looked at the construction industry over a seven-year period—1998
through 2005. The research team determined that workers age 24 and younger
had a fall injury rate twice that of those over 45, but workers over 50 suffered more
serious injuries and a higher proportion of fractures from falls.
The study team recommends expanded enforcement of fall prevention regulation and calls on the industry to work harder to “design out” hazards that lead
to fall accidents. ■
MEET MARC NORBERG
Construction Workers Experience Higher Rates of Chronic Disease
C
onstruction workers are
more likely to develop
chronic and debilitating
diseases than their white-collar counterparts. Arthritis, high blood pressure, heart problems and diabetes
were the most frequently diagnosed
diseases when researchers looked at
the problem in 1998. Ten years later,
very little had changed.
Researchers found that chronic
diseases, along with back problems,
functional limitations, disability and
work-related injuries are evident
among all workers, but appear to be
a major reason why nearly 36% of all
construction workers said that health
problems limit their ability to work.
Workers over 50 in all occupations
say that they have difficulty with four
functional tasks: stooping/kneeling/
crouching, reaching/arm extension,
pushing or pulling large objects, and
lifting/carrying 10 lbs. ■
SMOHIT Trustees
Robert Payne
SMOHIT Trustee
Business Manager
Local Union 441
Mobile, AL
Darrin Putman
SMOHIT Trustee
Jack's Mechanical
Albuquerque, NM
Norm Whiteman
SMOHIT Trustee
Business Manager
Local Union 68
Dallas, TX
Kevin Jones
Richards Sheet Metal
Works Inc.
Ogden, UT
2 FUNDS UPdate
20
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
FOCUS on FuNds
By Charles Austin, SMOHIT Industrial Hygienist
Prevention Through Design
It’s a fairly logical principal: If you’re designing a tool, why not make sure that it not only
does what it is supposed to do (i.e., a wrench that turns a bolt), but also that the person who
uses that tool doesn’t get injured in the process.
Q: Prevention through design seems to have
widespread applications in virtually every
human endeavor. How is it evolving in the construction industry?
A: As a concept, safety and health is like apple pie—who would
be against it? Architects, engineers, planners, contractors,
developers, and union workers would naturally agree that if you
can fix hazards before they get into a blueprint, you’re making a contribution to better living. You can take this concept in
hundreds of different directions, but one of the most practical
that we’ve seen is the Sustainable Construction Health and
Safety rating system designed by researchers at the University
of South Carolina under a NIOSH grant. SCHS scores various
steps taken by stakeholders to make a construction project
safer regardless of size, type, location or scope.
Q: How does the system work?
A: SCHS lists 50 health and safety factors organized into 13
categories and gives a numerical credit to each one. The value
of the total of all credits adds up to 100 and earns the project 5
stars—the highest possible score. In order to earn at least one
star—a project must tally 25 points, meaning that it fulfills all
required elements, but none of the elective elements.
safety matters
Q&A corner
was held for all workers on the site. In other words, lots of common sense steps in a coordinated plan, organized toward the
goal of keeping workers on the project safe and healthy.
Q: It all seems so logical, why wouldn’t everyone
approach construction the same way?
A: It’s logical and more economical to design hazards out of a
job way ahead of time, but it’s not necessarily easy. This kind of
commitment to sustainable health and safety requires planning and coordination ahead of time. Too often, contractors
and developers might just dismiss that step as an unnecessary
delay and an extravagance, but in the long run, as all the case
studies prove, it’s just smarter business and more profitable to
be safe.
Yet, some organizations have pushed back against the notion
of designing hazards out fearing that if they accept the challenge they might also be accepting the legal responsibility if
that effort somehow backfires and someone gets hurt anyway.
That’s a resistance that will no doubt go away when people
become more confident of the concept.
For more information about Prevention Through Design, see:
www.designforconstructionsafety.org. ■
Q: Aside from pride what does getting a high
score mean for a project?
A: A good safety sustainability score translates into lower insurance costs and better profit margins because there will be less
lost time injuries. Consistently maintaining high safety sustainability can enable a contractor to be pre-qualified for future bids.
Q: What are some of the ways that a development
team or a contractor can earn a higher rating.
A: One case study shows that the use of Building Information Management, such as SMWIA’s trademarked Benchmark
software, boosts safety because it eliminates the need to make
design changes in the field where moving ductwork to avoid
wiring, for example, might cause confusion and lead unnecessary hazards or even accidents. This particular project involved
miles of underground conduit, deep trenches and extensive
mechanical utilities. In that same case study, the construction
team required each sub to submit a site-specific safety plan
ahead of time. Workers performed stretch and flex exercises
before heading to their tasks and a project safety orientation
Winter 2013 3
January/February 2013
21
iTi Quarterly
FOCUS on FuNds
ITI Quarterly
BACK TO BASICS FOR ITI
Concentrating on Instruction Quality in the Year Ahead
T
Although some new instructors already have basic comhe latest text books, newest technology, state of
puter skills, many do not, Lawrence pointed out, adding:
the art classrooms, laboratories equipped with real
world products, bright students…These are all key
“Even those that do have familiarity with the basics usually
need to work with Total Track a bit to get comfortable
requirements for SMWIA apprentice training, but the
most important ingredient is the classroom instructor—an with using it.”
experienced professional in the trade who can inspire and
Similarly, the format for the next CPI course scheduled
motivate apprentices to grasp complex concepts and work for late September 2013 has been significantly revised,
although the topics remain the same as always—legal
independently to put those concepts into practice.
obligations, proper
The International
training protocols,
Training Institute
the overall curricuhas dedicated 2013
lum and training
to tune up instruc“It’s what you learn after you know it all
objectives. But
tor quality and get
that makes a difference.” — HARRY TRUMAN
classes will break
back to the basics,
out into workshops
enabling instructors
with regional coorand coordinators to
dinators acting as
sharpen their skills
facilitators for the JATCs in their respective regions, Lawto meet the challenges that lie ahead. The focal point for
rence explained. “The idea is to be interactive and hands
that effort was initially rolled out at the new instructor
training last November where, as curriculum development on for all the participants,” he said.
“We have abandoned the old lecture model. We have
specialist Larry Lawrence described it, “we added a full
changed everything, using breakout sessions to address
day and one-half to the program.” He said the expansion
problems and then we come back together to the big
was necessary to provide more computer skills. “If ITI is
group to discuss possible solutions. It’s a format that
pushing JATCs to embrace the digital age, we need to
reinforces learning because the participants are effectively
make sure new instructors are conversant with Microsoft
teaching themselves.”
Word and the use of Powerpoint.”
Last June, 74 newlyminted JATC instructors
completed ITI's Instructor
Training Course 101
conducted at Las Vegas
Local 88's facilities.
4 FUNDSUPdate
FUNDS UPdate
22
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
FOCUS on FuNds
In 2012, ITI put the final touches
on its entire collection of training
materials—a learning library that
includes 28 texts and DVD packages
covering every sheet metal specialty,
the latest instruction materials for
green and LEED construction, and
a comprehensive software suite for
Building Information Modeling (BIM).
“We want to use this year to polish up the skills of instructors and
coordinators to ensure they are well
grounded in teaching technique and
completely familiar with the tools at
their disposal,” said ITI Administrator
James Shoulders.
The New Coordinators’ Training Workshop set for September 24
through the 28th in Las Vegas will
follow the same format. The annual
Continuing Professional Instruction
(CPI) program begins on September
29th running through October 2nd in
St. Louis, hosted by Local 36. “Scheduling courses back-to-back like this is
not ideal, but we had the opportunity
to showcase the local’s new green
building on these dates and that’s just
too good an experience to pass up,”
Lawrence said. ■
❱ Save the Dates
September 24, 2013 thru
September 28 — LAS VEGAS, NV
New Coordinator
Workshop (For coordinators
and instructors appointed within
the past 5 years.)
September 29, 2013 thru
October 2 — ST. LOUIS, MO
Continuing Professional
Instruction (CPI)
(For JATC members, coordinators
and instructors.)
iTi Quarterly
SMWIA members from Austin Local 67 installed 350,000
pounds of ductwork and 60 rooftop units in the massive
new Circuit of the Americas Formula 1 racetrack facility
which began operation last Fall.
PHOTO CREDIT:
Tiffanie Bond, Imagine Marketing
ITI’s Benchmark™
& SMWIA Skills
Integral to Successful Debut
of Formula One Track in Texas
U
nion sheet metal workers from the Porter Company—
located just outside of Austin, TX—designed an HVAC
system to keep race fans, drivers and crew members comfortable during Grand Prix races held at the new Circuit of the Americas Formula 1 racetrack. The design of the ductwork employed the
ITI’s Benchmark building information modeling (BIM) Training
software allowing certified Porter Company employees to spot problems in the design and fix them before the ductwork was fabricated
and installed.
The facility includes a 40,000-square-foot media/conference
center; a three-level, 270,000-square-foot pit building that can
accommodate 5,000 people; a three-story permanent grandstand;
a 5,000-square-foot medical center with helicopter landing area,
enclosed ambulance bay and outdoor chemical shower; and a live
outdoor music entertainment area.
Approximately 36 sheet metal workers from Austin Local 67
installed 350,000 pounds of ductwork along with 20 rooftop air
conditioning units on the pit building, which includes a garage
area and suites and lounges for crews and racers; 40 rooftop units
at the grandstand, of which three floors include a kitchen area,
lounge and bar, and VIP suites; and the roof support structure on
the media center. ■
Winter 2013 5
January/February 2013
23
iTi Quarterly
FOCUS on FuNds
ITI’s COURSE CATALOG
One of ITI’s missions is to provide quality training programs to expand the skills of its members. ITI’s current and open
courses are listed below. If you are uncertain about eligibility, please do not to hesitate to call Sue Burke at 703-739-7200,
ext 631. Instructor Training Programs have limited seating available. Please make your reservations early.
Online Training – Learning Portal
COURSE
LOCATION
DATES
DEADLINE
Supervisory Training
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
Fire Life Safety Level One Technician
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
Foreman Training
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
Fitting Input Tool Training
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
Fire Life Safety Level Two Technician
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
JAC/JATC Trustee Awareness
Learning Portal
Open Enrollment
Open Enrollment
DEADLINE
Instructor Training Program – Professional Development
COURSE
LOCATION
DATES
Instructor Development 201/301/401 Electives
Las Vegas, NV
3/10/2013 – 3/16/2013
1/20/2013
Instructor Development 101
Las Vegas, NV
6/2/2013 – 6/9/2013
4/14/2013
New Coordinator Workshop
Las Vegas, NV
9/24/2013 – 9/28/2013
8/6/2013
Continuing Professional Instruction
St. Louis, MO
9/29/2013 – 10/2/2013
8/12/2013
COURSE
LOCATION
DATES
DEADLINE
TAB Teachers and Teaching
Las Vegas, NV
4/14/2013 – 4/20/2013
2/24/2013
TAB Learners and Learning
Las Vegas, NV
4/14/2013 – 4/20/2013
2/24/2013
Fire Life Safety Level 1 and Level 2 Instructor
Las Vegas, NV
4/28/2013 – 5/4/2013
3/10/2013
Benchmark Fabrication/Administration/Fitting Input Educator and Inspector
Las Vegas, NV
6/17/2013 – 6/21/2013
3/25/2013
Instructor Training Program – Technical Classes
Residential Instructor Training
Las Vegas, NV
5/19/2013 – 5/25/2013
3/31/2013
Benchmark Estimation/Administration/Educator and Inspector
Las Vegas, NV
6/24/2013 – 6/28/2013
4/1/2013
4/15/2013
Benchmark Draft/Administration/Fitting Input Educator and Inspector
Las Vegas, NV
7/8/2013 – 7/12/2013
OSHA 500
Las Vegas, NV
7/10/2013 – 7/19/2013
4/17/2013
OSHA 502
Las Vegas, NV
7/15/2013 – 7/19/2013
4/22/2013
Detailing Curriculum for Instructors
Las Vegas, NV
7/15/2013 – 7/19/2013
4/22/2013
Benchmark Project Management/Total Station/
Admin./Field Install. Ed. and Inspector
Las Vegas, NV
7/22/2013 – 7/26/2013
4/29/2013
Architectural Instructor Training
Las Vegas, NV
8/18/2013 – 8/24/2013
6/30/2013
Industrial 2
Las Vegas, NV
11/3/2013 – 11/9/2013
9/15/2013
Industrial 1
Las Vegas, NV
11/3/2013 – 11/9/2013
9/15/2013
COURSE
LOCATION
DATES
DEADLINE
Structural Welding
Las Vegas, NV
2/3/2013 – 2/9/2013
1/16/2013
Test Supervisor Instructor Training
Las Vegas, NV
8/18/2013 – 8/24/2013
6/30/2013
Welding Supervisor Instructor Training
Las Vegas, NV
10/6/2013 – 10/12/2013
8/18/2013
Advanced Welding Technologies
Las Vegas, NV
12/8/2013 – 12/14/2013
10/20/2013
COURSE
LOCATION
DATES
DEADLINE
Benchmark Draft
1250 Petaluma Blvd.
North Petaluma, CA 94952
1/23/2013 – 1/28/2013
1/20/2013
Advanced Service Technician
Las Vegas, NV
4/14/2013 – 4/20/2013
2/24/2013
Instructor Training – Welding Classes
Technical Training
Oil/Hydronics Technician
Las Vegas, NV
9/22/2013 – 9/28/2013
8/4/2013
Direct Digital Controls
Las Vegas, NV
11/17/2013 – 11/23/2013
9/29/2013
6 FUNDS UPdate
24
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
FOCUS on FuNds
Mid Atlantic SMACNA Briefs Building Pros,
Code Officials on Fire Life Safety
MEET
JIM PAGE
n early December 2012, the
SMACNA Mid-Atlantic Chapter
sponsored a professional educational seminar for the National Capital
Chapter of ASHRAE on the subject
of Fire Life Safety. Speakers included
TABB’s John Hamilton, SMACNA’s Eli
Howard, and Metro Test & Balance
and SMACNA Mid-Atlantic Chapter
President Frank Battaglino. The audience of about fifty people included
code enforcement officials, contractors, company owners, architects and
engineers from the Washington D.C.
metro area.
The seminar included a hands-on
display, built by Battaglino’s company, showing various types of smoke
and fire dampers. ASHRAE Program
Chairman Omar Hawit said, “The
presentation was very well received.
The speakers were able to cover a lot
of ground and brought some great
insight to attendees.”
“The display was especially impressive, and the animated style of the
presentations kept the audience
thoroughly engaged. We look forward
to future opportunities to work with
SMACNA to further education in our
ASHRAE chapter,” Hawit continued.
Even after the program concluded,
participants gathered around the
damper display asking questions and
examining how the different types of
dampers work.
According to Bernie Brill, SMACNA
Mid-Atlantic Chapter Executive Director, “the interest in the program has
been amazing.”
He described the equipment display
built by Battaglino’s company as “a
real hit, so much so that this is the
second one he has built. The first one
was donated to the Maryland Fire and
Training Institute for use in their training programs.” After that experience,
im Page is directing
NEMIC’s activities
from its offices in Fairfax, Virginia. Jim hails from
Long Beach, California.
He is a member of SMWIA
Local 105. Jim comes to
NEMIC after serving five
years on the ITI staff as their
TAB specialist. Jim has been
supervising the construction
and retrofit of JATC testing
and balancing labs across
the country, that seek to be
distinguished as certified
TAB testing centers for the
ITI. One of the most recent
locations to gain TAB testing
certification was in Local
19’s Philadelphia JATC.
Jim started his apprenticeship in sheet metal in
1980. He worked in fabrication, HVAC installation and
TAB service before moving
to a small, independent TAB
firm in 1990. He helped
grow the firm to one of the
largest in the Los Angeles
area. In 2007 he was asked
to join ITI staff.
“We are working in a
construction and building
maintenance environment,
where we must assist our
members in staying current
with today’s industry needs.
The challenge is improving
our members’ skill sets and
putting them in a position to be competitive in a
fast changing construction
market. To help our members with future employment
we use certifications as the
benchmark to meet the need
of our customers.” ■
I
January/February 2013
Brill said, “Frank is determined that this
one isn’t going anywhere.”
Members of the SMACNA MidAtlantic Chapter have been in talks
with Charles E. Altizer, Virginia’s Fire
Marshall, as well as representatives
from the Marriott Corporation to hold
similar programs. They will be conducting a seminar for the Fairfax County,
Virginia Fire Marshals and code officials in February. ■
FROM TOP: TABB’s John Hamilton reviews the
importance of fire life safety devices to construction stakeholders. Frank Battaglino, who heads
the Mid-Atlantic SMACNA Chapter, explains the
function of various fire life safety devices using
the display built by his company, Metro Test and
Balance. Eli Howard of SMACNA describes how
smoke dampers and other devices comply with
building code safety requirements.
J
NEMIC News
News
Winter 2013 7
25
2013 TABB Conference
Set for Las Vegas, May 19 – 24
L
Visit NEMIONLINE.ORG For Details
on NEMI and Its Activities
V
isit the NEMI Website
(nemionling.org) for
up-to-date information and schedules. Among the
valuable resources on that site,
readers will find:
• Two HVAC Fire Life Safety videos
entitled “Reducing the Risk”,
which addresses the need for
proper inspection of smoke and
fire dampers by ICB Certified HVAC
Fire Life Safety Level 1 Technicians,
and “Controlling Smoke” which
addresses the importance of hiring
ICB Certified HVAC Fire Life Safety
Level 2 Technicians to keep stairwell
pressurization fans operating at
optimal levels are now available for
viewing on YouTube.
• Information on training available
via NEMI to eligible individuals who
want to enhance their skills
• A repository of technical information,
including reports by the National
Center for Energy Management and
Building Technologies. These reports
are in the Resources
• Examples of inspection labels to be
applied upon completion of inspection and testing of smoke and fire
dampers. (These samples are in
Microsoft Word to enable eligible
companies to incorporate contact
information on the inspection labels.
• A listing of NEMI marketing materials.
• Take the proportional balancing
challenge—an interactive exercise
that includes a copy of construction
plans and rules of the game.
Individuals searching for certification opportunities, follow
the prompts to be connected to
the website of the International
Certification Board for the Sheet
Metal Industry. ■
E
M
IE
S
CERTIFY
N
as Vegas’s South Point Casino and Hotel will be the site of
the 2013 TABB Conference, May 19-24, 2013. Built around
the premise that skill certification is both an opportunity and
a necessity in today’s hypercompetitive markets, NEMI is offering
supervisor classes in Commissioning, HVAC Fire Life Safety Levels
1 and 2, Indoor Air Quality, Sound and Vibration, and Testing,
Adjusting and Balancing. Additionally, planners have set aside time
for a session specifically for TABB affiliates and a roundtable discussion with ICB/TABB leadership.
Simultaneously, ITI will produce classes for technicians in energy
audit and fume hood performance testing. ICB/TABB will conduct
certification exams in all the areas listed above at the conclusion of
each class presentation.
In addition to the supervisor and technician classes, the conference will feature a number of seminars for attendees. Topics for the
seminars are still under development. Contractors attending the
conference will also have a chance to participate in a round table
discussion and there will be a meeting for TABB affiliates to round
out the conference.
Registration for the conference will open in February and more
information will be available on the www.tabbcertified.org and www.
icbcertified.org websites. ■
A
NEMIC News
FOCUS on FuNds
IC
W E B I NA R S
ER
Monthly Webinars
Showcase ICB/
TABB Certifications
A
ttention: Coordinators, Business Managers, Contractors.
Welcome to Certify U—
NEMIC’s new webinar series for Business Managers, Coordinators and
Contractors to aid in understanding
the value of certifications in ICB/
TABB specialties. The first webinar
took place on January 17 dealing with
Fire Life Safety 1.
Remaining Schedule
(all times are noon – 1 p.m., Eastern)
Feb. 21
March 21
April 18
May 9
June 20
Fire Life Safety 2
TAB
Fume Hoods
Energy Audit
Commissioning, IAQ,
Sound & Vibration
Each session agenda will follow the
same format, that is:
• Introduce the topic and brief
participants on the background
of presenters;
• Analyze job tasks and knowledge
base requirements;
• Explain who can become certified in the given specialty;
• Describe the path to certification
training and testing; and
• Review career opportunities.
The final segment of each session will be devoted to questions and
answers. ■
8 FUNDS UPdate
26
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
FOCUS on FuNds
LAWSUITS FILED NOVEMBER 2012 – DECEMBER 2012
LOCAL
EMPLOYER
SUIT FILED
MONTHS REFERRED
ESTIMATED AMOUNT DUE
FOR MONTHS REFERRED
017
COMMONWEALTH VENTILATION SYSTEMS, INC
HINGHAM, PA
11/2/12
4/2012-8/2012
$50,984.06
018
MONROE MECHANICAL, LLC1 2
MONROE, WI
12/10/12
7/2010-8/2012
$56,808.62
027
kOLBE CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURAL
SHEET METAL, LLC D/B/A
kOLBE’S CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURAL SHEET METAL, LLC
EGG HARBOR CITY, NJ
11/6/12
1/2012-8/2012
$24,977.48
028
CM AIR CONDITIONING CONTRACTORS, INC and
MATTHEW HUGHES as an individual
WOODSIDE, NY
11/16/12
6/2012-10/2012
$52,341.80
028
CONTRACTOR’S SHEET METAL WORkS, INC and
FRANk BINDEL as an individual
LONG ISLAND CITY, NY
12/26/12
2/2012-3/2012
$7,059.11
054
TRINITY MECHANICAL, LLC D/B/A
TRINITY INDUSTRIAL SERVICES, LLC
12/5/12
9/2011-10/2012
$4,412.44
066
ARCHITECTURAL METAL WORkS, INC
WILSONVILLE, OR
11/30/12
2/2011-12/2011
$49,521.57
073
CROSE COMPANY RAY-LIN, LLC
LAkE BLUFF, IL
12/10/12
8/2012-10/2012
$10,379.18
100
R.E.L. SCHNEIDER CO., INC1 2
BALTIMORE, MD
11/20/12
1/2011-9/2012
$7,746.19
104
A QUALITY HEATING & AIR, INC1
BRENTWOOD, CA
11/2/12
COMPEL AUDIT
104
ALLEN-SIMMONS HEATING & SHEET METAL CO1
SUISON CITY, CA
12/3/12
8/2012-9/2012
104
BAY AREA SHEET METAL SPECIALTIES, INC1
SAN JOSE, CA
11/2/12
COMPEL AUDIT
104
MCCLANAHAN INC D/B/A
HARTMANAIRE1
TEMPLE CITY, CA
12/3/12
8/2012
$155.80
104
ORSON MECHANICAL CO. INC1
UNION CITY, CA
12/14/12
8/2012-10/2012
$558.45
104
PENINSULA AIR CONDITIONING, INC1
REDWOOD CITY, CA
12/3/12
7/2012-9/2012
UNkNOWN
104
WESTERN PLUMBING & HEATING COMPANY1
SAN FRANCISCO, CA
12/14/12
9/2012-10/2012
UNkNOWN
UNkNOWN
1. Joint collections with local
2. Includes audit discovery hours
January/February 2013
27
LOCAL NeWS
Local 20 Honors First Female Apprentice
and Journeywoman’s Retirement,
Members’ Service, Apprentice Graduation
General President Emeritus Michael J. Sullivan (left) and local
20 retiree Maribeth Bender at their local 20 Indianapolis Area
Retirees Christmas luncheon, held Wednesday, December
12, 2012, in Indianapolis. During Sullivan’s tenure as Business
Manager, Financial Secretary/Treasurer of local 20, Maribeth
was the first female to be accepted into the Apprenticeship
Program. After serving her Apprenticeship from March 1979
to July 1983 in then local 41 (now local 20), Maribeth became
a journeyman in 1983. She remained working as a journeyman
sheet metal worker until her recent retirement from local 20 in
September 2012. Sullivan and all of local 20 are proud of Maribeth’s achievement of becoming the first female journeyman to
retire from local 20. Congratulations, Maribeth!
Local 20 Honorees
25 YeAR HONOReeS
Front row, left to right, honorees Scott Koning, David Hankins, Richard
Havlin, Michael Harris, Jim Hampton Jr., Deb Brackemyre, Michael
Bratt,Bryan Bowman, and thomas akers Jr. Second row, left to right,
honorees allen Yagle, Chris Renholzberger, Chris Perkon, Gary
O’Connor, leslie lester, Brett lennon, David Johansen, David Holzinger,
and Chris Husted. third row, left to right, Business Manager Scott Parks,
honorees nick West and Ray Smith, Business Representative Gary
Pierson, honorees Brian Sheilds, Michael Reese, and Randall taylor,
and Business Representatives Jason Benson and trent todd.
40 YeAR HONOReeS
Front row, left to right, honoree thomas Dwyer, Business Manager
Scott Parks, honoree and Business Representative Gary Pierson, and
honorees Samuel Schaf, Ralph Shinn, Stephen Holzinger, edward
elsner, and lawrence Campbell. Back row, left to right, honoree Fred
Sturgill, and Business Representatives Jason Benson and trent todd.
50 YeAR HONOReeS
Front row, left to right, honorees larry Whyde, David Spaulding, Richard
Perkins Sr., John Perkon, Ronald Hyatt, William Germain, Rockne Curren,
and Michael Boylan. Back row, left to right, Business Manager Scott Parks,
Business Representatives trent todd, Jason Benson, and Gary Pierson, and
honorees John taylor and allan Snowball.
28
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
60 YeAR HONOReeS
Front row, left to right, honorees lester Bedell, Robert Winter, Fred
Green, Charles Phillips, Fred Vest Sr. and Kenneth Young. Back row,
left to right, Business Representative Gary Pierson, Business Manager
Scott Parks, and Business Representatives trent todd and Jason Benson.
70 YeAR HONOReeS
70-year honoree Frank
J. Striby with his
proud family. Front
row, left to right,
grandson Richard
l. Striby, honoree
Frank J. Striby, and
grandson Ryan Striby
and his wife, Debra.
Back row, left to
right, Mona Striby
and her husband,
son John Striby, son
Christopher Striby,
and son Richard J. Striby and his wife, linda. Sadly,
Brother Striby passed away on January 13, 2013, just
before this issue went to press. We offer our condolences to all the Striby family.
GRAdUATiNG APPReNTiCeS (iNdY AReA)
indianapolis area graduating apprentices. Front row, left to right,
instructor Duane Smith, graduate nathan Rinehart, JatC Coordinator
tim Myres, and graduates Jeramie Jones, Justin imlay, Zach Hankins,
luis Gonzalez, nathan easterday, and Justin Cruse. Second row, left
to right, JatC Committee Member nick West, and graduates Brandon
Meek, David Wilson, Christopher Volk, Matthew Slinker, Jason Rogers,
Craig Roudebush, Christopher Penley, and Kyle Mills. Back row, left to
right, JatC Committee Member Hank Meyers, instructor Joe Potesta,
JatC Committee Member Joseph lansdell, Business Representative
Jason Benson, and Business Manager J. Scott Parks.
GRAdUATiNG APPReNTiCeS (LAFAYeTTe AReA)
lafayette area graduating apprentices. Front row, left to right,
instructor Duane Smith, graduates Bryan locker and Justin Geisler, and
apprenticeship Coordinator tim Myres. Back row, left to right, Business
Representative eric Clawson, executive Board Member Scott Koning,
JatC Committee Member Shane Hegg, instructor Joe Potesta, and
Business Manager Scott Parks.
Local 33 Presents Service Awards
Cleveland District retirees
andre Gene Robinson and
Joseph Milkovich receive their
50-Year Service awards. also
pictured, Financial Secretarytreasurer tom Wiant, Retirees’
Club President Dave Gaeta,
and Business Manager
Michael Coleman.
January/February 2013
Cleveland District retirees
Charles Mittelstaedt, Richard
east, and Robert Heim receive
their 60-Year Service awards. also pictured, Financial
Secretary-treasurer tom
Wiant, Retirees’ Club President
Dave Gaeta, and Business
Manager Michael Coleman.
left to right, Financial
Secretary-treasurer tom
Wiant, Business Manager
Mike Coleman, 50-year
honoree thomas W. Voltz,
and Business Representative
Dave larson.
left to right, Financial
Secretary-treasurer tom
Wiant, Business Manager
Mike Coleman, 25-year
honoree James P. Hamm,
and Business Representative
Dave larson.
29
Local 8 Honors Service
edMONTON
left to right, 30-year honoree Bobby Gallant, Business Manager Doug Worobetz, 30-year honorees Mike Chellew and Johann lobner, 40-year
honoree Stan lockett, Business agent Steve Satter, 35-year honoree Ken Maclennan, and 40-year honoree Pierre tetrault.
CALGARY
left to right, Business Representative Dan Palmerchuk, Business
Manager Doug Worobetz, 40-year honoree Guy Knappe, and
Business Representative Steve Satter.
FORT MCMURRAY
left to right, Business Representative Steve Satter, 35-year honoree Gary
Summers, Business Manager Doug Worobetz, Business Representative
Dan Palmerchuk, and Recording Secretary larry ingram.
Red deeR
left to right, Business Representative Dan Palmerchuk, Business
Manager Doug Worobetz, retired Business agent and honoree J. Peter
Wyatt, and Business Representative Steve Satter.
left to right, Business Representative Steve Satter, 35-year honoree
Richard tomanek, 50-year honoree Bob Martin, and Business
Manager Doug Worobetz.
Local 54 Honors Service
left to right, Business Manager/Financial Secretarytreasurer Bill Kenyon, 25-year honorees Willie Martinez
and Bobby J. Sandidge, Jr., 50-year honoree Samuel
Davis, 40-year honorees David P. McCullough, Mauricio
G. lopez, and lawrence J. landry, and Business
Representative Kenneth Krustchinsky.
30
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
Local 36 Gives Back
to the St Louis Community
local 36 members—along with members of other labor
unions—took part in the renovation of the Arnold Food
Pantry and Thrift Store in Arnold, MO, this past December. In honor of organized labor’s contribution, one of the
pantry’s vans was permanently decorated with the logo
of every union that participated in the massive project.
The Jefferson County labor Club’s emblem is
displayed on the van in recognition of the $280,000 in
volunteer labor and donated materials that went into
the pantry and thrift store’s renovation.
“We have always made sure to be out front donating
our time to support local communities and the groups
that help their residents,” said David zimmermann,
local 36 Business Manager and SMART’s 5th General
Vice President.
“We could not be here today celebrating what we’ve
done without the labor guys and gals who stepped for-
ward,” said President of the Arnold Food Pantry Board
of Directors Roger Horn.
Building Trades local unions donated labor and
cash, and they coordinated donations of materials
from signatory employers to renovate a former warehouse distribution center as the new location for the
pantry and thrift store. Working with their signatory
contractors, local 36 donated nearly $43,000 worth
of new equipment to the food pantry, including two
new five-ton air-conditioning units and two 90%-efficiency furnaces and duct work—all in addition to their
donated labor.
The Arnold Food Pantry is the largest non-denominational food pantry in the St. louis area. It provides
food and personal care items to about 1,560 families a
week—all without any money from city, county, state,
or federal sources. ■
Local 565 Honors 25-Year Service Members
Wausau Banquet, november 3, 2012. left to right, President Randy
Kurth, honorees Peter Krause, Bruce Gunseor, Marvin Podgorskt, and
larry Sterzinger, and Business Manager Ray Ficken.
January/February 2013
Madison Banquet, november 10, 2012. Front row, left to right,
honorees Patti austin, Dale laube, Kevin nicholson, Dave Henning,
Rich Boldt, Kay tippet, Randy thayer, and Brad Hoffmaster. Back row,
left to right, Business Manager Ray Ficken, Business agent tim Sullivan,
President Randy Kurth, and honorees Mel troia, Kurt Kroll, Bruce
McCluskey, Dick Helley, tom Hefty, Kurt neumann, and Ron Hefty.
31
Local 49 Honors Service, Celebrates Recent Graduates
25-year honorees. left to right, Business Manager and Financial
Secretary/treasurer Vince alvarado, honorees W. Gary Gillespie and
lee Gutierrez, Business agent Richard espinosa, and President and
training Coordinator Jerry arms. not pictured: honorees Robert l.
Chavez and Gregorio Garcia, Jr.
40-year honorees. left to right, Business Manager and Financial
Secretary/treasurer Vince alvarado, honorees Waylen n. Riley, Joe.
S. March, Mark B. ellis, and Jack S. Martin, Business agent Richard
espinosa, and President and training Coordinator Jerry arms. not
pictured: honorees David Balderrama, Frank Johnston, Chester Riley, Jr.,
Raymundo Rincon, and Frenando Salas.
60-year honorees. left to right, Business Manager and Financial
Secretary/treasurer Vince alvarado, honoree Carlyle e. Hansen,
Business agent Richard espinosa, and President and training
Coordinator Jerry arms. not pictured: honorees Richard a. Dotson,
George F. Riley, and Fred H. Welsch.
2011 and 2012 apprentice graduates. left to right, Business Manager
and Financial Secretary/treasurer Vince alvarado, graduates Richard
P. Salazar, Kristopher Montano, Matthew allen, Bruce abeita, and
Cody Gonzalez, President and training Coordinator Jerry arms, and
Management trustee anthony e. Kocurek. not pictured: graduates
Manuel ayala, Kirk Barnard, erick Corona, erik Garcia, Patrick
Hatfield, Christopher Kinney, Jeremiah Manning, and Seth thomas.
Current and former JatC instructors. left to right, Business Manager and Financial Secretary/treasurer Vince alvarado, instructors eddie telles,
mark B. ellis, Ray Velarde, Karl R. Montano, and John C. Pennebaker, President and training Coordinator Jerry arms, instructors Kevin Hayes,
Robert Ryan, and John Pennebaker, and Business agent Richard espinosa.
32
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
Local 85 Member
earns Name of Hero
Wednesday, August 29, 2012, was just another day at work
for local 85 member Jeff Justus. As he made his way home
from a job he was working on at Georgia State University in
downtown Atlanta, Jeff came across a fiery crash on Interstate
85 that was a result of a wrong-way driver. Jeff thought and
moved quickly, grabbing the fire extinguisher from his company truck to try to extinguish the flames. While others helped
to contain the fire, Jeff pulled 62-year-old Gary Tucker to safety.
Following is an excerpt of an email from photographer
Jerry Quarles, who witnessed Jeff’s heroism:
It was deeply moving to witness these men,
strangers, immediately forming a cohesive
group with the selfless goal of rescuing
these two men from the mangled truck.
Companies spend untold amounts of money
each year in efforts to build teams within
their organizations. This handful of men did
it spontaneously and accomplished their goal
very quickly. A short 5 minutes from the
time Jeff is seen hoisting Mr. Tucker from his
truck, the cab of the truck became a burning
inferno. Had these rescuers waited for fire
and rescue personnel to arrive, both of the
innocent victims who were pulled from the
wreckage would have been burned alive.
Jeff has since visited Mr. Tucker at the hospital and joined his
family for dinner. Jeff has been getting to know Mr. Tucker’s
grateful family, a wife of 40 years, four grown children, and ten
grandchildren.
In fact, this is not Jeff’s first act of heroism. He pulled
someone from an overturned vehicle about six years ago, as
well. local 85 Business Manager Ron Whatley states, “I have
known Jeff since we were apprentices and I am honored to
have had the opportunity to contribute this story about a
truly humble, caring, and brave guy. This was just another
day on the job for Jeff Justus.”
We can all be proud of Brother Justus and hope that when
we see others in need, we, too, will lend a hand. ■
January/February 2013
33
Let Us Always Remember…
Local Union
& Address
Name
Age Date of Death
Local Union
& Address
Name
Age Date of Death
2-Kansas City, MO
2-Kansas City, MO
2-Kansas City, MO
2-Kansas City, MO
2-Kansas City, MO
3-Omaha, NE
3-Omaha, NE
4-Memphis, TN
5-East, TN
5-East, TN
5-East, TN
5-East, TN
5-East, TN
7-Lansing, MI
8-Alberta, Canada
Kemp, Donald
Kennedy, Elmer D
May, Stanley
Sprague III, Marshall
Wright, Neal E
Fratt, Roger V
Miles, Jr., Lowell
Martin, Charles L
Bell, Hugh N
Hinton, Annie R
Holbert, Dennis J
Malone, O D
Painter, Joseph A
Bauer, Wayne A
Pozniak, Edward A
86
86
89
20
80
68
86
75
71
65
53
78
32
87
74
11/23/2012
12/19/2012
11/18/2012
1/7/2013
11/24/2012
11/28/2012
12/8/2012
10/19/2012
11/11/2012
11/8/2012
10/12/2012
10/17/2012
10/17/2012
10/23/2012
10/26/2012
17-Eastern, MA
Winston, Robert
89
1/9/2012
17-Eastern, MA
Witonski, Boleslau
83
2/24/2012
18-State of WI
Batzler, Stephen J
54
11/5/2012
18-State of WI
Becht, Jr., Peter
85
11/24/2012
18-State of WI
Delvaux, Russell J
77
11/21/2012
18-State of WI
Harp, Richard D
69
8/21/2012
18-State of WI
Heimstead, William R
85
10/23/2012
18-State of WI
Katzner, Herbert H
77
11/4/2012
18-State of WI
Timmons, Bradley J
55
10/17/2012
18-State of WI
Traeger, Thomas C
66
9/24/2012
18-State of WI
Wirth, Gerald M
65
10/10/2012
19-Southeastern, PA
Green, Charles O
88
9/16/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Burr, Wilbert O
84
11/7/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Daugherty, Joe E
90
1/4/2013
20-Indianapolis, IN
Dilley, Larry E
76
10/30/2012
9-Denver, CO
9-Denver, CO
9-Denver, CO
9-Denver, CO
Aalbers, Marinus J
Beckman, Allen D
Cochran, James W
58
76
60
10/28/2012
9/26/2012
11/4/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Gensic, Steven J
88
12/15/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Husselman, Roger M
53
11/16/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Jones, Jack T
82
11/16/2012
Tucker, Donald R
Closmore, Louis L
Juelich, Richard J
Rush, Patrick M
Schendel, Larry E
Wild, Doug J
Kaliszewski, Thomas J
Shaffer, Thomas L
Theiss, Sr., Ronald C
Williams, Sr., George W
Bechtoldt, Raymond
Brower, Roger
McShane, William
Trayle, Raymond
Bamford, Mark H
Berard, Arthur
Breen, Charles J
Cormican, Francis C
Costello, Frederick E
Crowell, Donald
Cunningham, Douglas
Dahl, Joseph J
Delehanty, William
Doyle, Timothy E
Fitzpatrick, James S
Fraser, Donald
Grossi, Americo J
Johnson, Fonda L
Kelley, 4th, William H
Keogh, Robert C
Lepore, Leonard L
Logan, John
Masiello, Dominic
Phoenix, Raymond R
Robinson, Win
Shorter, Guy
Turmenne, Richard D
White, Gary D
74
90
93
60
67
69
82
49
65
85
90
66
92
92
50
89
63
88
98
91
86
79
85
43
34
43
88
60
69
77
73
85
87
72
74
83
64
54
10/22/2012
11/3/2012
11/29/2012
11/16/2012
11/18/2012
11/10/2012
11/21/2012
11/18/2012
11/12/2012
10/30/2012
11/19/2012
11/16/2012
12/9/2012
12/14/2012
4/6/2012
8/23/2012
12/13/2012
12/19/2012
12/2/2012
10/20/2011
5/17/2012
2/14/2012
8/4/2011
9/17/2012
11/12/2012
12/15/2012
12/12/2012
12/13/2012
6/4/2012
12/6/2012
12/8/2012
11/16/2012
4/10/2012
11/13/2012
6/30/2012
8/24/2012
11/22/2012
10/31/2011
20-Indianapolis, IN
O’Dell, John W
74
11/28/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Terrell, Paul J
86
10/2/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Wicks, Mark A
51
11/26/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Williams, Charles R
82
11/10/2012
20-Indianapolis, IN
Wojciechowski, Dennis G
65
11/29/2012
10-Maplewood, MN
10-Maplewood, MN
10-Maplewood, MN
10-Maplewood, MN
10-Maplewood, MN
12-Southwestern, PA
12-Southwestern, PA
12-Southwestern, PA
12-Southwestern, PA
16-Portland, OR
16-Portland, OR
16-Portland, OR
16-Portland, OR
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
17-Eastern, MA
34
22-Union, Morris, Somerset/Sussex, NJ Macanka, Stanley E
68
1/22/2012
24-Southern, OH
83
11/5/2012
Belford, Lawrence
24-Southern, OH
Berry, Linda
70
10/25/2012
24-Southern, OH
Campbell, Earl K
65
10/29/2012
24-Southern, OH
Cooley, John T
59
11/17/2012
24-Southern, OH
Defelice, Frank
92
10/13/2012
24-Southern, OH
Eby, Harold H
96
10/14/2012
24-Southern, OH
Kollie, Komehn
55
10/15/2012
24-Southern, OH
Osborne, John D
73
10/10/2012
30-Toronto, Ont. Canada
Campoli, Guido
47
1/4/2013
30-Toronto, Ont. Canada
Mota, Rui P
46
11/28/2012
30-Toronto, Ont. Canada
Roberts, Dennis
88
1/7/2013
30-Toronto, Ont. Canada
Walker, Russell L
73
11/19/2012
32-Southern, FL
Marr, Fred G
93
12/17/2012
33-OH & WV
Eary, Edgar L
73
11/29/2012
33-OH & WV
Gelety, Michael
87
11/7/2012
33-OH & WV
Laux, James A
87
10/19/2012
33-OH & WV
Mason, Robert E
91
11/16/2012
33-OH & WV
Shaffer, Jr., Richard E
44
11/18/2012
33-OH & WV
Shannon, Elwood D
81
10/24/2012
33-OH & WV
Sikon, Jr., John S
64
10/16/2012
36-St. Louis, MO
Johnston, Willard E
75
10/23/2012
36-St. Louis, MO
Puckett, Donald D
82
10/20/2012
36-St. Louis, MO
Schroeder, Frederick W
75
11/3/2012
36-St. Louis, MO
Smith, Joel L
87
10/14/2012
36-St. Louis, MO
Woods, Billy D
88
10/24/2012
38-S.E., NY & Western, CT
Bedard, Roland
86
11/12/2012
38-S.E., NY & Western, CT
Dutra, Manuel
83
11/28/2012
38-S.E., NY & Western, CT
Kozlowski, Stanley
91
10/1/2012
38-S.E., NY & Western, CT
Scalzo, Richard
76
12/29/2012
45-Des Moines, IA
Antill, James H
70
12/12/2012
45-Des Moines, IA
Bever, Theodore G
87
11/9/2012
45-Des Moines, IA
Schnathorst, Leonard L
50
12/18/2012
The Members’ Journal|www.smart-union.org
Let Us Always Remember…
Local Union
& Address
Name
Age Date of Death
Local Union
& Address
Name
Age
Date of Death
12/5/2011
47-Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Doran, Dave
49
8/28/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Wiedbusch, Anthony J
77
48-Birmingham, AL
Harris, Sidney C
86
11/17/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Wilkins, Jr., Walter H
89
9/10/2011
49-Albuquerque, NM
Trottier, Roland A
89
11/5/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Woodruff, Scot A
53
11/18/2011
54-Houston, TX
Fields, William E
75
10/27/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Allen, Jr., Charles
85
10/11/2012
58-Syracuse, NY
Janosko, Joseph
89
11/26/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Diranian, Papken
60
10/3/2012
58-Syracuse, NY
Mascato, Vincent
86
11/26/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Dufour, William
66
11/20/2012
10/29/2012
58-Syracuse, NY
Mento, James
70
11/27/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Gilley, Raymond
77
58-Syracuse, NY
Palucci, Cesario
85
11/25/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Kogok, William
68
10/5/2012
58-Syracuse, NY
White, III, Lewis J
78
12/9/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Lane, Stuart
81
11/20/2012
63-Western, MA
St. Pierre, Donald
75
1/3/2013
66-Western, WA
Bender, Leonard
80
12/25/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Simmerman, Clarence
81
8/18/2012
66-Western, WA
Creese, Clair
87
11/22/2012
100-Washington, DC & Vicinity
Sutphin, Sr., Gene
67
10/25/2012
66-Western, WA
Hulse, Thomas
57
1/6/2013
66-Western, WA
Kasson, Raymond
88
11/29/2012
66-Western, WA
Knowlton, Rodney W
84
11/9/2012
66-Western, WA
Lyons, James H
73
9/22/2012
66-Western, WA
Martinson, Albert M
82
11/25/2012
66-Western, WA
Niemeyer, Marvin
95
12/2/2012
66-Western, WA
Seay, Loren V
75
10/27/2012
66-Western, WA
Summers, Jesse E
94
12/4/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Brady, Thomas G
89
11/27/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Cogan, Jr., Harold R
77
11/16/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Green, Melvin J
82
11/17/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Hansen, Walter L
88
12/17/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
McLaughlin, Edward
77
12/20/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Migliacio, John W
86
12/2/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Niemczyk, Terry
58
11/19/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Palumbo, Charles L
74
12/19/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Pointkowski, Henry L
89
11/10/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Robson, Edward J
70
12/19/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Taucher, Ronald T
75
11/3/2012
73-Chicago/Cook Cos., IL
Thayer, Ralph R
83
12/17/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Akers, John E
40
8/23/2011
80-Detroit, MI
Allen, Brian P
50
11/12/2011
80-Detroit, MI
Angelevski, Philip
89
3/18/2010
80-Detroit, MI
Armstrong, Brian S
55
8/10/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Clinch, John B
48
5/18/2009
80-Detroit, MI
Dunn, Ronald
79
7/8/2007
80-Detroit, MI
Dyer, Sr., Eric B
51
5/24/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Frisbee, Troy C
90
5/18/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Ganzberger, Steve
88
5/20/2011
80-Detroit, MI
Gilroy, Jack
77
5/1/2009
80-Detroit, MI
Groves, Harry H
78
7/9/2011
80-Detroit, MI
Harding, William P
75
11/2/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Huyghe, George J
86
9/14/2011
80-Detroit, MI
Kragenbrink, John P
70
3/16/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Bopp, Leopold
89
11/4/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Court, James H
93
11/7/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Danz, Arthur R
52
9/23/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
David, James
65
11/13/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Detert, Daniel
41
12/21/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Divittorio, Daniel A
91
10/30/2011
104-San Francisco, CA
Enos, Henry
81
10/20/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Fallon, James
78
11/11/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Hartman, Albert
84
12/12/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Koeppe, Peter
76
11/12/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Lewis, Foster
77
11/18/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Messina, Thomas V
93
12/6/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Quiroz, Pete
95
12/12/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Reilly, Christopher
53
10/26/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Sebastian, Darryl
66
9/19/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Spaulding, Samuel
68
11/10/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Thomsen, Gary
70
11/16/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Tillman, James
79
5/8/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Wallin, Roland
88
11/14/2012
104-San Francisco, CA
Zelms, Conrad A
73
11/2/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
Greene, Charles J
69
10/14/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
King, Glenn A
91
10/25/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
Levine, Jacob M
20
10/17/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
Martinez, Salvador D
82
10/1/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
McTaggart, Charles
76
10/2/2012
105-Los Angeles, CA
Wilder, James A
41
10/29/2012
137-New York, NY and New Jersey
Sajur, Wladyslaw
78
10/19/2012
206-San Diego, CA
Jesme, Robert M
59
11/14/2012
206-San Diego, CA
Owens, James E
74
12/6/2012
206-San Diego, CA
Roche, William
88
11/30/2012
218-Springfield, IL
Killion, James
66
11/11/2012
218-Springfield, IL
Klein, Benjamin
41
10/22/2012
218-Springfield, IL
Nixon, Paul M
60
2/1/2012
219-Rockford, IL
Leander, George
82
10/4/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Kree, Eugene
87
10/11/2008
270-Tulsa, OK
Lewis, James A
68
11/20/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Mark, Richard W
45
4/20/2009
270-Tulsa, OK
Smith, Seamon H
77
11/13/2012
80-Detroit, MI
McDonald, Thomas H
95
5/1/2010
276-Victoria, BC, Canada
Dingley, William S
84
11/10/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Megge, Gerald
76
1/15/2011
276-Victoria, BC, Canada
Robilliard, Edward J
77
11/14/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Mlinac, Jr., Martin J
62
11/1/2012
280-Vancouver, BC, Canada
Zoldy, Russell
58
8/29/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Patterson, Walter C
90
1/1/2008
312-Salt Lake City, UT
Guercio, Victor
90
11/1/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Pollitt, William J
85
6/7/2012
312-Salt Lake City, UT
Thompson, Hershel
73
12/27/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Pruneau, Donald T
56
9/20/2009
359-Arizona
Seidel, Stanley F
82
12/8/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Sarney, Donald J
79
7/20/2011
511-Winnipeg, MB, Canada
Lopez, Reynaldo B
56
10/21/2012
80-Detroit, MI
Skazalski, Paul
54
4/21/2009
562-Kitchener, Ont. Canada
Thompson, Fred
74
11/15/2012
January/February 2013
35
ICE • SOLI
D
Y
ENJO
40
IT Y
S
EFIT
BEN
FR O
US
ENJOY •
PL
SA
RV
AR
VINGS •
SE
INTERNATIONAl ASSOCIATION OF SHEET METAl,
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