April meeting report

Local 247 President Bruce Dennis presents member John Strand a golf shirt from Chicago Carpenters Local 13, which Strand won as a door prize at the March meeting.

Local 247 commits to help relief nursery

The Portland Relief Nursery is in the process of purchasing a building in St. Johns at 8425 N. Lombard to provide a collaboration of services for young children. The organization is seeking financial and volunteer assistance to help purchase, retro-fit and equip the facility.

Local 247 agreed to donate up to $300 and possibly do some volunteer work during the remodel. Members interested in helping should call the office.

The Portland Relief Nursery is a private, non-profit program that works to prevent child abuse and neglect. Early intervention and services that focus on keeping families together are offered at no cost to low-income families in St. Johns who are at high risk of abusing and/or neglecting their children. Services include: 

1) therapeutic classes for young children with highly trained professionals; 
2) in-home support and counseling to families; 
3) classes to help parents set realistic expectations for their children’s behavior; 
4) access to family support programs including drug and alcohol assistance, emergency food, job placements assistance, housing and mental health services; 
5) child care; 
6) 24-hour respite care for crisis situations involving young children. 

The families they serve are living at the poverty level or are at least impacted by extremely low income. A large number are unemployed. Many are single parents. And many have had a problem with substance abuse. Most of the clients of the Portland Relief Nursery are referred by agencies and service providers dealing with families in crisis, such as Adult & Family Services, Corrections, Parole and Probation, public schools, the courts, State Office for Services to Children and Families, hospitals, Multnomah County Health Department, domestic violence programs, and women’s and children’s shelters.

The Portland Relief Nursery is modeled on “The Relief Nursery,” a nationally recognized child abuse prevention program that has operated in Eugene, Oregon for more than 20 years. Within the next six years, they plan to create three different “centers” to serve the needs of children and their families in high-risk neighborhoods throughout Portland.

Scholarship
Local 247 has a scholarship program available for members’ children and grandchildren. Guidelines are available at the office. Applications and Labor History Essays are due in the office by June 26. Please call or drop by the office for any questions or more information.

Local 247 picnic
Mark your calendars! The Carpenters Local 247 annual picnic will be Sunday, Aug. 19, 2001 at Blue Lake Park. There will be lots of fun, food and activities for the whole family! Be sure to mark the date on your calendar because it’s an event you won’t want to miss! More details will be provided in the upcoming issues. We are looking for volunteers to assist with various tasks. If you are interested in volunteering or would like any additional information, please feel free to call the office.

Bush whacks safety grants
In early April, the Bush Administration abruptly revoked 19 previously approved federal grants to unions, universities and labor-management groups for safety and health training programs for immigrant workers, small business employers and employees and workers in such high-risk jobs as construction. The grants totaled $4.8 million. In a March 29 letter from the Department of Labor, the groups were told that because of “budgetary circumstances and an evaluation of the financial projections for this program,” the long-term grants would not be funded. “Sadly, workplace safety will suffer once again to fund tax breaks for the wealthy, said Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) “This action is particularly troubling in light of the Bush Administration’s previous repeal of ergonomics protections for workplace safety.”

Web site targets CEO pay
The AFL-CIO launched a campaign April 5 on its Executive PayWatch Web site — www.paywatch.org — that gives shareholders new “e-tools” to rein in excessive CEO compensation. The site now allows investors to discover whether their mutual funds or pensions invest in companies that are among the worst offenders and lets them send an e-mail message urging their investment managers to join shareholders in challenging CEO pay. Also on the site, you can play GREED!, the new board game that takes you through a story of what life is like for a millionaire CEO and a worker struggling to make ends meet. Since its 1997 inception, the PayWatch site has had more than 30 million hits — with more than 11 million coming last year.

Pressure backfires at Oregon Steel
Under the threat of a National Labor Relations Board complaint, Oregon Steel in Pueblo, Colo., has agreed not to pressure injured employees who have workers’ compensation cases to give up their rights to back pay as unfair labor practice strikers in return for settling their injury claims. The NLRB ruled last year that the company violated federal labor law and ordered the reinstatement of and back pay for 1,000 Steelworkers who walked out in 1997.