VOL. 78 #07 JULY 2020 GRIZZLY ISLAND ROAD OPERATING ENGINEERS LOCAL 3 OFFICERS ENGINEERS NEWS STAFF DAN REDING Editor MANDY MCMILLEN Managing Editor/Photographer JOHN MATOS Associate Editor/Photographer SALVADOR CID III DAN REDING Graphic Artist/Photographer BUSINESS MANAGER STEVE INGERSOLL PRESIDENT website OE3.ORG instagram @engineersnews BUG Engineers News (ISSN 1069-2185) is published monthly by Local 3 of the International Union of Operating Engineers, AFL-CIO; 1620 South Loop Rd., Alameda, CA 94502. Periodical postage paid at Oakland, CA and additional mailing offices. Engineers News is sent without charge to all members of Operating Engineers Local 3 in good standing. Non-member subscription price is $6 per year. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Address Change, 1620 South Loop Rd., Alameda, CA 94502. JUSTIN DISTON VICE PRESIDENT JIM SULLIVAN RECORDING CORRESPONDING SECRETARY ON THE COVER FRONT & BACK From left: Maggiora & Ghilotti operators Steve Hubert and Vince Medeiros DAVE HARRISON raise Grizzly Island Road FINANCIAL SECRETARY in Suisun City as part of a wetland restoration and NATE TUCKER flood control project. TREASURER 2 ENGINEERS NEWS JULY 2020 3 27 JULY 2020 HAWAII’s PRIMARY 05 FROM THE PRESIDENT President Steve Ingersoll discusses some of Local 3’s e-mail action ELECTION campaigns, including successfully naming the new Construction and is on Technical Education (CTE) School in Washoe County after former State TH Sen. Debbie Smith (a big friend of Local 3), as well as a call to members AUGUST 8 to keep the 3,995-home Daybreak housing development on the books in Reno, Nev. ALSO INSIDE 07 HAWAII PRIMARY ELECTION 07 ENDORSEMENTS Get the updated Local 3 recommendations for Hawaii’s Aug. 8 Primary Election here, and use this list, when you vote in Hawaii. 25 14 FIFTY-YEAR HONOREES Congratulations to these 50-year members for their longtime service to Local 3. See if you recognize any of the names! 25 FACES FROM THE FIELD A Local 3 elevator operator saves the life of a co-worker in distress on a jobsite, using her medical knowledge, calm response and safety preparedness. Read about this real-life hero. 27 EQUIPMENT CORNER Check-out this occasional feature, which will highlight recent developments in equipment and technology that are likely to impact Operating Engineers now or in the near future. 14 05 2 ENGINEERS NEWS JULY 2020 3 & By Dan Reding, business manager Staying strong and united, no matter what At the time of this writing, I’m happy to report that Local 3’s Please also remember that when it comes to politics, we remain continued outreach and membership service efforts have focused focused on bread and butter issues. We will always support measures on ensuring our work continues safely. When the COVID-19 and candidates that will create work for us and protect workers’ pandemic struck the country mid-March, we were operating on a rights. That is and always will be our driving factor. minute-by-minute basis, as federal, state and county guidelines As we continue to market this career as a wonderful and lucrative shifted in confusing ways every day. We responded proactively, option for younger generations, some of Local 3’s best are retiring. developing new staffing plans, communicating through texts, calls, Two very influential leaders who recently retired at the end of e-mails and social media daily and working to keep all systems June include the Operating Engineers Local 3 Journeyman and working seamlessly with a skeleton crew. As more counties have Apprenticeship Training Center (OE3 JATC) Director Tammy begun to reopen and some offices are slowly opening up to foot Castillo and Hawaii District Rep. Pane Meatoga. traffic with social distancing protocols in place, we have slowly Tammy has been the director at the OE3 JATC since 2013, and brought back more staff. The work so far has remained fairly steady, prior to that, she held many positions within California’s prestigious despite some hiccups early on, and this is great news for all of us. I training center and staff. She began as an apprentice in 1988 and commend you for your commitment to safe work practices, taking later became a dispatcher in 1995. Her 33 years of union service have our online COVID-19 Safety Preparedness test and having the made her an advocate for all things training and union, and I have good sense not to come to work, if you are sick. It is because of your worked closely with her as the officer in charge of the OE3 JATC diligence that we have weathered this storm a lot better than many for many years. I will miss Tammy very much, as will the thousands workers have. Please continue being safe on your jobsites and in your of apprentices whose lives she changed, and the hundreds of staff communities. Though the work is going well, this is not to say that members whose careers she molded, while overseeing them. many have not been drastically impacted by this virus, financially, Former Hawaii district rep. Pane Meatoga became the district rep. socially, emotionally and physically. For those who have lost loved for Hawaii in 2011, and during that time, he dramatically changed ones, jobs or are battling isolation because of this pandemic, our the Labor industry on the islands, driving home the necessity of thoughts and prayers are always with you. accountability, connection, membership service and politics to his I’d like to think things will return to normal soon, but I’m not staff. He is very well-known throughout his community as a strong sure any of us knows what “normal” is anymore. The handshake, and steady voice for Labor and has furthered Local 3’s presence in which meant trust and a hearty greeting may one day be seen as Hawaii through organizing and political advocacy for many years. old-fashioned as the handkerchief. Human interactions as we once Again, his leadership will be missed. know them, may very well be different in the future. We continue to train new staff, even in these trying times, and Since Local 3 is family, we have all struggled with the inability these new folks, as well as our veterans, have really risen up to the to meet face-to-face and hold our regularly scheduled meetings challenge, rotating between weeks on and off, handing out face and picnics, including the much-loved and time-honored tradition masks, answering calls and providing answers and resources when of our Retirees Picnic. (You can find the list of this year’s 50-year many of us are anxious, worried and confused. I thank our staff and honorees in this edition on pages 14-15). There is familiarity in membership for understanding that we are all in this together, and seeing each other, not just on a jobsite but at a meeting, a rally or that this, too, will pass. a picnic. However, as we always do, we have coped and adjusted What we don’t want to see pass us by is November’s General to this new way of doing business, because our business must go Election. Our influential Voice of the Engineer (VOTE) program on. To ensure you get the information you need, we have filmed is gearing up right now, assessing upcoming legislation and crucial virtual district meetings due to those cancelled in June. You can seats up for election. The outcome of this election will be great, find them at www.youtube.com/user/OE3user/videos. If you and we will use all safe and necessary means to Get-Out-The-Vote need assistance in accessing these, please contact Public Relations (GOTV). Even if you have to phone bank from your kitchen, or Director Mandy McMillen at (916) 240-1635 or visit Local 3’s leaflet with gloves on, answer the calls to help that will be coming website at www.oe3.org. We have also recorded several episodes your way soon. Most importantly, VOTE UNION. on our new podcast, Breaking Ground, which you can find at To many of our frontline members, either in the medical field, oe3.buzzsprout.com and access through several common platforms, working in prisons or performing water and sewer services to such as Spotify. In short, we’re doing everything we can to keep you sheltered communities, thanks for all you do and for putting informed and connected. It is more important than ever to connect yourselves at risk, in order to keep the rest of us safe. Some of these right now. workers, like our Caltrans Unit 12 members, are getting ready for As I write this, connection seems to be such a confusing word, as contentious negotiations, as the State tries to take away money from unrest has broken out across our country. The country is not very their pay, while calling them essential. It’s not right, and Local 3 is well connected, it seems. I am reminded of famous Labor and Civil doing everything we can to protect them. Rights activist Martin Luther King Jr.’s quote, which resonates more Since 1939, we have been here for you, and we always will be. May than ever in these trying times: “We must learn to live together you and your families stay safe and secure, until we can meet in as brothers or we will perish as fools.” Local 3 is one of the best person again. brotherhood and sisterhoods in the country. Let’s always remember that we are a union family, regardless of our individual differences. 4 ENGINEERS NEWS JULY 2020 5 By Steve Ingersoll, president Nevada honors Debbie Smith Even though we haven’t been able to meet face-to-face for some Regional Planning Agency (TMRPA) approved the 3,995-home time now, Local 3 continues to represent the needs of our members Daybreak housing development in Southeast Reno in January.