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Hawaii
Business Manager March 7, 2002 Labors fresh new face in Hawaii is among the youngest state federation presidents in the country. Charged with invigorating the labor movement on the Pacific islands, Harold Dias, Jr. has a full agenda geared toward greater respect for workers, more legislative action and better political mobilization, especially in this election year. But that mandate will not interfere with his day job, as business manager-financial secretary of IBEW Local 1357. "My top concern is IBEW members," said Dias, 35, whose two-year term as state AFL-CIO president commenced last November. "When I was approached to run, I said I didnt want the responsibility taking away from my responsibilities as business manager." So Dias said he relies on his full-time staff at the state AFL-CIO in Honolulu to press forward with his priorities. Education is a top one, because Dias said workers in the second-most heavily unionized state in the country (behind New York) may need reminding how they became among the nations highest-paid workers. "Weve become complacent and thats one of the things we want to work on," he said. "We need to let them know a lot of the benefits you have are not because of the companyits because of the hard work and dedication of the union." The internal education campaign will be coupled with a public relations approach, reminding workers outside of the labor movement that many of their benefits, like overtime pay and maternity leave, are the result of the work of unions. That idea will be communicated through television advertisements, he said. And unifying those members of unaffiliated unions into the state federation will also be a project Dias will work toward. Twenty-five percent of the labor force in Hawaii is unionized, Dias said. As a political force, they will have greater influence if the state federation can compile a master database to mobilize in this election year, when nearly every elected official in the state will face a race. This year will be spent putting together that list, Dias said. Another goal will be developing a Hawaiian Workers Bill of Rights to use in the candidate endorsement process. Items will include the right to collective bargaining, the right to organize and the right to a safe work environment. An influential presence in state legislative matters continues, as the state AFL-CIO will press for bills protecting workers compensation and prevailing wage laws. They will also work to block efforts by right-to-work advocates and encourage the passage of laws supporting sick leave and increasing the availability of health care benefits. On the IBEW front, Local 1357s goals continue to be organizing workers on Saipan and Guam, where sister local, Honolulu Local 1260 recently organized a 900-worker unit, Dias said. Local 1357 recently hired an organizer to work on Saipan, where they intend to organize the telephone company workers as well as dockworkers, teachers and porters. (Saipan is one of the Mariana Islands, U.S. territories, which are the closest Pacific island chain to Japan.) Local 1357 has approximately 2,000 members working for Verizon. Dias joins a roster of other IBEW members who head state federations, including Charles Huggins, Arizona, from Local 518 in Globe; John Bourg, Louisiana, from Local 995 in Baton Rouge; David Kemnitz, North Dakota, from Local 714 in Minot; Ken Mass, Nebraska, from Local 1974 in Omaha; and Denis Hughes, New York, from Local 3, New York.
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Hawaii AFL-CIO State Federation Web site |
