The organizing activities of Local 183 in what some considered the exclusive jurisdictions of craft unions as well as in the industrial, commercial, and institutional sector were always controversial among other labour groups. The Toronto Building and Construction Trades Council often attacked us over our presence in ICI. Fortunately, most of the other trades, such as plumbers and painters, were not affected by the disputes and they remained either neutral or on our side. The reason why some were on our side was primarily self-interest. We were the real power in the residential sector. They knew that they needed our support in the event of a strike or for organizing assistance in the residential sector.
For example, in 1985 the United Association of Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 46 had a strike in the residential housing sector. Sean O’Ryan, the dynamic and progressive young business manager of the plumbers, called asking for our help. I did not hesitate and assigned a full-time representative, Quinto Ceolin, to O’Ryan. I told Quinto to make sure our guys respected the plumbers’ picket lines, and eventually O’Ryan won the strike and his local established strong roots in the residential sector.
O’Ryan developed an organizing strategy that he called “sectoral organizing.” It included six months of “marketing” their union to the non-union plumbers working in hundreds of subdivisions throughout Southern Ontario. He then invited the workers to the Triumph Hotel on Keele Street for a one-evening signup event. Four hundred non-union plumbers joined the union for one dollar that night and within the next three days they signed up another hundred, thereby capturing 80 per cent of the low-rise plumbing workforce in the region.
O’Ryan was then in a tough battle with twenty or so contractors for a first agreement and his members had to go on strike for seven weeks before reaching a settlement. Sean has often stated that “their organizing program and negotiation for a first agreement could not have been such a success without the support and assistance of John Stefanini and Local 183.” To this day, Local 46 enjoys a 95 per cent market share in the residential sector. O’Ryan went on to a stellar career in the union and was promoted to be senior administrative assistant to the president of the Plumbers International in Washington.
The climax of our difficulties with the other trades came in 1988. At that time, the manager of the Toronto Building and Construction Trade Council was Dave Johnson who was a member of Ironworkers Local 721. He fought us tooth and nail. He did not do so out of malice. As a matter of fact, I know that he respected Local 183. He simply felt it was right to protect the jurisdiction of an affiliate craft union.
He brought a case in court claiming our agreement with builders contravened the master agreement of the Toronto Building and Construction Trades Council. The day of the court ruling coincided with the Trades Council’s monthly evening meetings. The court ruling was such that, upon first reading, it gave the impression of giving the Toronto Building and Construction Trades Council a victory, especially in the first part of the judgment. Later in the afternoon, however, our lawyer Ray Koskie called me and explained that the court ruling had actually come down on our side.
That evening I went to the monthly meeting of the trades council, something I rarely did. At the meeting Johnson was beaming over the ruling and claiming the court had vindicated his position. I brought the decision with me, fresh from the Koskie briefing. I explained to those in attendance that, in fact, the decision said the opposite of what Johnson was describing. Quite understandably, Johnson became upset, banging his fist on the table and saying he had had enough. A few days later, he quit his job. I regretted his resignation because, apart from our differences in this matter, he was a good manager.
The battle continued. Both the carpenters and the ironworkers brought complaints against us at the Ontario Labour Relations Board, accusing us of violating the single-trade province-wide bargaining legislation. To make things worse, at the same time a major dispute broke out between us and the Operating Engineers Local 793. The latter was a problem which had been simmering for a long time over the operation of small excavating equipment, the so-called Tonka Toys, in the utility industry.
These mini-excavators, like Bobcats, were operated from time to time by working foremen who were Local 183 members. Joe Kennedy of Operating Engineers Local 793 was extremely protective of his jurisdiction and he was furious at what he saw as an incursion by our union. It did not matter to him how small or how easy it was to operate the Tonka Toys, he claimed any machinery had to be piloted by his members, period. For our part, we resented his inflexible position, especially since the utility sector had been originally organized by us and we had more or less gifted his Local 793 the heavy equipment operators. They gained members without having to lift a finger.
Also, our members had been operating these small excavators ever since they first started to appear on construction sites in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They are compact and can be fitted with a front claw or a bucket and even a small dozer-like blade. They are easy to operate, they get into small places, and they take the hard labour out of site work. Kennedy sent us a written notice of Local 793’s intention to withdraw from a forming council his local had set up with ours. This was bad news for us. As a consequence of a variety of earlier jurisdictional agreements, we needed this forming council to remain active in ICI projects.
This was just the beginning of a bitter dispute between us and Local 793. Al Minsky, our lawyer, also acted for Kennedy’s local. He was friendly to both parties and he was upset at the situation because it was awkward for him and affected his ability to serve both clients. He invited Joe Kennedy and me to dinner at the Mastro restaurant on Wilson Avenue where he cautioned us that our squabble was detrimental to both organizations and reminded us how much progress we had made by working together. Kennedy acknowledged his points but emphasized in a lengthy speech how sacrosanct his jurisdiction was to him.
I had brought with me two souvenirs from a trip to Edmonton. They were wooden miniatures, one of a tomahawk axe and the other of a peace pipe. After Kennedy made his big speech, I simply pulled the items from my jacket pocket and laid them on the table and said: “Joe, it is up to you. Which do you want to pick up?”
I said nothing more. Kennedy was surprised at my move. He kept quiet for a while and then broke out in a laugh. The two of us hugged. Joe withdrew his notice of withdrawal from the forming council. Minsky was pleased: his mission was accomplished.
We still faced the complaint of the carpenters and ironworkers before the Ontario Labour Relations Board. The day of that hearing, there were fourteen interested parties present. The chair was Rosalie Abella, who would go on to be the youngest Ontario Family Court Judge in Canadian history, at age twenty-nine and, ultimately, in 2004, a member of the Supreme Court of Canada.
One of the delegates from the forming association, Italo Cirone, a forming contractor, asked her for more time to locate a lawyer. Abella was not buying it, noting there had been ample notice and that she had difficulty understanding why his organization could not have retained legal counsel before the hearing.
“With all due respect,” Cirone replied, “just take a look around this room and you will see every labour lawyer has already been engaged.”
Loud laughter ensued. Indeed, there were some fourteen parties to the dispute, including unions and contractors, all of them represented by counsel. It was a big issue in the industry and their presence underscored its importance.
Then the game began. There was some fascinating legal manoeuvering by the lawyers on the merit or the lack of merit in the complaint against us. After a break, Chair Abella wisely recommended we all sit down and talk this out rather than go through a lengthy and expensive hearing. She offered to appoint a Labour Relations Board officer as facilitator and, in the interests of fair play and being reasonable, I was the first to accept. The others had little choice but to agree.
Over the next few months there was nothing but acrimony during the talks. We broke it down into individual meetings, that is, Local 183 and the carpenters, and Local 183 and the ironworkers. With the ironworkers, the dispute was only around high-rise forming but with the carpenters there was also the residential housing sector. I wanted to find a way to connect everyone so that we could reach common ground.
At one time, Local 183 represented employees of Frost Fence, a subsidiary of Stelco Steel. Stelco had apparently called their chain-link fencing company after the American poet Robert Frost, who in his 1914 poem “Mending Wall” said, “good fences make good neighbours.” While the poet actually questions fences for the sake of fences, that line was all I needed to make my point and that is exactly what I said to the Ironworkers Local 721: “Good fences make good neighbours. Why don’t we put a fence around ICI for us and we will fence you out from residential?”
It was a deal. We withdrew from ICI and they allowed us to represent rod men for residential construction, something unheard of in North America. I was surprised because I thought the ironworkers would be more difficult than the carpenters. The business manager of the Ironworkers’ Local 721 was Al MacIsaac, a trade unionist who was tougher than nails. But Al was realistic. In making the deal he gave up nothing and gained jobs in ICI. We gave up good jobs and in turn we got security and respect.
With the carpenters it took longer although we eventually sorted out our differences thanks to new leadership from Jimmy Smith, John Cartwright, Cosmo Mannella, Tony Iannuzzi, and Ucal Powell. We dealt with the high-rise sector by building a fence in the same manner as we had done with the ironworkers but in residential housing we retained framing and recognized the carpenters’ union to represent the finish carpenters and, further, to help each other to organize the unorganized.
The signing of this peace treaty took place at the Constellation Hotel in 1991. Brian Foote, representing the Toronto Construction Association, was so happy he bought six bottles of Dom Pérignon champagne to celebrate. Everybody was pleased, including the Ministry of Labour. I forwarded copies of those unique “peace treaties” to our International and Arthur E. Coia called to congratulate me on them.
“Arthur,” I said, “you are the only one who called to recognize what we have achieved. No other international union representative in Canada called.”
“I know, they are jealous of what you have managed to accomplish,” he replied.
Arthur E. Coia was an extraordinary man. Sadly, he died shortly after I retired. I went to his funeral in Providence, Rhode Island. I was paying my respects at the casket when I turned to greet and offer sympathies to his son, Arthur A. Coia, who was then general president of the union.
“John, my father would have done anything for you,” he said as we shook hands.