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By VICKI URBANIK Fed up with the tired argument of jobs versus clean air and water, the United Steelworkers and the Save the Dunes Council have joined forces in a new effort promoting worker and environmental protection. The two groups have issued a position statement titled “No More False Choices,” in which they take aim at the notion that either the Northwest Indiana region supports “big industries’ demands for higher pollution releases” or face economic loss. “The United Steelworkers together with the Save the Dunes Council believes that this ‘either-or; equation is false, misleading, and destructive to the achievement of a healthy and prosperous region,” the joint statement says. Tom Anderson, executive director of the Save the Dunes Council, said the new partnership was prompted by recent permit cases, including the BP Amoco permits. Some of the comments raised – by industry backers and government officials in support of the permits – seemed to be “almost going backwards,” Anderson said, by suggesting that clean air and water have to take a back seat to job creation. The attitude that’s been expressed recently is that “we can’t afford a clean environment because we need jobs,” he said. “It’s almost like this rhetoric that hasn’t been around for 20 to 30 years is coming back,” Anderson said. After United Steelworkers District 7 Director Jim Robinson initiated the idea a few months ago, the Save the Dunes Council and the steelworkers agreed to work together to promote a new, “green economy.” “We have a lot more in common than different,” Anderson said. He cited as one example the potential for wind power. Already, he said, about 200 jobs at Mittal Steel are directly or indirectly involved in the manufacture of wind farm components. This is hardly the first time that labor and environmental interests have joined forces. In the 1980s, labor and environmentalists teamed up in the coalition opposing the Bailly nuclear plant. Then in 1994, after the Congressional elections, the two forces teamed up again to oppose health and safety rollbacks proposed nationally. More recently, the United States Steelworkers and the Seirra Club formed the Blue Green Alliance, with a report called “Indiana’s Road to Energy Independence” that outlined how renewal energy manufacturing could create more than 32,000 Indiana jobs. With the latest effort, Anderson said the steelworkers and environmentalists intend to continue the dialouge in proposing “green-collar” jobs. In their “No More False Choices” statement, the two groups note their common interests: The District 7 steelworkers have a mission of improving the wages, benefits, job security and conditions for workers, while the Save the Dunes Council has the mission of protecting and restoring natural resources in the Lake Michigan basin. “Since Union members are citizens who breathe the air and drink the water, and since all citizens are also workers who need jobs and thriving community economies, we believe that cooperation is the name of the game when it comes to jobs and the environment. We wholeheartedly share in our goals, if not our main focuses,” the statement says. “Manufacturing jobs -- and the construction and service jobs that are directly related to the health of basic industry -- have been decimated in the past 20 years through misguided trade policies. Those same trade policies which have shipped our jobs to undemocratic countries with terrible labor records and low environmental standards have also created environmental disasters which will affect us all.”
Posted 6/12/2008
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