Cincinnati, OH (March 21, 2012) – LIUNA – the Laborers’ International Union of North America –today launched a multi-city media tour in U.S. House Speaker John Boehner’s home state of Ohio, highlighting the safety crisis of America’s roads and bridges and urging the Republican leader to swiftly adopt the U.S. Senate’s bi-partisan Highway Bill.

A 15-foot flatbed truck labeled “Emergency Bridge Repair Team” made the first of several stops at the Cincinnati’s Brent Space Bridge – one of nearly 6,400 structurally deficient or functionally obsolete bridges in Ohio – where LIUNA members passed out information about the Highway Bill. The truck carried a giant roll of duct tape, symbolizing the current approach to the crisis facing America’s aging bridges. Local labor, elected and business leaders also convened a press conference near Rep. Boehner’s West Chester district office.

“If extremist Republicans in Congress have their way, we will need a whole fleet of trucks and a lot more duct tape,” said Randy McGuire, Marketing Director for the Ohio Laborers’ District Council. “Instead of passing a bipartisan bill that will protect bridges and jobs like the Senate has done, the House continues on the path of partisan politics and is putting public safety at risk.”

The average U.S. bridge is now 45 years old, dangerously close to the average bridge lifespan of 50 years. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, one-in-four bridges nationwide are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. Many are unsafe – and thousands of others create a chokehold on commerce because they are unable to carry commercial vehicles. Another 3,580 are closed altogether because they’re unsafe for travel.

The week-long tour includes additional stops in Dayton and Columbus as the current extension of the Highway Bill is set to expire on March 31. Last week, the Senate passed a two-year, $109 billion investment that enjoyed broad bipartisan support.

“It is now up to Speaker Boehner to lead the House to follow suit,” said McGuire. “Bipartisanship is hard to come by these days, but the Senate came together to pass a good Highway Bill last week. Speaker Boehner can now lead his party to do the same in the House. So far, previous efforts to pass the bill in the House have been blocked by Republicans efforts to slash investment and jobs.”

“Playing politics with our nation’s crumbling roads, bridges and highways isn’t just putting the chokehold on jobs – it’s endangering lives,” said Butler County community leader and life-long resident Jodi Billerman, citing the fatal bridge collapse on I-35 in Minneapolis four years ago. “We don’t want a terrible tragedy like that to happen here in Ohio – and if Congress can pass a Highway Bill to keep people safe and protect jobs at the same time, that just seems like a no-brainer to me.”

In addition to the “Emergency Bridge Repair Team” truck, LIUNA’s multi-media campaign also includes a powerful radio ad – “Russian Roulette” – which warns motorists that the House is in effect forcing motorists to play Russian roulette every time they cross an unsafe bridge. The ad is saturating airwaves in Speaker Boehner’s home district, including Dayton, as well as in Columbus and Cincinnati.

The effort also includes a direct mail piece, “How to Survive a Collapsed Bridge: Inspired by House Speaker John Boehner.” The tongue-in-cheek brochure draws from the U.S. Army Survival Guide on bridge collapses. The brochures were mailed to 90,000 activist Ohio voters last week.

And thousands of LIUNA members across the country continue to call their representative in the House, urging passage of the bi-partisan Senate bill in the House.

“This campaign is hard-hitting and it’s provocative – it’s also accurate,” said McGuire. “The crisis is real. What is it going to take for Mr. Boehner to listen, to rise above partisanship and to lead the passage of a bi-partisan Highway Bill to save our bridges, support jobs and protect lives?”

For more information, to view campaign materials and listen to the ads, visit www.HighwayBill.org.

At a time when 1.3 million construction workers are still jobless, we are particularly encouraged by the President’s ideas to create jobs in one of the economy’s hardest hit sectors.

As the men and women of LIUNA have long argued, investing in America’s crumbling transportation systems will put millions of men and women back to work. We applaud his proposal to invest half of our nation’s “peace dividend” in rebuilding America’s basic, critical infrastructure. Congress can start by passing a long-term Highway and Transit Bill by March 31 that makes a full investment in rebuilding America’s basics – the highways, bridges and transit systems that are falling apart across the country.

The President’s “all-of-the-above” strategy to increase development of American energy – including oil, hydraulic fracturing to extract natural gas and investment in renewables – can create and support desperately needed jobs. Hydraulic fracturing alone will provided needed energy and jobs for an estimated 600,000 men and women. The President accurately noted that our nation does not have to choose between good jobs and protecting our environment and he reinforced that comprehensive climate change legislation is the best, if not only way, to tackle global warming.

The President’s proposal to make it possible for responsible homeowners to refinance their mortgages can ease the pain for millions of working people, help cure our still sick housing market and add fuel to a robust economic recovery.

In short, the President’s speech was a good one, but there must now be action. As the Build America union, the men and women of LIUNA urge Congress stop standing in the way and to act.

Washington, D.C. (December 14, 2011) – Today Terry O’Sullivan, General President of LIUNA – the Laborers’ International Union of North America – made the following statement regarding negotiations over an extension of federal unemployment insurance benefits:

It is time for Congress to do something real to help the millions of Americans who now face the holidays without knowing if they will be able to provide for their families next year.

LIUNA supports both an extension of the current federal unemployment insurance program – without the mean-spirited cuts that have been proposed by the Republican leadership – and the Keystone XL pipeline which deserves approval based on it own merits independently.

Unemployment benefits are not a windfall for the millions of people who rely on them to keep themselves and their families afloat during tough economic times. These modest benefits are essential to workers who have lost jobs through no fault of their own. Congress should not leave for the Christmas recess before enacting such an extension.

Unfortunately, the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2011 passed by the House of Representatives guts the current unemployment insurance program and extends an unfair pay freeze for federal employees. From health care workers at veterans’ hospitals to federal law enforcement officers, these workers make America a better place to live. They should be rewarded, not punished, for the work they do.

Our union also supports the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would create millions of work hours in an industry where unemployment still far outpaces the national average. Now in the fourth year of review, the Keystone XL will put thousands of construction workers back on the job almost immediately. For them, it is not just a pipeline – it’s a lifeline. Continued delay of this important project is an unacceptable insult to men and women who are trained and able to build the infrastructure that keeps the American economy moving forward.

While addressing both of these issues would help ease the burden of unemployment, they should be resolved based on their individual merit. With unemployment levels among construction workers far outpacing other sectors of the economy and our national economy dependent on oil from unfriendly foreign regimes, it is time for the Keystone XL pipeline to be approved. And with so many Americans still struggling to stay afloat financially, Republicans in Congress should pass a clean unemployment insurance extension before they go home to celebrate the holidays with their loved ones.

Statewide Billboard Campaign Highlights Need to Fix 6,600 Crumbling Bridges in Iowa, Aims to Elevate Issue in GOP Caucuses

Sioux City, Iowa (December 12, 2011) – Today Sioux City members of LIUNA – the Laborers’ International Union of North America – came together with contractors, political leaders and community allies to urge Congress to pass a new, jobs-creating Highway Bill and get answers from Republican presidential hopefuls on how they would address the crisis facing the nation’s roads and bridges.

At a rally on the I-29 overpass at Wall Street – one of nearly 6,600 Iowa bridges classified as structurally deficient or functionally obsolete, LIUNA unveiled a billboard that highlights the condition of Iowa’s ailing bridges and demands passage of a Highway bill in Congress. The billboard is just one of several like it across the state and will remain up through January’s Republican caucuses.

“For more than two years, Congress has played politics and refused to pass a long-term, jobs-creating Highway Bill,” said Bill Gerhard, President of the Iowa State Building and Construction Trades Council and Secretary-Treasurer of the Great Plains Laborers’ District Council. “Meanwhile, Republicans running for the highest office in the land have remained silent on this issue. We have too many men and women out of work and too many roads and bridges that need repair to keep quiet on this any longer.”

Since 2008, Iowa has lost over 12,000 construction jobs. Meanwhile, the state has the second-highest number of structurally deficient bridges in the nation, according to the latest U.S. Transportation Department data.

A new, fully-invested Highway Bill would address both issues, but so far Congress keeps playing political games and refuses to move forward. A Senate proposal that enjoys broad, bipartisan support would keep investment level for two years and would create and protect jobs. However, some U.S. House members have proposed a Highway Bill that would actually cut investment by a third – killing more than 600,000 jobs along the way.

At the same time, the crisis facing America’s roads and bridges has received zero attention on the campaign trail, even though one-fourth of the nation’s bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete and congested roads cost the country 4 billion gallons of fuel every year. Mitt Romney’s 160-page jobs plan does not contain a single mention of investing in roads and bridges, nor does Newt Gingrich’s nine-point jobs plan. The issue has yet to come up in any of the GOP presidential debates.

“It’s concerning that not one candidate has offered up ideas to fix our roads, bridges and highways – even though they’ve crisscrossed the state dozens of times this year asking for our vote,” said LIUNA Local 430 Business Manager Andy Schoenewe. “If they want to lead this country and get our vote, shouldn’t they have a plan? We deserve to know where they stand.”

For America’s construction workers, an answer to the crisis facing the country’s transportation system cannot come soon enough. More than 2 million construction jobs have been lost since 2007. Currently, over 1.2 million construction workers are unemployed.

“For construction workers like me, a good job has been tough to come by the last few years,” said LIUNA member Nick Prymek. “But if we match workers up with the backlog of work that America needs to have done, I think we can get our economy moving again.”