Workers remember those who didn?t make it home

Stark cutouts against a granite monument at the Capitol were part of the Workers Memorial Day ceremony sponsored by Machinists Local 1833.

Gray, rainy weather added to the somber tone of Workers Memorial Day ceremonies in the Twin Cities Friday.

At events outside the Capitol, at MnDOT offices, at a construction site in Minneapolis, and at a cemetery in Apple Valley, union members and elected officials spoke of the never-ending need to make workplaces safer.

Unfortunately, they pointed out, trends are going the other way. Deaths on the job rose in recent years in both the nation and in Minnesota.

?It always takes a tragedy before they fix something,? said Bobby DePace, president of Machinists Air Transport District 143, who spoke amid a steady drizzle at a ceremony at the Capitol.

Workers deserve more than one day of remembrance ? they deserve a safe place to work, said 4th District Congresswoman Betty McCollum.

Union members paused in silence in memory of fallen co-workers during the ceremony at the Capitol sponsored by Machinists Local 1833.

But it?s only April, and already 26 mine workers have died ? more than were killed on the job in all of 2005, she said. Most of those deaths could have been prevented, but they?re a symptom of ?President Bush and the Congressional Republicans recklessly abandoning workplace safety,? McCollom said, listing a series of cuts in safety enforcement, requirements and training.

The wrong priorities.
The mine deaths are typical examples of how workers die because companies refuse or are not required to spend a few hundred dollars on proper equipment, said Joe Rolfer, president of the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees.

In a day filled with numbers, Minnesota AFL-CIO president Ray Waldron threw out one number ? 61 ? that demonstrates how low a priority workplace safety is. Sixty-one is the number of years it will take for safety inspectors in Minnesota to check every workplace in the state, he said. Gas pumps and scales are only two examples of things the state checks more often than workplaces, Waldron said.

As rain began to fall, Ken Hooker, president of Machinists Local 1833, urged action to ?make OSHA what it should be so we never have to add another name to this list.?

That leaves workers to depend on the voluntary compliance of their employers, said Mary Sansom, of Machinists Local 1833. But too often, she said, workers don?t get the proper personal protection equipment, the proper time to do the job right, or the safety training they need. ?We want to return home from work in the same condition as when we went to work,? Sansom said. ?We came here to work; we did not come here to die.?

Death always inches away on the highway.
In Roseville, at the Metro District headquarters of the Minnesota Department of Transportation, more than 100 workers crammed into a conference room to commemorate the 29 co-workers who have lost their lives in highway work zones in Minnesota.

As if they needed to be reminded of the dangers of their jobs ? which often require them to work inches from cars and trucks whizzing past at more than 60 miles per hour ? Dale Cody told of surviving a collision with a semi while he was driving a salt truck early one morning last November. Cody, a member of AFSCME Local 2792, says he believes he suffered only minor neck and muscle strain because he was wearing his seat belt.

Highway workers ?risk their personal safety so motorists can commute quickly and safely.? Workzone safety is about life and death,? said Eliot Seide, director of AFSCME Council 5. ?Remember the co-workers you lost in an effort to keep Minnesota moving.?

MnDOT driver Dale Cody, of AFSCME Local 2792, stands in front of photos taken after his truck was rammed by a semi last November while Cody was salting Interstate 35-E.

Lt. Gov. Carol Molnau ? who is also Transportation commissioner ? praised MnDOT construction, maintenance and survey workers for putting themselves in harm?s way every day to do their job ? work that too many motorists see as an inconvenience, she said.

Molnau spoke at the Metro District ceremony even though she cancelled the traditional statewide MnDOT observance of Workers Memorial Day. That observance not only honored the memory of fallen workers, but also served to launch public education efforts urging motorists to drive more carefully through work zones as construction season begins.

AFSCME, the Metro District of MnDOT, and private sponsors stepped forward to maintain the observance.