Activist Attitude Prevails in New Leadership at Labor Council

By Tom Herriman

Steve Williamson

Williamson, former staff director at Teamsters Local 174, fills the vacancy left by Ron Judd, who was recently appointed Western Regional Director of the AFL-CIO.

Williamson is a seasoned trade unionist who developed political awareness and a strong union consciousness when he was a bricklayer in Denver in the early '80s.

"When Reagan fired the air traffic controllers, it was a signal to employers all over the country to come down hard on workers, and try to destroy the unions," Williamson told The Seattle Press in an interview last week.

"Denver contractors cut wages by $3 an hour, eliminated health and welfare benefits and tried to shut down the pension fund," he said. "We called a strike but we lost the strike, and we nearly lost the union. Pretty soon I was out of a job. I never want to go back to those days."

Williamson says that the labor movement has made a good start on re-building itself since the Reagan era, especially with the leadership of John Sweeney in the AFL-CIO and people like Ron Judd at local levels.

Since his bricklaying days, Williamson has worked as a union organizer for the Machinists and the Service Employees Health Care union. In 1992 he joined the Teamsters Local 174 as an organizer and worked his way up to staff director. Williamson helped expand the membership in the Seattle sanitation industry from 80 percent to over 95 percent.

"As a result of this strength we got a fabulous contract in our last negotiations," said Williamson.

Williamson is widely respected in the Seattle labor movement as a skilled organizer and a tireless activist who has devoted his life to building the labor movement. Though he was the only announced candidate for the job, one major affiliate spoke out against Williamson's appointment to fill the vacancy citing lack of experience. Over the last few weeks the vacancy and selection process set off a vigorous debate among trade union activists for the what direction the Labor Council would take after Judd's departure.

In 10 years on the job, Judd had united the unions as never before and built the organizing, research and political action capabilities of the Labor Council so that it is now a major force in Seattle politics and economics. The Labor Council today can turn out hundreds of marchers on 24-hour notice to support fellow workers on the picket line and influence perhaps a quarter million voters on election day.

Perhaps most important, Judd had forged alliances between unions, churches, environmental groups and other parts of the community that led to the stunning success of the WTO demonstrations last December. These alliances signify community support for many of the goals of unions, and strengthen labor's hand immensely at the bargaining table.

Williamson is devoted to the same long-term strategy for the Labor Council.

Williamson says, "John Sweeney, Ron Judd, and Bob Hasegawa, Local 174 president, are my mentors. I want to make the King County Labor Council bigger, stronger and even more effective in our community."

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