Union stands strong
at Older Adult Center

By Lauren Fritsky
Times Staff Writer

The level of residents’ aggravation over the delayed opening of a local recreation and senior center has gone through the roof.
About two weeks ago, union workers went on strike outside the joint site of the Rhawnhurst Recreation Center and the Northeast Older Adult Center, at Bustleton and Solly avenues. The picketing arose over the use of non-union roofing company, Wespol Construction Inc.
Ernest Bock & Sons Inc. is the general contractor for the $7 million project.
Richard Tustin, director of the city’s Capital Program Office, said members of the Sheet Metal Workers Local 19 are picketing because of the special standing steel seam roof to go on top of the building.
"The sheet metal workers claimed that since they were using metal that they should do the work," Tustin said. "I would have never thought the sheet metal workers would picket, but that’s what they did."
In addition to Local 19, workers from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98 and Plumbers Union Local No. 690 are honoring the picket line, Tustin said. That means that although those workers are not on strike, they will not work on the rec and senior center project as long as Local 19 is striking.
Tustin, along with residents waiting to use the new centers, fear that the strike will push back an already postponed opening.
The project began in 2005 and was scheduled to finish in May and then in December 2006. It is now due for completion at the end of May.
The Northeast Older Adult Center has been in its current facility, at 7522 Castor Ave., since 1982. Seniors there say they’re cramped in the small basement space.
The Rhawnhurst Recreation Center is used by the Rhawnhurst Athletic Association, which has been deprived of any facility in which to hold sports practices and games since construction began. It’s been able to use some of the fields surrounding the construction site in the spring and summer months.
Wespol is continuing to work on the roof, but with the union workers off the job, remaining building labor is not getting done, Tustin said.
"Will it delay the job even further? Yes," Tustin said of the strike.
The city cannot require general contractors to use union labor on city jobs, Tustin said. It only requires that the company pay the prevailing wage to all subcontractors, both union and non-union.
In previous newspaper articles, Tustin cited disputes between Bock and the unions over non-union workers as one of the reasons the facilities did not open in December.
Bock did not return calls from the Times.
Tustin said the city’s labor standards unit, which operates out of the Managing Director’s Office, is mediating between Bock and Local 19, but that no agreement has been reached.
Neither Perri Divirgillo, director of the Labor Standards unit, nor anyone from Local 19 returned calls for comment.
Dan Bucher, president of the Rhawnhurst Athletic Association, which uses the recreation center, is frustrated over the strike.
"It already was delayed," Bucher said of the project. "This is just going to delay it more."
Bucher added that no one from the city had contacted him or other members of his board to report the strike.
Sam Luciano, president of the advisory council at the Northeast Older Adult Center and the person who notified the Times of the strike, is beginning to lose hope that the building will open.
"All I know is the people here are frustrated," he said. ••
Reporter Lauren Fritsky can be reached at 215-354-3038 or lfritsky@phillynews.com