In Painters DC 7: Almost wins top job but barred for 5 years

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Steve Schreiner did not begin his career as a painter in 1994 with the intent of being a union democracy reformer. It just seems to be the way it turned out. But then, after organizing hundreds of new members into the local, he never expected to be fined $1,500 in 2009 and suspended for five years.

When in 2000, Painters Union Local 781 Business Manger John Jorgensen asked him to become a full time union organizer, it went well for awhile. But something went rotten in the state of Wisconsin. From his base as BM of Local 781, Jorgensen ran successfully for BM in the new Painters District Council 7, extending his power over the union to 41 counties in Wisconsin. Then, according to Schreiner, things began to change.

Soon after winning, says Schreiner, Jorgensen proceeded to fire several highly competent union staff members and stack the District Council Executive Board with his personal sympathizers. He pulled Schreiner off organizing duties and shifted him to bureaucratic office duties, a very big Jorgensen mistake it appears. Schreiner, from his new post, concluded that the BM was cutting locals out of decision-making, even when the issues pertained directly to them; and the BM used union funds for political purposes that Schreiner felt could have been better used for organizing, a task that Schreiner thought was being neglected. He told Jorgensen so --- and emphatically.

After a heated argument, Jorgensen allowed Schreiner to go back to organizing. In the very short span of 4 months, he reports, he had successfully unionized 3 shops and turned $500,000 worth of non-union work to union. But the turn of events that disillusioned him and impelled him to resign as organizer, arose out of his efforts to stop one grocery chain from using non-union subcontractors in building new stores. At the direction of the store managers, he and one other organizer, then helping out the Milwaukee Building Trades Council, were ticketed by the police for distributing handbills to store customers. Schreiner says he could prove, with witnesses and police reports, that the arbitrary police action was provoked by the employer; and so he filed an unfair labor charge at the NLRB against the chain. Without discussing the issues with him, he says, BM Jorgensen instructed him to withdraw the charge.

In 2005, Schreiner decided it was time for a change and threw his hat in the ring against Jorgensen for Business Manager-Secretary Treasurer of the District Council, the top job. Now the president of Local 781 and a highly successful union organizer, Schreiner was popular and a formidable candidate. He came close. Jorgensen held on by a whisker: 292-280. Jorgensen and his colleagues were more than unhappy. In the years that followed, they worked to solidify themselves and to undermine Schreiner.

He says they spent $250,000 for cars and trucks for the staff and $47,000 for flashlights and hats as novelty giveaways; they loaded the 2009 election slate with friends; business reps were fired and replaced by those more to Jorgensen's liking. Schreiner says he went from "hero to zero" with the Jorgensen camp. They threatened him with charges, they denounced him as disloyal and a traitor, they demanded that he resign as Local 781 president or face removal charges.

Through it all, he held on. He remained local president; he was elected the local's delegate to the district council. But shortly before the 2009 election, five sets of multiple charges were filed against him. One far out charge accused him of being a member of the Association for Union Democracy. The council president threw them out as untimely. And so in 2009, he was again able to run for DC Business Manager against Jorgensen. Again Jorgensen held on by a narrow margin: 337 to 310. Too close for the Jorgensen team! They decided to finish Schreiner off. Jorgensen appealed the dismissal of the charges. Schreiner was tried and found guilty of "public interference with the District Council's purchase of a new building after the decision had been made by the delegates of the District Council." He was fined $1,500 and barred from running for office for five years. The fine was stayed, serving as a sword of Damocles over his head, imposable should he dare to again publicly criticize Jorgensen.

Editor's note: The bulk of the charges related to Schreiner's dealings with a state senator and with a Town of Vernon Supervisor. Schreiner had asked the senator for information relating to a grant by a state agency to the local. In the second instance, he asked the supervisor for information concerning the union's application to acquire a building for a training center. By so doing, the charges went, he revealed union business and attempted to "subvert the will of the members."

The LMRDA protects the right of union members to appeal to government agencies, and no union can curtail that right by charges or discipline. Title I reads: "No labor organization shall limit the right of any member thereof to institute an action in any court, or in a proceeding before any administrative agency, irrespective of whether or not the labor organization or its officers are named as defendants or respondents in such action or proceeding, or the right of any member of a labor organization to appear as a witness in any judicial, administrative, or legislative proceeding, or to petition any legislature or to communicate with any legislator." The action against Schreiner seems to be a clear violation of that provision. He has appealed the action.