IBEW 569 Brothers and Sisters,
Thank you for continuing to strengthen IBEW 569 with your engagement!
My name is Jeremy Abrams and I’m honored and excited to be your next Business Manager.
I want to take a second to thank my wonderful wife and family for their tremendous support, and that of our friends, union brothers and sisters, and all other supporters.
I also want to congratulate all the newly elected officers – I look forward to working with all of them – and I thank our outgoing Business Manager Nick Segura and President John Sherrell for their hard work and progress made for Local 569.
We all share in the benefits of their work, and that of all of us to make our union stronger….and we have much more work to do. Let’s outline some of our priorities.
IBEW 569 has long been a leader in the IBEW when it comes to organizing green renewable jobs and PLAs – taking the lead on securing solar work, and now battery storage and CCA’s that create good union jobs – and leading the Trades in electing progressive school board candidates and city council members that champion local hire and a skilled and trained workforce.
Rest assured, we are going to continue our work fighting for PLAs and organizing renewable energy projects that put members to work.
And when it comes to Organizing, we are going to shift our resources a bit and focus more on top-down organizing. We need to bring more contractors into our local. This will create more opportunities for members to work and raise our market share within this region. This will be especially important as we go into negotiations on our Inside Agreement and fight to raise our wages and maintain quality healthcare and a healthy pension.
We are going to be investing in empowering our membership – supporting the work and activities of our Committees and member groups like our EWMC, United Sparkies, Alianza, RENEW, and Retirees Club — and working with the International to facilitate steward classes.
I am going to appoint Stewards to all major projects and will be starting a monthly Steward meeting where we communicate consistently with our stewards, listen to concerns, and stay on top of all member and job-site issues.
Please let me know if you want to be signed up and we’ll get you the dates as soon as the classes are scheduled.
Further, we are going to do more work to highlight your work to our supporters and communities – building a portfolio of pictures and videos featuring you, so that everyone completely understands and sees that YOU are indeed the best trained and skilled electricians in the industry. Check out the first video in our series ‘IBEW Works for YOU.’
And finally, I will again mention – we need to focus on our Inside negotiations coming up next year – along with our hundred year anniversary.
We are going to be extremely busy and I look forward to rising to the challenge with all of you – in solidarity, and as a true brotherhood where we collectively support each other and our Union’s priorities.
I have an open door policy – I truly want to keep our communication open and bring more transparency and accountability to our Local Union. I will continue to visit you on the jobsite and at our Union events, but I ask that you also communicate with us too.
Please contact our staff or myself with your questions or concerns. Let’s collaborate together and strengthen our job outlook and Local 569.
Thank you sisters and brothers!
Jeremy Abrams
Card # A129528
858-569-8900 | jabrams@ibew569.org
