February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Stephen McKinley
Union leaders who attended the World Economic Forum in New York took time off on Sunday afternoon for a visit downtown to pay their respects at Ground Zero. The conference delegates were led by John Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO.
At ground zero, Uniformed Fire Officers Association president Peter Gorman led the group on a tour of the site. Sweeney had the privilege of introducing Kevin Kelly, a New York City firefighter, to Juan Somavia, director of the International Labor Organization from Geneva, Switzerland.
On Sept. 11, Somavia, who works with Kelly’s sister in Geneva, helped comfort her as she tried to find out if he was still alive.
“When it happened, my sister still hadn’t heard from me,” Kelly said, recounting his experience of Sept. 11. “Juan Somovia and my sister’s colleagues, they all came together for her, and tried to help her, and prayed with her. She finally heard from me. What they did was very nice, it was very touching.” The two men embraced, and Kelly presented Somovia with two FDNY caps.
Union delegates were visibly moved when they reached Ground Zero. The long history of workers’ struggles and the proud response of organized labor was vividly brought to mind by the events of Sept. 11, when, as Sweeney noted during the visit, so many of the victims were union members who worked either at the World Trade Center or who were members of rescue and emergency services. These heroes, he said, were the reason why workers from all over the world were united in solidarity with New York.
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Gorman pointed out various areas of Ground Zero, including where the South Tower fell. There, he said, workers still expected to find many more bodies of firefighters and police officers.
“I take a great deal of pride as a firefighter and as a member of labor, that we are giving human dignity to the victims of this disaster. It is a labor of love,” he said, describing the scene when a new body is uncovered. All equipment is silenced and the body, covered in an American flag, is brought forth by firefighters to an ambulance.
“Seventy-five percent of the tonnage [of debris] is out by now,” he said, a testament to the dedication of the firefighters, the ironworkers, and other union members who continue to work 24 hours a day at the site.
Sweeney paid tribute to the workers, and as the delegates boarded their bus back to the WEF, introduced three immigrant workers. One, a member of the Hotel and Restaurant Workers’ Union, described the effect of Sept. 11 on his co-workers.
“Since Sept. 11th, 350 of my co-workers have been devastated. Seventy-three of them died, the rest are out of work,” he said. “We have been suffering. Employers are firing, not hiring, and they are not helping us at all. If it was not for the union, I would not be able to stand here today.”
Another immigrant, from the Caribbean, told her harrowing Sept. 11 story. “I worked here at the World Trade Center for 21 years,” she said. “Sometimes we worked seven days a week. It was like a family. When the plane hit the tower, my friend came to me on fire. I had to help put her out. The reason she got burned was because she operated an elevator.” When her friend opened the doors of an elevator, cascading, burning jet fuel set her on fire.
A third immigrant, from China, told the delegates of the plight of garment workers. Her union, local 2325 is largely Chinese. On the day of the attacks, she had been working as an election volunteer. She remembers the fear in Chinatown, only 20 minutes’ walk from the World Trade Center, and how she rushed home to help her sick husband. “Our shop,” she said, “is not so good anymore.”
Sweeney reminded the delegates of the need for unions to be stronger than ever. He drew attention to areas where unions had to help workers that may not be as obvious as other, well-known employer-worker relations, such as mental health problems that workers at the World Trade Center site might experience. Sweeney, an Irish-American native of the Bronx, has been president of the AFL-CIO since 1995.