May 13, 2021
|
Around the NASRCC, Company News
A strong union needs skills, benefits and ACTION!
Fred Taylor, Carpenters Local 336 Business Representative has been selected as one of the Worcester Business Journal’s “Power 50” which recognizes the most influential people in the Worchester business community, while in New York Local 276 Council Representative Jomo Akono and Local 277 President James Mason have been chosen for the “New York State Labor Power Top 100” by City and State.
Taylor joined the Carpenters union as an apprentice in 2000. In 2008 he was elected as a delegate to the council and became the first Black Recording Secretary for Local 107 (now Local 336) and in 2015 was hired to work on staff. Taylor was recently elected as President of the Worcester branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and through his work as a business representative, he is entrenched in advocating for equity for Black, brown and other underserved communities.
Jomo Akono, a second-generation union carpenter joined the Carpenters union in 2005. He went through the apprenticeship program and worked as a journeyman for over five years before becoming a Council Representative in 2016. Jomo was later appointed to the Eboard of the North Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters. Akono has played a fundamental role in the Council’s diversity outreach efforts in Western New York, and continues to pursue goals to diversify the Local Union by working to represent local demographics and to increase the number of women in the trade through special pre-apprenticeship initiatives: specifically, the Sisters in the Brotherhood program.
James Mason leads Carpenters Local 277 that represents more than 3,000 members in a 21-county area spanning northern and central New York and the Southern Tier. He also sits on the North Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters Eboard. Last year, Mason played a key role in the city of Fulton introducing new rules intended to prevent wage theft on construction projects; warning contractors to play by the rules or risk fines or losing their building permits.