We Rise by Lifting Others
Our Union is grounded on the principles of mutual aid and protection of all workers engaged in our trades. BAC has long recognized that our strength as a union is directly related to our ability to elevate the standards for all craftworkers. Organizing, training, and collective bargaining are the essential tools that allow us to collectively raise standards for BAC members, their families, and the communities they live in. Ultimately, our strength lies in our ability to lift each other up.
There is no better example of the uplifting work that BAC is engaged in than the apprenticeship and training opportunities that BAC local unions across North America provide to groom the next generation of skilled craftworkers. I was fortunate enough to recently visit several local training centers to see firsthand the transformative power that our training programs afford those seeking to realize their potential (page 14).
And while training the next generation is central to BAC’s mission, organizing the unorganized, both workers and contractors, is just as critical if we are to truly elevate the standards in our industry (page 18). And there is no better advocate for the value that union construction represents than you, the BAC craftworker. Your skill and commitment are the best advertisement for BAC, and your support of newly organized contractors and members is central to our effort to improve the lives of all workers engaged in our trades.
Today, there are 200,000 fewer construction workers engaged in non-residential construction than there were at this time in 2019. However, with construction activity across both our countries projected to exceed pre-pandemic levels next year, the primary challenge facing the construction industry is addressing this shortage of skilled craftworkers. Those organizations that successfully address this challenge will shape the future of the construction industry for years to come.
The task before us is clear, even if the path forward is challenged by greedy developers, unscrupulous contractors, and competing building systems. But none of this is new to BAC — those forces have persisted for as long as our union has been in existence. Our role now, as it has been in the past, is to meet those challenges head on by:
+ remaining the preeminent source for skilled craftworkers in the trowel trades;
+ engaging the public on the benefits of union labor; and
+ working actively with industry partners to advance the role of our trades on the jobsites of tomorrow.
BAC will remain engaged on all these fronts because the right of craftworkers to have a say in how they apply their trade, how they are compensated, and under what conditions they work remains the charge that has been placed upon us. When those things no longer matter to workers, then BAC will have completed its mission. Till then, there is much work before us.
Stay healthy and stay safe, brothers and sisters!