Local Roundup Local 8 members at a Concord City Council meeting March 2023 27 LOCAL 8 • San Francisco, California As the W-2s come in every year, I stop and think about finances—what I have coming in, what I have going out, etc.—mental gymnastics of money, evaluating what I spend it on and what I can get rid of. While I always try to rectify subscriptions I don’t use, cars I don’t work on, stacks of baseball cards I still own (yes, I’ve got thousands), I’ve noticed that the piles of parts and cards, golf clubs, and skateboards, never seem to shrink enough. (I’ll give you a moment while you think of your garage/spare bedroom/closet…) All of these things cost me time, money and space—both physical and mental trying to decide what this year’s plan involves for these projects, piles and plans. My dad, who had heard this from his stepdad, once told me, “When I’ve got time, I don’t have any money, and when I’ve got money, I can’t seem to find the time.” As a father myself, with a litany of projects, especially this past decade of booming work, the latter seemed to be a constant. I could count on more work than I wanted to do, more hours than I wanted to spend, more overtime than I could work. For a variety of reasons, it looks like the outlook has changed here. Things have slowed. Overtime isn’t as much of a necessity. The work outlook isn’t as frenetic. Another thing my dad always told me about money is, “Son, it’s going to rain again someday.” He was a Teamster who mostly drove locally for a couple of cement companies, one small company he was with for years, and then a larger one that had scooped up all of the competition in the Bay Area (sound familiar?). It’s looking more and more like that rainy day is here. For a bit of perspective, I was an apprentice in 2008 and 2009, working first in mod, and when that slowed, new construction. And as that slowed, well… I remember a job I was on in 2009, down in the South Bay. The company I worked for was hiring superintendents directly out of the military, just young kids who were “yes” men. They brought them on for one reason and one reason only—to do the dirty work of laying guys off. Fridays on this job were like standing in front of a firing squad. We’d all look around and wonder who was going to get it this week. Employees would try to hide from the supervisor and sneak out, because if they didn’t catch you this Friday, maybe you would get another week of work out of it. Eventually my number got called too. I was off work for three months, got picked back up for six, and then off for another three. Money was tight, things were rough. We had savings, three months’ worth, because, like my dad said, it was going to rain and you can’t pour concrete in the rain. Just the same, we pulled our kids out of daycare (Shout out to all the moms; have no idea how you do it. My kids ran me ragged) and tightened our belts. I was fortunate that my wife worked through the slowdown, but not everyone is so lucky. The moral is take care of each other and save enough for that rainy day. Save enough even during the booming times, because while we are fortunate here in California to have SDI, which provides some money should you be injured or have to take care of a sick family member, that isn’t the case everywhere, including for our Local 8 siblings in Nevada. Save, prepare, do good work, be proud of who you are and what you do. And please reach out if you or those you know are struggling. Sometimes it’s enough to know that you aren’t alone. Members Gabe Lange, Matt Canfield and Adam Shoivitz outside of the Concord City Council Apprentice Kyle Edwards working on a remote pipe run Remote pipe run installed by Dave Davison and Kyle Edwards
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