Labor commissioner hints at re-run

SALEM, OR -- Oregon Labor Commissioner Jack Roberts hinted that he will seek re-election to an agency that he spent most of the 1997 legislative session trying to dismantle.

The Eugene Republican was explaining to union officials attending the second annual labor law conference of the Oregon State and Columbia-Pacific Building Trades Councils the virtues of spinning off sections of the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) and having his job appointed by the governor rather than elected, when he said, "Maybe the people will decide to let me continue next year, and maybe they'll decide to pick someone else."

When asked if that was an official announcement that he was running for re-election, he replied, "It's a hint."

Roberts maintained that elected officials are actually less accountable to the people than appointed agency heads. As an illustration he used the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), saying that had Jane Cease been an elected director of the DMV rather than appointed, "instead of being removed (fired) for the $100 million computer fiasco, she would right now be figuring out how to get re-elected."

Roberts said that the intent of his labor-opposed bill to dismantle BOLI was to create "a larger, more respected and powerful" agency to administer and enforce laws on wages, working conditions and discrimination in the workplace, housing and vocational and trade schools.

As it stands, he believes BOLI is too small and isolated to be effective.

The bureau also facilitates apprenticeship training programs.

His bill received only 13 votes in the Senate, which was controlled 20-10 by Republicans. Roberts announced that a second prevailing wage survey was in print and soon would be mailed to contractors. A survey last year proved inconclusive.

He said a bill passed by the Legislature will require annual prevailing wage surveys to determine minimum wages for the various construction crafts on publicly-financed projects. The first-term commissioner also announced that the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) would be filing discrimination complaints against several unnamed apprenticeship training programs.

A bill passed last session will release apprenticeship training committees as "agencies of the state" effective Oct. 4, but Roberts vowed to "stand behind apprenticeship committees" if the EEOC comes knocking.

"I don't know the basis of the complaints," he said, "but most of the problems we see with committees usually comes from the smaller non-union programs."

The labor law conference drew more than 50 union officials and staffers who were updated on laws revolving around picketing, salting, handbilling, and representing injured workers. Roberts made his comments during lunch at the Metro Electrical Training Center in northeast Portland.

(Editor's Note: Ray Baker, financial secretary of Oregon City Carpenters Local 1388, has announced that he will run for labor commissioner in the Democratic primary. Baker is president of the Northwest Oregon Labor Council.)