It’s been an incredible week for our campaign! Last Friday we kicked off the Labor Day weekend by announcing the endorsement of the Building & Construction Trades Council of Alameda County. This week we’re announcing the support of the Alameda County Carpenters Local 713!

Robert Raburn tours the wheelhouse as new tram cars are tested on the Oakland Airport Connector

This endorsement means a lot to me. For over 100 years, the Alameda County Carpenters Local 713 has worked to strengthen our communities, provide high paying jobs with good benefits, offer education and training for Alameda County carpenters, and ensure a safe and secure work place. I share these goals, and honor the Local 713’s tradition of fighting to make worker’s lives better. These shared values are why we’ve worked so well together while serving the public on the BART Board.

Join the Alameda County carpenters and construction workers in supporting our campaign! Please consider making a contribution today!

Over the past four years I’ve collaborated with the Carpenters union to accomplish the following:

• Ensured that the local jobs promised by BART contracts on the Oakland Airport Connector project were delivered, resulting in 100,000 hours of paid work time to carpenters, with 67 percent of these hours coming from Alameda, Contra Costa, San Francisco and San Mateo County workers (vastly exceeding BART’s projected goal of 50 percent workers from these four local counties).
• Established an ongoing apprenticeship program which has led to 19,000 hours of paid work time on the Oakland Airport Connector by apprentice carpenters, with 44 percent of those hours going to Oakland residents!
• Committed to creating state-of-the-art, career-oriented carpenter training, helping provide pre-apprentice classes, regular apprenticeship, pile driving apprenticeship and instruction in reading blueprints and worker safety.  
• Worked with non-profit developers to create affordable housing around Transit Oriented Developments (TOD) and secured a state budget obligation to spend 15 percent of Cap and Trade revenue on transit and housing to create more livable communities.

We’ve got two months until Election Day and just four weeks until people start voting by absentee ballot! Help me continue to work for you. Please join with the Alameda Carpenters Local 713 and the Building and Trades Council of Alameda County in supporting our campaign by contributing $25, $100, $1000 or more today!

Thanks for your support!

Robert