Pittsburgh UNITED (Unions and Neighborhoods Invested in Transforming Economic Development) came together in 2007, when it achieved the first-ever Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) with local developers. CBAs are legally enforceable documents that spell out specific benefits — like job training and local hiring preferences— that developers agree to provide residents, institutions and businesses located close to the proposed project.

Pittsburgh UNITED has grown into a broader coalition of unions, environmental, faith based, and community organizations. Pittsburgh UNITED is currently working the greening of a massive sewer infrastructure project in Allegheny County.  This workshop will highlight their efforts on that project.

Presenters:
William Peduto, City Council Member, Pittsburgh City Council

The ambitious goal to plant a million trees in New York City by 2017 has inspired government agencies, non-profits and private businesses to work together towards this common vision. The MillionTreesNYC Training Program was created to train individuals to carry out this work, while gaining valuable technical and professional skills to fortify their growing green careers.

This workshop will consider the recruitment process and how private and public groups identify good candidates for green job training programs. Representatives from the companies and non-profits that provide their time and technical expertise to empower the program’s participants will also discuss the specifics of the certifications they deliver. Finally, alumni who have jobs in public and private sectors will discuss the benefits and challenges they face in both job training programs and subsequent green jobs.

Presenters:
Lisa Hawkins, Job Developer, New York City Parks & Recreation/MillionTreesNYC Training ProgramJ
onathan Pereira, Director of Special Projects, Comprehensive Development Inc., Manhattan Comprehensive Day and Night School
Vincent Blakeney, Crew Leader, New York City Parks & Recreation/MillionTreesNYC Training Program
Trainee, MillionTreesNYC Training Program (Invited)
Alumni, MillionTreesNYC Training Program (Invited)

This workshop focuses upon creating wholly replicable and fully self-sustaining economic entities and opportunities for classroom teachers. The green economy is about more than creating green manufacturing, construction and energy jobs; it must also be aligned to classroom engagement and opportunities facilitating academic success and post secondary career engagement readiness.

Essential elements of a new green economy include creating jobs and opportunities in the growth and distribution of good, high quality foods, as well as locally sourced products and services that enhance quality of life for all stakeholders. Stephen Ritz, a NYC educator, has done just that with the Green Bronx Machine. In this workshop, Steve and his students will describe the evolution and goals of Green Bronx Machine — a locally grown classroom initiative dedicated to harvesting hope and cultivating minds with a triple bottom line orientation.

Presenters:
Stephen Ritz, Founder, Green Bronx Machine Group
Darrell Francis, Green Bronx Machine 2011 Cohort
Jonathan Collazo, Green Bronx Machine 2011 Cohort
Nadje Maguehi, Green Bronx Machine 2011 Cohort
Nathali Sorriano, Green Bronx Machine 2011 Cohort

This workshop will highlight Jobs21!, a comprehensive national jobs plan developed by the BlueGreen Alliance. Presenters will describe how such a plan can revitalize the East’s economy and protect the environment through a set of smart policies and investments in clean energy, green technology and modernizing the region’s aging infrastructure.

How can states play a role in ensuring a clean energy manufacturing base in America?  While policies to scale-up clean energy technologies are stalled on the federal level, many states are still making investments in clean energy projects and installations.  As states take these bold steps towards the clean energy economy, how can they ensure domestic manufacturing takes the leap with them? This workshop will explore the various state-based procurement initiatives underway to ensure that the state-funds used to pay for clean energy projects place a preference on American-made components in order to effectively grow and sustain a clean energy manufacturing base in America.

Presenters:
Linda Andros, Legislative Counsel, United Steelworkers
Scott Boos, Deputy Director, Alliance for American Manufacturing

Green jobs are not always safe jobs, and many hazards associated with green jobs are not unique.  They can be the typical workplace hazards — including fall, lockout/tagout, and confined space hazards — or new challenges discovered as workers and managers confront new processes and materials. Employers are required to protect workers from hazards and follow OSHA requirements, whether they are "green or not."  This panel will discuss the typical green job hazards in different industries and discuss the OSHA requirements that apply to these hazards. They will also the discuss safety and health training programs that can help workers and employers address these requirements.

Presenters:
Mitchel A. Rosen, Director, Office of Public Health Practice, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, School of Public Health
Ted Outwater, Public Health Educator and Program Administrator, Worker Education and Training Program, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
Sanji Kanth, PE, Safety Engineer, Office of General Industry Enforcement; Directorate of Enforcement Programs, Occupational Safety and Health Administration

Green buildings will only perform as designed if the people who build, renovate, operate and maintain those buildings have a thorough working knowledge of green practices.

Labor unions are taking a leadership role in accelerating the construction industry’s transition to green building practices by providing trained workers and collaborating with environmental groups to create comprehensive green worker training.

This panel will address labor unions’ critical role in transforming the green building workforce and how labor unions and Urban Green Council successfully collaborated to create the Green Professional Building Skills Training program, a national green building certificate program for contractors, trades, operators and building service workers.

Moderator:
Ellen Honigstock, Director of Construction Education, Urban Green Council

Presenters:
Bob Muldoon Director, The Green Building Initiative, Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ Training Fund
Howard Styles, Training Director, International Union of Operating Engineers Local 94 New York City
John Sullivan, The United Association of Plumbers Local Union No.1 Trade Education Fund
Michael Yee, Director, The Educational and Cultural Trust Fund of the Electrical Industry Board

Through its work as a joint labor/management educational program for eligible members of the United Steelworkers and a Department of Labor grantee, the Institute for Career Development (ICD) will share its unique perspective on how it has contributed to building a clean energy movement one Steelworker and one citizen at a time. ICD staff members will share examples of coursework offered through local Career Development programs that has affected how Steelworkers think about and use energy. Many of ICD's local programs have had success in offering introductory level type classes on solar energy and home efficiency. The workshop will also focus on the high-level heating and air program that has established itself as an industry leader.

Presenters:
Sean Hayden, Communications Director, Institute for Career Development
Randy Noak, Technology Coordinator, Institute for Career Development

Government plays an important role in making the U.S. a global powerhouse in automobile and truck manufacturing and jobs. Panelists will describe the success of key policies including strong vehicle fuel efficiency and carbon pollution standards and manufacturing investments. Strong standards drive new innovations in fuel-saving technologies while loan guarantees and research grants help ensure the innovations and new technology manufacturing happen in the U.S. Join the conversation about these foundational policies and learn about the thousands of U.S. workers building components today that make cars and trucks cleaner and more fuel efficient.

Presenters:
Luke Tonachel, Senior Analyst, Transportation Program, Natural Resources Defense Council
Zoe Lipman, Senior Manager Transportation Solutions, National Wildlife Federation

A new Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDL) set by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, was adopted in an effort to restore the Willamette River and the endangered salmon species. This change required Albany-Millersburg Water Reclamation facility and ATI Wah Chang — a local manufacturer — to make changes to their waste water treatment systems to meet the new set of thermal load limits.

Inspired by the surrounding environment, an abandoned 50-acre lumber mill was beautifully transformed into a engineered wetlands that include a series of hydrological features to replicate the cleansing and cooling characteristics that happen naturally in nature. The workshop will discuss this effort.

Presenters:
Henriette Emond, Natural Resource Engineer, CH2M HILL
Kevin Moran, Safety Coordinator, United Steelworkers
Ryan Bodily, Environmental Manager, ATI Wah Chang

This workshop will explore the creation of an offshore wind supply chain that runs synergistically along the Atlantic seaboard, why it’s important, and how it could come to be. Will it be entirely market-driven?  Or will states act cooperatively in an effort to make the process more orderly and efficient?  What happens without the synergy?  Could thse manufacturing jobs be lost to China? This panel will answer these questions and more.

Presenters:
Patrick Fullenkamp, Director, Technical Services, Great Lakes Wind Network
Mark Sinclair, Executive Director, Clean Energy States Alliance
Representative, Gamesa (Invited)
Paul Williamson, Director and Industry Coordinator, Maine Wind Industry Initiative (Invited)

This workshop will explore innovative strategies being used to grow both the number and quality of jobs in the recycling and zero waste industry, one of the leading sectors of the green jobs economy. There are currently 800,000 jobs in recycling, and another 1.5 million jobs could be added. These jobs will dramatically reduce greenhouse gases and toxic pollution.  Speakers will discuss recent findings about the long-term potential of the recycling industry, as well as new work happening on the ground in Boston and New York to reduce waste while creating new, family-sustaining jobs.

Presenters:
Diana Bell, Senior Organizer, Community Labor United (Massachusetts)
Alex Papali, Green Justice Campaign Organizer, Clean Water Action Massachusetts (Boston)
Matt Ryan , Executive Director, Alliance for a Greater New York

 IUE-CWA and the Environmental Defense Fund partnered together to train IUE-CWA members to identify energy-efficiency opportunities through “Treasure Hunts.” These Treasure Hunts improve the competitiveness of manufacturing facilities, save companies money, and cut greenhouse gas emissions, by leveraging the expertise of the workforce to investigate a facility’s energy and natural resource consumption. Teams identify, quantify, and recommend projects to maximize efficiency and minimize waste. Attend this workshop to learn how this project works to develop union capability to conduct Treasure Hunts in order to catalyze wider energy-efficiency awareness among the entire labor movement.

Presenters:
Lauren Asplen, Assistant to the President, IUE-CWA
Ed Derr, Lean Coordinator, IUE-CWA Local 648
Bill Draves, Treasure Hunt Team Leader, IUE-CWA Local 722
Brendan FitzSimons, Corporate Partnerships Project Manager, Environmental Defense Fund
Bruce Bremer, Bremer Energy Consulting Services

With 14 million Americans out of work, the potential for the solar industry to help reinvigorate the American economy has never been more important. This panel will discuss the importance of jobs in proving the value of the solar industry; how the solar labor market compares with other sectors; leading states in solar job growth; and employer workforce challenges and needs. Recommendations for employers, policymakers and workforce training providers will be discussed in order to ensure that the economic benefits of the solar industry are fully realized.

Presenters:
Andrea Luecke, Executive Director, The Solar Foundation
Phil Jordan, Founder and President, Green LMI
Mike Healy, Independent Advisor for Solar Heating and Cooling, State Policy, Solar Energy Industries Association
Jane Weissman, Executive Director, The Interstate Renewable Energy Council 

Since 1998, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded more than $35 million in Brownfields Job Training grants. With that funding, more than 6,600 people have been trained and more than 4,400 individuals have full-time jobs in the environmental field. In this workshop, EPA Brownfields Program Job Training Grants (now called Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training) recipients will discuss how they assess and meet the needs of trainees, employers and their communities in growing the size and value of the Green Jobs market. 

Presenters:
Lawrence Jackson, Director of Programs, STRIVE East Harlem
Tania Beaubrun, Deputy Director for Skills Programs, St. Nicholas Alliance
George Paffendorf, Director of Programs, New Jersey Youth Corp
Schenine Mitchel, Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training Regional Contact, Brownfields & Land Revitalization Branch, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 2 (Invited)
John Mello, Green Projects Director, Baltimore Center for Green Careers, Civic Works, Inc
Dennis Chestnut, Executive Director, Groundwork Anacostia River, D.C.
Cheryl Deitz, Coordinator Workforce & Economic Development, Harrisburg Area Community College
Jeff Barnett, Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training Regional Contact, Brownfields & Land Revitalization Branch, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 3 (Invited)

As we move America to a cleaner, healthier energy economy, we must consider the impacts of this transition. How will people in specific industries fare? How will communities and regions adapt to this change? How can we limit adverse impact and make sure the transition is prosperous for as many people as possible, throughout regions and industries? These questions are already beginning to be dealt with in America, but our counterparts in Germany and other areas in Europe are further along in their transition. We invite you to hear from a panel featuring representatives of unions and environmental organizations — many of whom participated in a 10 day long "Green Jobs Tour" of Germany and Belgium — to learn about just this subject.

There are any number of issues around which labor and environmental groups can work together. In Virginia, the Communications Workers of America and Sierra Club set out to work together by convening a workshop of their leaders in order to explore their shared values and differences. The groups then focused on concrete actions they could take to build a working relationship such as environmentalists walking on the CWA picket lines and CWA members speaking at environmental forums and supporting environmental legislation.   This program will share lessons learned in how CWA and the Sierra Club came to work together in Virginia.  

Presenters:
Kenneth Peres, Ph.D., Researcher & Economist, Communications Workers of America
Richard Hatch, President, Communications Workers of America- Virginia State Council
Glen Besa, Director, Sierra Club-Virginia Chapter

The Good Jobs, Green Jobs movement is underappreciated as a positive method for addressing the ongoing legacy of environmental injustice in communities of color throughout the East. The remediation of contaminated sites in these communities has always been a green issue, yet it has rarely been a priority. This workshop will provide participants with an understanding of how green principles are being incorporated into the recovery of impacted communities in Philadelphia. Presenters will provide an overview of the local environmental justice issues, successful green jobs projects as a path forward, and the revitalization and restoration of impacted coastal communities.

Moderator:
Ted Outwater, Program Administrator, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Worker Education and Training Program

Presenters:
Donald Killinger, Minority Worker Training Director, New York District Council of Carpenters Labor Technical College
Mitch Rosen, Director, Office of Public Health Practice, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, School of Public Health
Michael Johnson-Chase, Director, Green Workforce Training Program, Solar One

The United Nations has declared 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives with the theme “Cooperative Enterprises Build a Better World.” Because cooperatives are democratic and focus on member-owner needs rather than maximizing return for shareholders, they are able to not only create jobs, but also create local wealth and enrich communities in an environmentally sensitive manner. This workshop will provide an overview of the cooperative business model and discuss their ability to empower workers through democratic workplaces and generate sustainable, local-based employment opportunities. The natural and historical affinity between unions and cooperatives will be demonstrated through examples.

Presenters:
Bob Noble, Cooperative Business Developer, Keystone Development Center
Peter Frank, Advocacy Coordinator, CooperationWorks!
Jeff Hornstein, President, Philadelphia Jewish Labor Committee

Recycling is an important alternative to landfills and waste-to-energy facilities — it helps the environment by reducing the need to mine new materials; uses less water and energy and creates less pollution than primary resource industries; reduces health impacts on predominantly poor people and communities of color who often live near landfills and incinerators; and creates jobs. Recycling already represents nearly one million jobs across the country, and has the potential to add 1.5 million more. 

This workshop will look at new research on recycling jobs, including More Jobs, Less Pollution, a national report that describes job creation potential in the recycling industry. The workshop will also discuss Recycling and Jobs in Massachusetts, A Study of Current and Future Workforce Needs, a report that digs down into the types of jobs that are anticipated to be created in the next two years, job drivers, and needed skills, along with information on how product stewardship by manufacturers creates jobs. The workshop will also touch on how environmental justice communities are organizing against incinerators and in favor of recycling. 

Moderator:
Mark Lichtenstein, President, National Recycling Coalition; Executive Director, SyracuseCOE Center for Sustainable Community Solutions

Presenters:
Ananda Lee Tan, U.S. and Canada Coordinator, Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives
Matt Prindiville, Associate Director, Product Policy Institute
Amy Perlmutter, Principal, Perlmutter Associates
Desire Grover, Community Organizer, Delco Alliance for Environmental Justice

Forest products industry responsibly manage the forest resource, use renewable energy, minimize their environmental impact, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, promote recycling and strive for a safe workplace.  The workshop will focus on the industry’s new “Better Practices, Better Planet 2020” initiative which set challenging goals in each of these areas.  It also will discuss green jobs in the growing arena of forest ecosystem services, where new jobs are created as landowners monitor, measure, and verify the existence and extent of the ecosystem services provided by forests.

Presenters:
Mark Pitts, Executive Director, Printing and Writing Papers, American Forest & Paper Association
R. Neil Sampson President, The Sampson Group, Inc. and President, Vision Forestry, LLC.
Keith Romig, Public Policy Analyst, United Steelworkers (USW)

Civic Works, a Baltimore-based nonprofit, is working for a vibrant and equitable home performance industry in Baltimore. The organization pioneered a suite of interwoven projects that are simultaneously creating demand for residential energy efficiency while also providing job training and placement for Baltimore's unemployed and underemployed residents.

In Massachusetts, the Green Justice Coalition has developed a successful and compelling program to build equity and opportunity into the implementation of the state’s Green Communities Act. This residential retrofit program taps into a public utility rate-payer fund, and works directly with low-income communities to generate demand for retrofits by highlighting the benefits to family budgets of reduced energy costs.

This workshop will lay out the successes of each model, while also addressing ongoing challenges to bringing both the Baltimore and Massachusetts energy efficiency market to scale.

Presenters:
John Mello, Green Projects Director, Baltimore Center for Green Careers, Civic Works, Inc.
Ketorus Gooding, Graduate, Home Performance Installer Training, Civic Works’ Baltimore Center for Green Careers
Eli Allen, Founder, Retrofit Baltimore
Darlene Lombos, Executive Director, Community Labor United
Jovanna Garcia Soto, Green Space Coordinator, Chelsea Collaborative
Robert Bower, Political Director, Massachusetts AFL-CIO (Invited)

Healthy schools that are free from toxic chemicals are critical to children’s health. Recent Environmental Protection Agency testing of schools found elevated levels of PCBs, a banned chemical tied to cancer and nervous system damage. Additionally, an emerging toxic plastic of concern, PVC, is widespread in schools. This plastic if often filled with phthalates, chemicals that have been banned in toys.

The panel will explore efforts to create greener and healthier schools that are free of these toxic chemicals. Panelists will also discuss how eliminating these harmful chemicals in our school will create healthier schools, new jobs, and money-savings in the long-term.

Presenters:
Mike Schade, Campaign Coordinator, Center for Health, Environment & Justice
Joel Shufro, Executive Director, New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (Invited)
Al Huang, Senior Attorney, Natural Resources Defense Council (Invited)
Darryl Alexander, Program Director, Health and Safety, American Federation of Teachers (Invited)
Michael Williams, Senior Policy and Legislative Advocate, BlueGreen Alliance

This workshop is a joint venture between The Sustainability Workshop in Philadelphia and the State of Connecticut's Technical High School’s green construction learning laboratory. The Sustainability Workshop provides Philadelphia public high school seniors with an opportunity to spend a year on the Clean Energy Campus of The Navy Yard, working on real-world projects to improve energy efficiency, address the challenges of climate change and lead Philadelphia into the green economy. Connecticut’s learning laboratory consists of E-Houses that provide clean energy curriculum and hands on experience for its architectural, carpentry, electrical, and plumbing departments faculty and students. Both of these innovative education models prepare students for post-secondary education and taking their place in the new green economy.

In this workshop, students and staff from the Sustainability Workshop will describe how they have worked together to identify and complete projects. Students and faculty from Connecticut’s E-House will demonstrate the process of construct E-Houses on their three campuses.