Teamsters Local 24 has a couple of good reasons to celebrate Labor Day today.
The union — the largest Teamsters local in Summit County — expects to have a sizable presence of 150 people in the annual Barberton Labor Day Parade that starts at 10 a.m.
It also will soon move its offices from cramped, rented space at 441 Wolf Ledges Parkway in Akron to a new, permanent headquarters it bought this year off Romig Road in front of the old Rolling Acres mall.
By the end of the month, Local 24 officers and staff should be moved in and holding their first meetings in the refurbished and expanded former National City Bank branch, said Travis Bornstein, president and principal officer of the local.
“We’re excited,” Bornstein said. “Things are really, really positive for us.”
The Teamsters local has been leasing office space ever since selling its large union hall on nearby Grant Street about two years ago. The union represents hourly workers at trucking company YRC Worldwide and its local subsidiaries, plus Coca-Cola, East Manufacturing, UPS Freight, ABF Freight, other businesses and some local governments.
“We have to stay in Akron,” Bornstein said. “We looked at several different properties in the Akron area.”
Space more than triples
The new union hall at 2380 Romig Road, just across the street from a McDonald’s restaurant, is 3,800 square feet, more than triple the 1,100-square-foot space the union officers now work in.
“It will have a meeting hall there set up for about 50 people,” Bornstein said. That will be large enough for most regular local meetings. The union will continue to rent larger halls as needed for such things as contract votes.
“The location works for us,” Bornstein said. “There’s tons of parking, which is key.”
Plus, the building is easily accessible from nearby highways, he said.
The area appears to be in transition from what at one time had been a popular retail center to a more industrial base, he said.
Bornstein declined to say how much the new union hall cost but said the purchase and the renovations are within the budget approved this year by the local membership. The project was aided by money the union had in its coffers from the sale of its Grant Street hall, he said.
“This is going to meet our needs. It will be efficient in what we need it to be,” Bornstein said. “Everybody likes to have a place to call home.”
Bornstein showed off the new hall, noting that a lot of work remains to be done (by union contractors) before anyone can move in.
“It’s coming together,” he said.
Some sweat equity has also gone into the project: Bornstein and other Local 24 members cut down a row of hedges blocking the view of the building from along Romig Road.
Membership recovers
Active membership now stands at about 1,500, Bornstein said. That’s up hundreds of people from just a couple of years ago, when the troubled economy was taking a toll and some members were placed in a Cleveland-area local as part of a union jurisdiction decision. (Membership was at more than 5,000 in the 1970s.)
A couple hundred Teamster 24 members have been called back from layoff in the recent past, Bornstein said.
“We have seen that things have really leveled off,” Bornstein said. “The economy has definitely leveled off. I’m not saying it’s booming. I’m not saying it’s back.”
Local 24 members are pretty excited about promoting union issues in the upcoming election, Bornstein said.
That includes having a sizable presence in the Barberton parade, he said.
Right to speak out
Larry Newsom, a 20-year steward with Local 24 and a longtime truck driver at YRC Freight, expects to walk in the parade with his son, 10, and daughter, 6. His trucking job involves delivering large and small packages door-to-door, similar to what UPS and other companies do, he said.
People need to see what being in union is all about, Newsom said.
“I’m on a one-man crusade to change the perception of the union worker,” he said. “I work hard every day and try to sell my company to the customers out there.”
Newsom, 46, said he is lucky to be in a union.
“I can voice my opinion without fear of repercussion,” he said. “I’m glad to know somebody is on my side. That’s what it means to be in a union. The biggest benefit of the union is to be on my side. It’s kind of like being a defense attorney. I don’t think people realize that.”
Participating in the Labor Day parade is a good thing, Newsom said.
“We should be doing more of this kind of stuff, getting out in front of the working public,” he said.
Jim Mackinnon can be reached at 330-996-3544 or jmackinnon@thebeaconjournal.com.