Kudos to AFSCME Ohio Housing Inspector, Unionist Bill McEntee

by Mike Hall, Oct 31, 2008

AFSCME Local 101 member John Carter

Abandoned houses with windows broken, doors hanging by a hinge and yards knee-deep in grass, eventually are boarded up and the yards mowed. But for too many years in Dayton, Ohio, that duty fell to the city because a tangled web of banking laws made it nearly impossible for city officials to determine just who was responsible for the properties.

That is, until John Carter, AFSCME Local 101 member and a city housing inspector, began to untangle this web of  banking bureaucracy. Thanks to his deft detective work, the city is now saving more than $50,000 a year in boarding costs and Carter has been named one of the eight “Public Officials of the Year,” chosen by Governing magazine.

In a post on AFSCME’s website, our colleague Clyde Weiss writes that once the houses were foreclosed and abandoned:

Banks would take ownership, Carter explains, “But you couldn’t locate anybody who would take responsibility” for boarding up a foreclosed house, or cutting the grass. So it became the city’s responsibility by default.

Determined to save taxpayers money as the number of foreclosures ballooned, Carter immersed himself in understanding how the mortgage industry works. Untangling this web of the banking bureaucracy on his own, he learned which companies were legally responsible for property upkeep, then dogged them with calls and e-mails to fulfill their obligations.

Click here to read the whole story.

In other news from AFSCME, Bill McEntee—father of AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee—has been honored in Philadelphia for his role in bringing about the first collective bargaining agreement between AFSCME and the city in 1938.

A historic marker, recently unveiled at City Hall by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, dedicated to Bill McEntee reads:

In 1938, 3,000 Philadelphia municipal workers launched a strike protesting wage cuts and layoffs, among the first in a major American city. After 8 days, a collective bargaining agreement was reached, leading to the formation of AFSCME District Council 33.

Click here to read more.

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