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The Great Plains Laborers District Council represents 19 different Laborers local unions, with over 11,000 members, in northern Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota.
These local unions represent workers that include construction laborers, public employees, plant workers and Indian Health Services.
Iowa Governor pushes misclassification study
Iowa Governor Chet Culver has created a special task force to close loopholes in state employment laws and help insure that workers are probably covered by workers' compensation and wage and hour laws.
John Penn new LIUNA VP
John Penn, Great Plains Laborers District Council business manager and a Laborers Local 362 member, was named Laborers Midwest Region Manager and a Laborers International Union Vice-President, effective May 1.
99 and still active
When people hear about “horse and buggy” days it conjures long ago times. But one Rock Island, Illinois Laborers Local 309 member has over 70 years of union membership and remembers covered wagons, horses, steam trains and his Model T.
Bill Stickney was born December 5, 1908 in rural Iowa’s Amana colonies.
Illinois Laborer wins community service award
Mike Matejka, a Laborers Local 362 member and legislative affairs director for the Great Plains Laborers District Council, was awarded the 2008 "Robert G. Gibson Community Service" award by the Illinois AFL-CIO.
Laborers 309 honors "Hero Street"
The steam locomotive whistles were a constant echo around Silvis, Illinois during World War II, where the Rock Island Line was busy repairing its equipment, keeping it rolling during that frantic time of war.
Second Street wasn’t far from the railroad shops, a small Mexican-American enclave whose residents weren’t the skilled boilermakers or machinists in the rail shops, but the track workers and day laborers who did the railroad’s grunt work and heavy lifting.
Second Street isn’t called Second Street anymore – today it is known as “Hero Street,” thanks to the brave military record of its residents, especially during World War II.
Laborers 362 wins Chamber award
Historically, the “chamber of commerce” in a community represents its business interests, while labor unions represent workers.
At the nation’s capitol and in Springfield you’ll often find them on opposite sides when it comes to issues of minimum wages or workers’ compensation.
In McLean County, however, local unions have built a long-term relationship with the local business community. Thus it was extraordinary, but not necessarily surprising, when the McLean County Chamber of Commerce named Laborers International Union of North America Local 362 its “small business of the year.”
New monument for shipyard Laborers
The quiet green park in tiny Seneca, Illinois, hides the flurry of activity here 60 years ago.
Crotty Park boasts a ballfield and other outdoor recreation facilities for the small town of 2,000 residents. It also boasts a new monument, erected with donated labor from Laborers Local 393 in Marseilles, Illinois – the LST monument.
More than hot air -- wind farms mean jobs
A gentle “whoosh” is the recurring sound, as giant propeller blades whir effortlessly on the prairie landscape.
Instead of occasional grain elevators and endless crop rows, a new bumper crop is coming to the Midwestern prairies – wind farms.
Small town honors desert war victims
As the Illinois River spins its course in the background, upright marble slaps perched on the stream’s bank recall fiery desert conflict a world away.
Thanks to the efforts of Laborers Local 393 in Marseilles, Illinois, the American service men and women who perished in desert conflicts this past decade are now permanently remembered.
The wall, which already contains over 2,000 names, features five black granite markers, each 6.5 feet tall, stretching more than 50 feet along the river’s bank.
Compasssion Corner built with donated Labor
Laborers 362 retiree Dick Kellerhals cuts the ribbon at Bloomington's new Compassion Corner, a day center for the homeless, along with Mayor Judy Markowitz. Over $200,000 of donated union labor helped open the center.
The case of the missing oysters
Laborer wins grievance
Is a missing can of oysters ground for termination?
John While, a Laborers 362 member, recently won a grievance against the Bloomington Housing Authority (BHA), over a can of oysters and use of a pair of donated coveralls.