Our Philadelphia

Representative, District 173

McGeehan's Top Donors, 2001-2008

1	Ironworkers Local 401 PAC	$73,400
2	United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America	$27,900
3	Sprinkler Fitters Local 692 PAC	$17,000
4	International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers	$16,350
5	Gabriel Piorko	$16,100

About McGeehan's Top Donors

Ironworkers Local 401 PAC

According to its website, Ironworkers Local 401’s members are “trained in skills such as the erection of structural steel, miscellaneous steel, metal curtainwall and windowall systems, precast concrete structures, fences, towers, pre-engineered metal buildings, and other steel structures.” Local 401 members have played a prominent role in the construction of the Philadelphia Convention Center, Comcast Center, and the city’s sports stadiums, among other projects. In 2009, Ironworkers joined other unions in helping to convince the Delaware County Council to spend $28.6 million towards the construction of a $115 million soccer stadium in Chester. From 2001-2008, Local 401 gave more than $450,000 to candidates in Pennsylvania.

United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America

With over 12,000 members, the UBCJA is one of Philadelphia’s largest and most influential unions. U.S. Rep. Bob Brady has been a member of UBCJA since 1964 and the union has continued contributing to his pension for work performed, according to a 2/6/08 article in the Inquirer. Lobbying by the union’s leader Edward J. Coryell, Sr. was instrumental in getting the Philadelphia Convention Center built, yet Coryell also led a strike that halted work on the Center for three weeks in 1991. High labor costs, including wages for carpenters, have been blamed for the dearth of new home construction in Philadelphia. According to a 8/12/01 article in the Inquirer, “The wage rates for union workers who build houses in Philadelphia are as much as 50 percent higher than the rates the same unions charge in the suburbs. The long-standing but little-known wage disparity, combined with union domination of the city building trades, increases the overall construction cost of a new single-family house in Philadelphia by 30 percent when compared with the suburbs, according to interviews, labor contracts, and cost data . . . Builders and city officials say the disparity is one reason that new-housing construction in Philadelphia is virtually nonexistent, threatening Mayor Street's ambitious effort to build 16,000 units and attract 75,000 residents to a city that has suffered a 40-year population decline.”

Sprinkler Fitters Local 692 PAC

http://www.sprinklerfitters692.org/

International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers

Gov. Ed Rendell called IBEW “the most politically influential union around,” in an April 30, 2008 article in the Philadelphia City Paper. As long-time leader of the IBEW and former treasurer of the city Democratic Party, John Dougherty has been a kingmaker in city politics, and an endorsement from Dougherty is often followed by an infusion of campaign cash from other sources, and volunteers to help with getting out the vote. The extent to which Dougherty and IBEW depend upon campaign contributions to wield influence was dramatized in 2007 when Dougherty joined U.S. Rep. Chakah Fattah in filing a lawsuit alleging that Philadelphia did not have the power to limit campaign contributions to candidates in city elections. As part of their lawyers’ arguments in Nutter v. Dougherty, et al, it was alleged that the Pennsylvania General Assembly had intended to preempt any municipality in the state from making its own campaign finance laws. Dougherty and IBEW have also been strong supporters of expanding legalized gambling and building casinos in Philadelphia, in part because of the potential contracts for IBEW members.

Gabriel Piorko

Gabriel Piorko