January 15, 2016
Hayden Mitman/for PhillyVoice
Ernie Bennett, a district director for the service workers union, addresses a gathered crowd during Friday's early morning protest.
Blue collar workers in the School District of Philadelphia on Friday aired their demands on Friday for a safer workplace to Mayor Jim Kenney, district officials and a representative of Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf.
In a late afternoon meeting, members of 32BJ SEIU District 1201 stated their safety concerns in the wake of a boiler explosion on Wednesday at an East Mount Airy elementary school that left a worker hospitalized with serious burns.
As a result, the mayor announced that the city on Tuesday would begin inspections of all boilers in school district buildings, according to a union statement. The district will also put in place new employee safety measures, training programs and a "long-term action plan based on condition assessments due in March.
“We appreciate that Mayor Kenney stepped in to make our schools safer for students and workers,” said Gabe Morgan, union vice president, in a statement. “School District workers should not have to risk their lives to do their jobs. We will be working with the Mayor and the School District to implement the safety measures necessary to make sure a horrific accident like this never happens again. We are praying for Chris [Trakimas] and his family at this difficult time.”
On Friday morning union members had gathered at the school district headquarters to demand increased safety in the workplace.
"The school district is overlooking issues that they should be funding," said Ernie Bennett, a district director for the Service Employees International Union 32BJ representing School District of Philadelphia workers. "We want answers to the questions to the problems that exist in these schools."
Workers at the demonstration said they have complained about the city's schools falling into disrepair for years, with little response from the district. The injury of a fellow union member in Wednesday's explosion was the last straw, they said.
"We can't and we won't risk any more lives," Bennett said. "You can't ask us to give our lives."
On Wednesday, a boiler exploded at F.S. Edmonds Elementary School on the 8000 block of Thouron Avenue in East Mt. Airy.
The explosion at 12:40 p.m. – which union members said happened as students were having lunch just 100 feet away – seriously injured Chris Trakimas, a 61-year-old maintenance worker at the school for 28 years.
Trakimas suffered third-degree burns to the lower portion of his body after he turned on a boiler that had been dormant for about a year-and-a-half, union officials said.
"He was badly burned," union spokesperson Julie Blust said. "He was apparently on fire for several minutes."
Gabe Morgan, vice president and state director for the union, said Edmonds students were in danger and, without changes, students throughout the district could be in danger of injury at other schools.
"A boiler blew up with children in the school," Morgan said. "If I was a parent with a student in that school, I'd think my kid was in danger."
Erik Fleming, a representative of the teachers union, discusses the Jan. 13 explosion that occurred at F.S. Edmonds Elementary School while he was on school grounds.
Erik Fleming, a staff representative for the city's teacher's union who was at Edmonds when the boiler exploded, said he could feel the impact from the explosion as he stood in the school's parking lot and saw a large black cloud arise from the building afterward.
"It was a sound like I've never heard. An explosion that big, you just shook," he said. "You actually shook."
Fleming said members of the service workers union have complained about safety problems in the past. They have sent petitions to the district as long ago as 10 years asking for more support for school infrastructure and maintenance, he said.
"The union has filed many petitions throughout the years about the safety conditions at our schools," he said.
As union members marched up and down Broad Street near Callowhill, where the school district building is located, wearing signs that read "Safe Schools For All" and "Philly Schools Are Danger Zones," Morgan vowed not to leave until the district addressed their safety concerns.
"We've done everything we know how to do," Morgan said. "Something different has to happen now."
After addressing the gathered crowd, protestors headed inside the district building to demand time to speak with district officials.
District spokesman Fernando Gallard said the district arranged a meeting with the protestors and were going to address their concerns. Gallard also said the district has bi-annual inspections of boilers throughout the district, in order to make sure they are safe.
During the last 10 years, he said, the district has spent more than $83 million on maintenance of boilers in the district alone.
"We want our schools to be as safe as possible," he said.
