Union Members Continue Cross-Country Tour to Urge Action on Clean Energy Jobs

SCRANTON, PA – A bus tour highlighting the potential to create good American jobs by passing comprehensive clean energy and climate change legislation in the U.S. Senate stopped in Scranton for a roundtable discussion today to urge Senators Specter and Casey to support action on comprehensive legislation that will create and save millions of American, clean energy jobs, including up to 78,000 jobs in Pennsylvania.

“Nearly 1 out of 10 Americans are still out of work and we need action now to create and preserve millions of jobs across the country,” said Frank Snyder, Secretary-Treasurer of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO. “We have a solution right at our fingertips — we can create good jobs here in Pennsylvania with clean energy. Green jobs need to be red, white and blue jobs.”

The Job’s Not Done tour is traveling to 17 states — with more than 30 stops along the way — and features clean energy workers, union members and environmentalists urging Senate action on important job-creating clean energy legislation. Workers on The Job’s Not Done Tour worry that China will take the millions of potential jobs that will result from the transition to a clean energy economy.

“Instead of importing clean energy technologies, we should develop and manufacture the technology to harness American energy here at home,” said Leon Weeks, a member of USW Local 5965 out of Freeport, Michigan. “We can’t afford to let other countries like China take the millions of jobs that could be created in America by transitioning to clean energy.”

The tour will continue to Springfield, Massachusetts, through Richmond, Virginia on September 3. For more information, visit www.bluegreenalliance.org.

“This tour is a reminder that millions of people are out of work, and clean energy is the best way to jumpstart the American economy. We need the Senate to get back to work and get the job done — for our families, the economy, our environment, and the future,” said Mark Mullholand, a member of USW Local 1915 out of Fremont, Ohio.

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The BlueGreen Alliance is a national partnership of labor unions and environmental organizations dedicated to expanding the number and quality of jobs in the clean energy economy. Launched by the Sierra Club and the United Steelworkers in 2006, the BlueGreen Alliance now includes the Communications Workers of America, Natural Resources Defense Council, Service Employees International Union, Laborers’ International Union of North America, Utility Workers Union of America, American Federation of Teachers, Amalgamated Transit Union, Sheet Metal Workers’ International Association and the United Auto Workers. For more, visit www.bluegreenalliance.org.