The Future of Long Island's Workforce is GREEN
STORY BY SARAH LANSDALE AND AMY HAGEDORN

Labor Day, spent at the beach or at a backyard barbeque is the symbolic end of summer for many of us.

The holiday celebrated on the first Monday in September originated in 1882 as a day off for the working. Over the last 126 years the face of the working has changed as has the work.

In the past we’ve had the blue-collar worker and the white-collar worker. Looking toward the next few decades – the future is green. The term “green-collar” began to pick up speed earlier this year when presidential candidates began proposing this promising option for the future to working-class Americans.

What is a green-collar job? Many are in skilled trades, formally referred to as blue-collar, where there is opportunity for occupational growth. These jobs tend to be manual in the clean-energy industries from solar-panel installation to laying public transit lines to retrofitting older buildings.
Growing our green-collar economy is more than creating short-term work on one project. It means building a sustainable region, in which the economic goals coincide with environmental and social goals – creating jobs that won’t be outsourced in our own neighborhoods.

According to the American Solar Energy Society, renewable energy and energy-efficient industries were responsible for the creation of nearly 8.5 million jobs nationwide in 2006. That number is expected to reach 40 million by the year 2030. That will be 40 million quality family-supporting jobs, and on Long Island that could mean a rebirth of our fading middle class.

The movement to create sustainable communities is not slowing down anytime soon. With growing concern over the future of our environment and the future of our economy, never before have our personal imperatives coincided so closely with the imperatives of safeguarding the environment and advancing our region economically. Creating a greener Long Island has the potential to benefit all of us.

Residents in some of our more distressed communities may perhaps be the biggest beneficiaries of the going green movement. The more government requires buildings to be more energy efficient, the more work there will be retrofitting. Retrofitting jobs tend to be well-paid and the work is not likely to be shipped elsewhere.

Perhaps the green economy will be the path out of deprivation and hardship for many Long Islanders and their families. It may also be the path to a vibrant and diverse regional economy and the path to a greener Long Island, creating a broad new set of opportunities for the future.
Picture this: thousands of Long Islanders with jobs – conducting energy audits, installing solar panels, constructing transit lines, weatherizing homes, updating insulation, building wind turbines, growing food locally, building green roofs, making bicycle repairs and deliveries, composting, hauling and employing alternative uses for construction materials and debris, maintaining and expanding parks, open space and green landscaping.

What stands in the way of putting Long Islanders to work, strengthening our local economic base and refining our environment?
1. No policies in place to create demand
Our state and local governments are just beginning to scratch the surface of all that they can do and all the can be gained from retrofitting and revitalizing older buildings, automobile fleets, downtowns, transportation systems, etc.

A municipality can create the demand for a green economy. The commitment to save money and energy can demand a green collar workforce to retrofit buildings, install solar panels, and build new green buildings.

Government can also create demand for a green economy by establishing incentives and requirements for more environmentally sound business.
Policymakers can offer tax incentives or rebates, technical assistance or financing. They can introduce strict building codes and enforce them. They have the power to initiate reform in the labor sector and to lead the charge to modernize our out-of-date buildings and energy sources.

2. Few current programs or training to cultivate the green-collar workforce
The growing green economy requires workers to be skilled. Most green collar jobs require more education than a high-school diploma, but less than a four year college degree.

Green collar jobs have the potential to be quality, career-track, middle-class jobs. But in order for the green economy to reach its full potential, the proper training needs to be affordable and available to workers.

The tradition of apprenticeship is one of the oldest methods of learning a trade. A craft master teaches his skills to a budding tradesman.

Apprenticeships are a great way to cultivate a skilled and sustainable green-collar workforce by retaining and spreading knowledge and skills and by embedding such skills in the industries’ standards.

One example, right here on Long Island, is the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 25, which has included photovoltaic training as a part of their apprenticeship program. Labor has focused on technologies that are clean, green and renewable. The local union has an 18,000 watt array on its roof, and it has developed both text book and hands-on training.

Right now the demand for these new technologies exceeds the supply. The IBEW is training the workforce to meet the needs of our communities and homeowners as the supply begins to catch up. The local union and the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) are working together to prioritize the use of American made products.

Programs are also available through LIPA to provide grant money to homeowners for equipment and to allow excess power to be sent back into the electrical grid. Consumers can learn more by looking at LIPA’s Solar Pioneer Program on line.

Now more than ever, we need the leadership of our elected officials and labor unions to work together to build this green economy.
Some of the nation’s most innovative green-collar cultivation programs come from our neighboring regions – from Sustainable South Bronx and from the City of Newark.

One of the nation’s most successful green-collar job training programs was initiated by Sustainable South Bronx, called the Bronx Environmental Stewardship Program (B.E.S.T.). The program not only emphasizes skill development in a particular trade, but successful job placement as well. Depending on need, the stewardship may be free. The program focuses on hands-on training, skill development, professional certification (students can choose from six) and meets the needs of the communities’ economic and environmental imperatives. In four years, the program has seen 85% of those graduated from the B.E.S.T. program, employed, and 10% enrolled in college.

Newark’s Lincoln Park Coast Cultural District (LPCCD) with the city of Newark has launched an innovative green collar program this year, titled Green Collar Apprenticeship Program (GreenCAP). GreenCAP will sponsor 100 trade licenses for Newark residents in plumbing, electrical and HVAC systems. The program provides training on construction projects with United States Green Council Building (USGBC) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified buildings.

This is just the start of what many are calling an economic revolution – the green-collar revolution. And if our state, local and even federal governments succeed in leading the way, and our labor unions have the proper training infrastructure in place, we could see Long Island on a path towards economic sustainability, where everyone has access to higher paying jobs locally.

Guest columnists Amy Hagedorn, president, board of directors and Sarah Lansdale, executive director, Sustainable Long Island