Unions Ask For Equal Airtime
by Christine Stuart | Jun 14, 2012 11:39am
(9) Comments | Commenting has expired
Posted to: Equality, Labor, Media Matters
(Updated 1:47 p.m.) The head of the Connecticut District Laborers’ Council wants former Gov. John G. Rowland to stop “lying” in order to get better ratings on his afternoon radio show on WTIC-AM.
Since Charles LeConche can’t get through to the former Republican governor by phone, he’s planning a 2 p.m. protest outside the station’s Farmington studios.
“If I don’t get on the radio we’re going to do it a different way,” LeConche said Thursday morning.
But LeConche, whose organization endorsed Rowland during his first term, said all he’s looking for is a little fair play on the issues. He said he understands Rowland may be looking for ratings, but he should be confident enough to let the other side of an issue be heard.
“If he has an issue with the busway he should be willing to discuss it,” LeConche said.
LeConche is referring to the Hartford-to-New Britain busway project, which Rowland has panned almost on a daily basis on his show. The 9.4-mile busway will cost nearly $570 million and most of the money is coming from the federal government with about $112 million being funded by the state.
But Rowland isn’t backing down.
“I will continue to speak out against the busway boondoggle. This is the biggest waste of taxpayer money in Connecticut history,” Rowland said in an emailed statement.
“The costs of this boondoggle will burden our children and grandchildren long after we are gone. The union bosses are sadly mistaken, if they think they can bully or intimidate me. I will continue to encourage taxpayers to sign our petition and write to their legislators and blockthebus.com.”
LeConche and the construction trades have argued that the busway will bring jobs, like the ones Rowland himself helped spur with the construction of both the Connecticut Convention Center and Rentschler Field.
LeConche said his 5,000 members endorsed Rowland during his first term because he came to them for support of Adriean’s Landing and they worked with him to ensure there was a Project Labor Agreement in place — the same type of PLA that Rowland continues to pan on his afternoon radio show.
PLAs are pre-hiring agreements that cover the terms and conditions of a construction project.
“This guy is nuts,” LeConche said. “We oppose the way his radio show is produced. It should be a fair airing of the issues.”
Roy Occhiogrosso, Malloy’s senior communications adviser, refuses to listen to Rowland’s radio show.
“I would’ve responded sooner but I was laughing too hard to type,” Occhiogrosso said Thursday. “John Rowland cut some of the dumbest deals this state has ever seen – ones that will burden our children and grandchildren long after he‘s gone.”
“He squandered billions of dollars in revenue, did nothing to rein in state spending or fix the economy, robbed the state blind, and then resigned in disgrace,” he added. “I’m still unclear as to why WTIC ever saw fit to give this fraud the kind of platform he has. He’s a joke.”
LeConche said he doesn’t know how big the protest will be today, but he expects a few people with signs to show up.
Messages left with radio station management were not immediately returned.
However, Jim Vicevich, who hosts the Sound Off Connecticut morning show on the same station, defended Rowland this morning and invited the union to come protest his show.
“I’ll meet you right at the picket line,” Vicevich said. “Then you get in my face you thugs.”
“You wanna come out to protest Johnny, you come out and protest Jimmy,” Vicevich said.
He said he’s sick of union workers using his tax dollars on projects such as the busway, which Vicevich says will never be able to sustain itself and will always need to be subsidized.
Public transportation systems in the U.S. are usually subsidized as an effort to provide more efficient ways to move larger numbers of passengers and to curb the pollution generated by single-passenger vehicles clogging roadways. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has said that the busway — which is now called CTfastrack — is part of a long-term plan to ensure that there is another corridor available for use by the time the Aetna Viaduct, the long elevated section of I-84 in Hartford, is due to be replaced.
LeConche has also been critical of Malloy. Last year he paraded up and down the sidewalk outside the state Capitol protesting a construction project that went to a Massachusetts company rather than to Connecticut workers.
Tags: Gov. John Rowland, Jim Vicevich, Charles LeConche, union, busway, dh
(9) Comments
posted by: Noteworthy | June 14, 2012 12:38pm
I agree with J and J - the union thugs who puff their chests out and wave their fists in the air frankly are stupid and boorish. The Magic Bus is no convention center or Rentschler Field. It’s one giant government teat for the unions to feed. There is zero justification for spending $11,484 per foot for the MB - $957 per inch. Even if you mistakenly assume the feds get their money not from taxpayers but from some magic pot of gold in the sky - the state taxpayer cost is just silly: $2,256 per foot or $188 per inch.
posted by: CT Jim | June 14, 2012 2:41pm
Funny Vicevich calling union people thugs. In 2009 he appeared with his band of tea party thugs outside a stop in shop to protest health care. Every one of his followers were threatening every person with an opposing view. The straw that broke the camels back for me is where a woman who I personally know told him how she had had cancer and no now couldn’t get affordable health care because of a pe-excisting condition. Vicevich went absolutley nuts calling the woman a liar and saying she made it up. I reported this to his employer who said they take it seriously but never called me or the woman and no apology was sent from this thug. Since then, I no longer will listen to WTIC except for one day a month to know which advertisers I will not do business with. Vicevich is a thug.
posted by: DirtyJobsGUy | June 14, 2012 4:46pm
The union guys screaming unfair must mean that the actual numbers are being highlighted. On real jobs, it’s becoming much more difficult to hide no-show jobs and excessive unworked OT
posted by: ACR | June 14, 2012 8:44pm
I appreciate the credit, but couldn’t you just refer to me as “ACR”?
Just askin’
They, most especially LeConche, were extremely polite to me even though they knew who I was.
Frankly I was surprised.
-Doug Hageman
posted by: DrHunterSThompson | June 14, 2012 9:25pm
truth of the matter is that both Charlie and the Governor are cut from the same cloth. they speak with little regard for the truth or the better good. the only real difference is Rowland has a radio show (which has become nearly unlistenable).
HST
posted by: joemanc | June 15, 2012 10:23am
“He squandered billions of dollars in revenue, did nothing to rein in state spending or fix the economy, robbed the state blind….”
Hey Roy, that sounds just like your boss Malloy! You Republocrats crack me up…
posted by: ctresident2012 | June 15, 2012 12:56pm
Does anyone else think Roy Ocho is an embarassment to this state? I’ve never heard of professional in the commsunications business so frequently comment with classless, sarcastic, baseless comments.
posted by: ebw1957 | June 16, 2012 9:02am
The most wonderful part of the bus way disaster is that the main contract went to a merit shop company and NOT to union thugs as the Governor had planned as political payback. For what it is worth the taxpayers will at least get their money’s worth with out this project being an ATM for the unions like the UCONN project will be.
posted by: eastrivertype | June 16, 2012 8:00pm
Of course the unions liked Rowland when he rolled over for their absurd pension deal that is bankrupting this state. But now when he says enough is enough they pay their members to walk a protest line. Give me a break. So we can’t pay to fix our roads and bridges and we squeeze children and the elderly and lay off state cops in retaliation, but we have plenty of taxpayer dollars for this 9 mile boondoggle. Lets make it easier to get people into Hartford at the same time that we drive companies out of Hartford and Connecticut because of the high costs of being there. Lets be sure that the entrepreneurs who create opportunity and hire people are driven out of this state since the majority party doesn’t think that they pay their “fair” share. Why do you think Hartford is a ghost town both in the middle of the day and at night? Because fewer and fewer companies will pay the high cost of being there. So great, lets build a busway that no one will use because there will be no jobs in Hartford. We will subsidize the hell out of it to get people toride it. It will never support itself. How ridiculous that the union guys don’t like the criticism on this boondoggle. They will just move on to the next one when this joke is finished.