By BERRY CRAIG
AFT Local 1360
Ex-state labor secretary Larry Roberts can't remember a governor-elect who named more union members to a Labor Department transition team than Andy Beshear.
Neither can fellow team members Dorsey Ridley and Bill Finn, the former a team co-chair.
"This number is just astounding," said Roberts, a veteran labor leader who was labor secretary under Gov. Steve Beshear, Andy's father. "You have a broad representation from the AFL-CIO, the building trades, the Teamsters." (John Stovall, president of Louisville Teamsters Local 783 is also a co-chair.)
Added Roberts, who lives in Frankfort: "I think we have some real expertise on that team. Gov.-elect Beshear has done a great job, and I commend him for it."
"I understand labor and industry, and I feel like the folks that are on this team represent a good balance," said Ridley, a Henderson banker and former state senator and state representative.
"My history doesn't go back as far as theirs [Roberts and Ridley's], but I guarantee they're right about the large number of union members on the team," said Finn, state director of the Kentucky State Building and Construction Trades Council.
He cited Roberts, who was state Building Trades director when Beshear tapped him for labor secretary, plus Kentucky State AFL-CIO President Bill Londrigan and state AFL-CIO staffer Liles Taylor. "You also have [State Rep.] Jeff Donahue, who is UAW, and Eddie Jacobs, CWA."
"There is no doubt in my mind that Andy Beshear is going to be the friend of labor he said he would be on the campaign trail," said Kyle Henderson, president of the Western Kentucky AFL-CIO Area Council in Paducah. "That's evident from the people he has named to this transition team."
Henderson, the team's third co-chair, is also business manager of Paducah Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 184. "Andy Beshear has put together a transition team comprised of representatives from all walks of labor; it's a perfect mix," he said. "He's hit the ground running, and he's already doing right by organized labor."