Watch the video below for a look at Local 3’s involvement in the civil rights movement over the years. This video was made for the NAACP New York branch’s 100th-anniversary ceremony held on June 3, 2011. Among those honored for their personal and organizational commitment to the advancement of civil rights were Business Manager Christopher Erikson, AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt-Baker, Teamsters Local 237 President Gregory Floyd and then-NYC Comptroller John Liu, who has served as a Public Member on the Joint Industry Board of the Electrical Industry since 2017.
The video shows photos of Harry Van Arsdale Jr. with Martin Luther King Jr., A. Philip Randolph, Robert F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson; Thomas Van Arsdale in the fight against apartheid, which took place in the 1980’s and early 1990’s; and trade union organizations such as the Black Trade Union Leadership Committee and the Hispanic Labor Committee of the NYC Central Labor Council and the Lewis Howard Latimer Progressive Association and Santiago Iglesias Educational Society of Local Union No. 3, IBEW. In his remarks at the General Membership Meeting on February 11, Business Manager Erikson reaffirmed that this storied tradition continues within Local 3 and the IBEW of finding ways of increasing diversity and minority participation.
