The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers, and Allied Workers (often shortened to Roofers) is an AFL-CIO-affiliated construction union. It has a relatively small membership in comparison to other construction-industry trades unions, with 18,428 working members and 3,803 retiree members. ¹

The Roofers union and some of its locals have a long history of connections to the Mafia and organized crime that have included what one federal judge described as “a campaign of violence, fear, sabotage, vandalism, bribery, and terrorism sponsored and carried out by its leadership to coerce contractors into dealing with the union” that resulted in multiple racketeering convictions against union officials and the union’s New York City local pleading guilty to being an ongoing criminal enterprise. ^{2 3 4 5 6}

While the Roofers generally support Democratic Party candidates and policies, the union called for the “repeal or complete reform” of Obamacare out of concern for the law’s impact on its multi-employer health plan. ^{7 8 9}

Overview

The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers, and Allied Workers was founded in 1919 from the merger of the International Slate and Tile Roofers Union of America and the International Brotherhood of Composition Roofers, Damp and Waterproof Workers. ¹⁰ It is affiliated with the AFL-CIO union federation and its North America Building Trades Unions (NABTU) construction-industry department. ^{11 12}

With just 18,428 working and 3,803 retiree members, the Roofers is one of the smaller construction-industry trade unions. ¹³ It is smaller than even the Elevator Constructors Union, which has 30,378 members, ¹⁴ and roughly tied with the 22,838-member Insulators Union. ¹⁵

The Roofers have a contentious relationship with the United Brotherhood of Carpenters, a much larger union that the Roofers accuse of regularly attempting to “raid” projects for work that is traditionally the responsibility of Roofers union workers. ¹⁶

James A. Hadel is the union’s president. ¹⁷

Political Activities

The Roofers operate the Roofers Political Education and Legislative Fund political action committee. In the 2020 election cycle, political action committees controlled by the Roofers and their locals donated $99,611 to federal candidates, parties and committees. ^{18 19} All but two of the candidates, parties or committees to receive donations from the Roofers in 2020 were affiliated with the Democratic Party. ²⁰

The Roofers have promoted Democratic Party positions on the success of the Biden administration’s infrastructure spending and other initiatives. ²¹

In 2016, then-Roofers president Kinsey Robinson broke from the union’s traditional support of Democratic Party initiatives when he called for the “repeal or complete reform” of Obamacare. ^{22 23} Robinson said that the federal health insurance legislation had ended up being implemented in a way that was “inconsistent with the promise that those who were satisfied with their employer-sponsored coverage could keep it.” ²⁴

The Roofers operate the Union Roofers Trust Funds, multi-employer health plans organized under the federal Taft-Hartley law that governs the provision of health insurance benefits to union members. ²⁵ Robinson expressed concerns that Obamacare’s structural bias against such plans could make it economically unviable for the Roofers and participating employers to continue operating the trusts, which would eliminate one of the advantages that the union uses to attract members and promote unionized contractors. ²⁶

More recently, the union has advocated for large companies to be required to provide free health insurance to their workers. ²⁷

Corruption, Scandals, and Criminal Activity

Corruption and Mafia Control

Multiple Roofers union locals have been proven in courts to be operating more as ongoing criminal enterprises than as labor unions. ^{28 29 30 31 32}

Local 8 in New York City

In the 2000s, federal and state law enforcement agencies charged Roofers Local 8 in New York City with being subordinated to a Mafia organized crime “family” for decades. ^{33 34}

In the 1970s and 1980s, federal and state law enforcement agencies identified former Roofers national executive and Roofers Local 8 leadership member Michael Crimi as a key “organized crime middleman” between unions and the Mafia in New York City and elsewhere. ^{35 36 37} Crimi, who denied those allegations, was charged but never convicted of crimes including murder and loan sharking. ³⁸ He was married to the niece of Genovese Family Mafia boss Frank Tieri, who was the first person to be convicted of operating an organized crime family under the federal RICO law. ^{39 40}

In 2000, the Manhattan District Attorney indicted construction contractors for an alleged decades-long scheme of charging customers the going rate for using union labor on their projects, then paying off Roofers Local 8 officials to look the other way while the contractors used non-union workers. ⁴¹ These schemes not only harmed the indicted contractors’ customers, but also Roofers Local 8 union members who were replaced with non-union workers who were paid half of what the union members would have been paid. ⁴² The government alleged that three-quarters of the impacted projects were public buildings, including $4 million for schools under the New York City School Construction Authority. ⁴³

In 2004, the New York County District Attorney took the unusual step of charging the union local itself, as well as its entire leadership team and two accused Mafia members, under New York state’s Organized Crime Control Act. ⁴⁴ This was just the second time that the law had been used to charge a labor union local, rather than just individual members or officers of the union, with racketeering. ⁴⁵

According to the indictment, contractors in New York City were threatened with “overly zealous enforcement of Local 8’s collective bargaining agreement” if they did not pay $1,500 to $2,000 a month in bribes to the union, but that contractors who did pay were allowed to use labor-saving tools that were usually banned under union contracts or to use non-union labor on their jobs. ⁴⁶

As part of a plea deal, self-confessed Mafia member John “Johnny Sausage” Barbato testified under oath that as a high-ranking member of the Genovese Family, “I influenced and controlled the Local 8 labor officials, and Local 8, and benefited financially from the criminal activities of the Local 8 group.” ⁴⁷

The union, through its lawyer, pled guilty to the racketeering charges. ⁴⁸ It was required to pay $200,000 in fines and agreed to be supervised by a court-appointed monitor for five years.

Local 30 in Philadelphia

In Philadelphia, Roofers Local 30 operated what U.S. District Court Judge Lawrence F. Stengel described as a four-decade “campaign of violence, fear, sabotage, vandalism, bribery, and terrorism sponsored and carried out by its leadership to coerce contractors into dealing with the union.” ⁴⁹ Non-union construction projects were firebombed and otherwise vandalized, while federal prosecutors alleged that the local Mafia family used Local 30 members as “strong-arm” debt collectors. ^{50 51}

In 1980, Local 30’s long-time president John J. McCullough was murdered in what the police described as a “professional hit” that was widely believed to have resulted from his involvement in disputes over labor agreements at Atlantic City casinos. ⁵² In 1987, a federal jury convicted his successor Stephen Traitz, Jr.; Traitz’s two sons; and 10 other union members of racketeering, extortion, conspiracy, and bribery charges. ⁵³ Two judges and two lawyers from a law firm affiliated with Local 30 were also charged in the operation of a “slush fund” that allegedly provided cash bribes to roughly 50 federal, state and local officials in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. ^{54 55} As a result, Local 30 was placed under federal court supervision, becoming the fourth labor union local in the country to suffer that fate. ^{56 57}

In 1992, Traitz and six other Local 30 officers pled guilty to additional charges of conspiracy, extortion and other crimes related to what the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Labor Racketeering described as “a 20-year pattern of violence against and intimidation of roofing contractors.” ⁵⁸

Allegations of Failure to Represent Non-English-Speaking Members

In 2011, members of Roofers Local 11 in Chicago sued the local in federal court, alleging that union leadership was failing to effectively represent its majority-Spanish- and Polish-speaking membership by not providing important documents in either of those languages or offering translator services at official meetings. ⁵⁹

A federal judge dismissed the complaint without reaching the merits of the case, ruling that the plaintiffs should have done more to exhaust all of their potential remedies within the union, despite the plaintiffs’ assertion that the union did not have any formal process to address such complaints. ⁶⁰

Losses from Madoff Ponzi Scheme

In 2009, Roofers Local 195 in Syracuse, NY discovered that it had lost $13.5 million in pension, health and accident, and annuity-fund investments in Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, thanks to investments made by an investment adviser used by many New York State union locals. ^{61 62}

This was roughly 90 percent of the value of Local 195’s pension fund, resulting in retiree benefits being cut by as much as 30 percent. In August 2009, the pension fund declared insolvency; funding Local 195 members’ pensions was taken over by the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. ^{63 64}

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