Masonry Magazine May 1978 Page. 19
IPF, IMAT, and the "All Weather" effort would wither away without continuing hard work by the MCAA's and IU's representatives to them. The men who serve on the boards of these organizations deserve our thanks. And the hundreds, perhaps thousands, more who work on such programs at local regional levels also deserve our appreciation.
It's not possible to reflect on the success of these programs without also thinking of developments at the IU over the past decade which opened the door to these successes.
Many of you may know that the IU has been going through a process of departmentalization. In the 1970s, we have created departments of collective bargaining, communications, organizing, data processing and trade jurisdiction. As these departments have developed, so has our ability to undertake and maintain a programmatic approach to problem-solving an approach built on the conviction that problems can be controlled, not immediately through miracle cures or by waving a magic wand, but through the steady, continuous application of a solution composed partly of intelligence and partly of sweat.
This kind of step-by-step approach to managing and controlling problems is not easy, and it's not spectacular. For that reason, some people shy away from it and look for the quick and simple solutions. But the experiences that you and we have shared over the past few years demonstrate that our step-by-step approach has been the right one, and indicate that we will be well advised to continue that approach in the years ahead.
The programs we have talked about are specific, bilateral programs with defined objectives and defined fields of operations. They demonstrate that your organization and ours can work together on a specific, defined basis.
That demonstration of what can be done is important. It's important in and of itself, because it brings a whole set of additional specific benefits to our members and to MCAA's members. It is also important as a necessary step in the still-developing relationship between your organization and ours.
Unfinished Agenda
I say that the relationship is a developing one because there are many things that remain for us to do together.
Some of the things on our unfinished agenda relate to existing programs. We need, for example, to provide IMI with money adequate to undertake much broader advertising programs. We need to work for full reciprocity in the pension field-not only to help our members, but also to help you by making our craftsmen more mobile.
IMAT needs and deserves much broader support. And "All-Weather" in many locales still must be converted from a possibility to a fact. President Murphy has frequently remarked that "All-Weather" is a big topic in the winter, but it quickly loses its urgency when spring comes and work starts up again. This kind of "mental seasonality" must be overcome.
But there are other things on our unfinished agenda which go beyond existing programs, and I believe it is time for us to push the MCAA-IU relationship one step beyond where it now is in order to accomplish some of them.
What I have in mind is proceeding, on the basis of our demonstrated ability to work together on specific programs, to create a means, a mechanism, that will enable us to work together on general matters of common interest.
Now, I recognize that a very welcome and important step toward creating an industry-wide mechanism for this kind of general cooperation has already been created in the Masonry Industry Committee, which is chaired by MCAA Past President Mickey Soloff.
MIC, in addition to MCAA, the Bricklayers' International.
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Specs call for a concrete block wall? Perlite loose fill insulation can help too! By filling the core holes with perlite loose fill insulation your fire rating will be doubled to 4 hours and your "U" factor improved by 54%. And you don't have to worry about permanence. Silicone treated perlite is inorganic and rot, vermin and termite proof. And it's non-combustible with its fusion point of 2300°F.
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Perlite Institute, Inc.
45 West 45th Street
New York, N.Y. 10036 212-265-2145
MASONRY/MAY, 1978 19