A Changing of the Guard Is on the Horizon

Skilled Trades Director Rick Karas poses with President Stephen P. Yokich and Secretary-Treasurer Ruben Burks during a break at the conference. The clock was presented to Karas by the Skilled Trades Department, which also presented Yokich and Burks with awards for their distinguished service.

Rick Karas knew he had some pretty big shoes to fill when he took over the reins of the Skilled Trades Department from Stephen P. Yokich, who appointed him to the post in 1995.

Both longtime UAW activists celebrated each other’s accomplishments at the International Skilled Trades Conference on Collective Bargaining in February. Karas, on behalf of the UAW’s skilled-trades workers, presented Yokich a bronze sculpture titled “The Tradesman,” and Secretary-Treasurer Ruben Burks a crystal chalice and a honorary journeyman’s card. Yokich presented Karas a clock on behalf of the entire membership. Yokich and Burks will finish their terms at the Constitutional Convention in June.

Karas, a journeyman tool-and-die maker who has been a UAW member since 1961, told the delegates this was his last skilled-trades bargaining conference.

“I am retiring later this year after 15 years as an UAW international representative, assistant director, director of TOP (1995-98), director of the Veterans Department, and director of a national department,” Karas said. “I am humbled by the confidence the UAW officers and IEB had in me by allowing me to serve in these leadership positions. I not only thank all of them, but also all of you for your support over the years.”

Karas outlined some of the accomplishments of the Skilled Trades Department since the last conference 15 months ago:

• Conducted more than 33 sets of national and local negotiations in nine regions at 33 local unions.
  
  
• Handled numerous lines of demarcation cases.
  
  
• Assisted in negotiations to install or modify 78 apprenticeship programs in all 12 regions.
  
  
• Made 153 plant entries and on-site visits in all 12 regions to review skilled-trade classifications and eligibility for journeyman card issuance.
  
  
• Processed more than 6,000 journeyman card applications and approved more than 4,400 for issuance.
  
  
• Handled 100 journeyman card rejection appeal cases.
  
  
• Assisted and/or provided Pre-Apprenticeship Training Programs at DaimlerChrysler, AM General, New Venture Gear and NUMMI. More than 15,000 have graduated, with many securing apprenticeships or earning a journeyman’s card.
  
  
• Assisted in numerous organizing drives.

The UAW secured a $95,000 U.S. Department of Labor grant to develop a Childcare Development Specialist Apprenticeship Program, which received an award from the federal government at the Michigan Apprenticeship Conference. Two people have already graduated and four have recently been indentured, Karas said.

The director also thanked the International Skilled Trades Advisory Committee (ISTAC) for its dedication and leadership.

“Without ISTAC, Skilled Trades would not be as successful as we have been,” he said.

He also thanked President Yokich.

“As you may or may not know, since Steve Yokich has been president of the UAW, he has established rank-and-file advisory committees, patterned after ISTAC, in all of the departments under his jurisdiction, like IPS, Civil Rights, TOP and other sections of our union,” Karas said. “They say imitation is the sincerest flattery. That being true, then it becomes incumbent upon us to admit our flattery and be proud of the legacy that Skilled Trades carries forth.”