I call your attention to the article on page 6 of this issue about Austin, Texas, Local 520's good work in exposing a corrupt nonunion contractor and the exploitation of part of the construction work force in that city. I wish I could say that this is an isolated case, but it isn't.

Playing workers off against each other, and squeezing every hour of work out of a person with as little compensation as possible is as old as the history of mankind. And our fight against such practices is a never ending one. We saw it in New Orleans when former President George W. Bush suspended Davis-Bacon and allowed his buddies to bring in people from outside the U.S. to do the work while the hard pressed citizens of the hurricane-ravaged area were kicked off jobs. We beat that back.

We see it in some projects where employers misuse the H-1B visa program, claiming they are bringing in people to perform specialty jobs and then having them do our work.

There are employers out there who would make this the norm for the future, and they might get their way. Unless, that is, we do something.

When I call for our construction locals to go after all projects in their jurisdictions, I am not doing it to hear myself talk. Only when we wake up and realize that no job is too small or beneath us and start winning back the total market in our respective area can we ensure that fair wages, decent benefits and high standards of safety become the norm and not the province of a shrinking base. Look on page 1 to see what some locals are doing in this regard. They are getting it right. The future is ours to win, or lose.

In September, Liz Shuler, executive assistant to President Hill, will proudly stand before America's labor movement as candidate for Secretary-Treasurer of the AFL-CIO alongside Rich Trumka and Arlene Holt Baker.

As the daughter of an IBEW member, Liz Shuler truly represents the kind of future that we want for all of our sons and daughters.

In introducing Liz at a rally to kick off the campaign for the AFL-CIO leadership ticket, President Hill noted the surprise that accompanied his 2004 selection of Liz Shuler as his executive assistant. "Everybody liked her," he says. "But some thought she might be too young, not experienced enough and was a break with the way things had always been done."

Since her appointment, Liz Shuler has won respect across the IBEW and from a range of members and leaders in other unions, confirming the wisdom of her selection. We are confident that Liz will be elected in September. We will miss her. But we take deep satisfaction knowing that she will carry her enthusiasm, her talents and her IBEW roots to all of organized labor. She will be the first IBEW member to hold one of the top positions in the AFL-CIO and its predecessor organization, the American Federation of Labor, another point of special pride to the Brotherhood. (After launching a challenge to the slate, IFPTE President Greg Junemann, candidate for Secretary-Treasurer, dropped out in late July and threw his support to the ticket.)

After several years of lobbying Congress and working in the grassroots political trenches with IBEW members across the country, Liz says, "Bringing the stories of our members to the halls of Congress was and is still my passion."

All too often, our unions have been slow to adapt to new changes in our nation's workplaces. As Rich Trumka says, "Nostalgia for the past is not a strategy for the future. We want to become a movement that can listen as well as it can talk, a movement that makes sense to young people. ..." The selection of Liz Shuler—at 39, the youngest candidate ever to stand for election as the AFL-CIO's Secretary-Treasurer, and only the second woman to run for that position—sends a powerful message of change. It shows that labor leaders are listening.

Old barriers are falling. Last year, millions of Americans voted for Barack Obama because they knew in their hearts that our nation needed young, dynamic leadership. Today, that same excitement is returning to our labor movement with Rich Trumka, Arlene Holt