By Eric Wolfe
Mike studies the poster honoring his service to the union. From left: President Mike Davis, Grimm, Business Manager Tom Dalzell, former Advisory Council member Michelle Benuzzi.
Union activist Mike Grimm was honored during the Advisory Council meeting on Oct. 25 for his years of service to the union, and in particular for his leadership role in the fierce contract battle with NV Energy in 2009-2010.
“He was the heart and soul of the NV Energy campaign,” said IBEW 1245 Organizer Fred Ross Jr. “He laid the groundwork on the front end and he continued to inspire workers to step up all the way through.”
Grimm served on the union’s negotiating team at NV Energy in 2003 and 2007. In 2009, when it was clear that NV Energy was pushing for brutal concessions, Grimm volunteered to help organize the union’s fight-back campaign.
At the Advisory Council meeting in October Grimm received a framed photo montage that recapped his career as a lineman, steward, negotiator and organizer. Making the presentation was former Advisory Council member Michelle Benuzzi, who served alongside Grimm as a member-organizer in the NV Energy battle.
“He’s an amazing man,” Benuzzi told the Advisory Council.
Unflappable
When the union was looking for members to help lead the charge at NV Energy, “it was Mike and Michelle who stood up,” said IBEW 1245 Organizer Eileen Purcell. “They identified, recruited and mobilized the campaign action team.”
Mike Grimm leads the rally that kicked the NV Energy campaign into high gear in late 2009.
Purcell called Grimm “unflappable,” someone who could execute thoughtful strategies and serve as an “honest broker” in an environment of short tempers and high anxiety.
“It was never about his own ego,” said Purcell. “He was generous with his time, generous with his spirit, a unifying presence—that’s Mike Grimm.”
Although he might have appeared unflappable during the campaign, Grimm acknowledged there were times when his composure was challenged.
“I remember before one meeting, David Thieme said, ‘You don’t look so good.’ Eileen had to give me a little pep talk,” Grimm recalled.
“Those were tough times. People were frustrated. They were anxious. They were scared,” he said. “They needed a lot of time … to get involved and speak their minds.”
“A Real Milestone”
Grimm and Benuzzi
An important turning point for Grimm—and the campaign—was a rally held at the Washoe County Senior Center in late 2009. By this time Grimm had been brought onto the union staff as a temporary business representative.
“The rally was a real milestone,” he said. “We’d never done anything like that before. We didn’t know a lot about what we were doing. We didn’t know if anybody would show up.”
But people did show up—about 600 of them. With Grimm as moderator, and the entire bargaining committee on stage, and Purcell and Jim Lappin on guitar and banjo belting out ballads, the rally got people’s blood pumping.
“When you’re a negotiator you spend a lot of time cooped up in a room and you don’t have a lot of contact with the outside,” said Grimm. But the rally showed the negotiators “they had the backing of the members.”
That rally was followed in short order with the first-ever picket at NV Energy headquarters in Reno and a large rally and picket line at its Las Vegas headquarters.
Grimm especially remembers the moment in Las Vegas, captured in a photo, of retiree activists Tom Bird and Rita Weisshaar opening the door to the building.
Sandwiches for the picket line
Mike Grimm’s father was a 40-year IBEW member at Reno’s Local 401. Mike shares this memory about growing up in an IBEW household:
“There wasn’t a lot of rah rah unionism, but dad always went to union meetings. There were a couple of times when he was on the negotiating committee. There’d be weeks at a time when they’d negotiate into the late hours. One time they went on strike. I remember mom in the kitchen making piles of sandwiches, and I said ‘Mom, I’m not going to eat all those sandwiches.’ And she said ‘Your dad’s on strike.’ I rode down there to deliver the sandwiches, but I had to stay in the car. I never did get to see the picket line.”