The Connecticut craftsman., 1932-03-15

connected With the puDllc health and safety as the plumbing and steamfit- ting craft. Without strict regulation of these pipe trades no person would be safe from disease or the hazard of explosion. It is these safeguards that the grafters in the license racket are undermining and threatening to destroy. Those officers in the en- ploy of the City whose duty it is to issue permits are at disadvantage in any effort to see to it that the ordinances are not violated, in that they have neither the time nor the opportunities necessary for a strict check-up of licensees and permittees, but they have given me their word that if they are furnished with defi- nite information showing abuse or violation of the City's laws, they will act with dispatch to punish the of lenders. Where the Structural Build ing Trades Alliance fits in is in the capacity of it's members to serve as experts and informants in cases of known violations"
 Hits Limited Licenses.
 MT. Lonergan criticized the practice of granting limited licenses'' to those unqualified to receive the full license. His contention was that in matters of public health and safety there should be no compromise, but that competent workmen should be required on all such work. He said that he felt that the practice amounted to permitting incompetent workmen to endanger the public health and safety "to limited degree only," which reduces the policy to terms of ridiculous folly. "So long as germs can grow faster than human can kill them, no trifling with them should be permitted" he said.
 Suggests Rigid Inspection.
 As a cure for the abuses now prac- ticed under the sanitary code of the City, MT. Lonergan suggested a of the inspection rules, so that the inspectors would have no hesitation in declaring a job unsatis- factory. The speaker said he felt that the inspectors now labored under the natural handicap that a sudden insistence upon thorough workman ship on plumbing and steamfitting work would subject them to the dan ger of losing their positions. In order to avoid this, it was recommended that the organized workers get firmly behind a campaign for code of definite rules that would appreciably tighten the requirements. With the responsibility thus lifted from the shoulders of the inspectors them selves, they could then proceed, it was asserted, to see to it that the general public got what it paid for, including health protection. The first step, the Alliance President repeated, should be to eliminate the license racketeers by a full exposure.
 Union Racketeers.
 The Alliance received the list of jobs which MT. Lonergan declared to involve license frauds and will use it as a beginning in the war upon the dishonest practitioners. The list in cludes jobs on Pennington Avenue, Victoria Road, Cleveland Avenue, Fern Street, Magnolia Street, Flat bush Avenue, Alden Street, Garden Street, Keeney Avenue, Mountain Road, Montowese Street, Main Street, Park Street and Albany Avenue. All these places are in Hartford or West | Hartford. The names of the licen- | sees and permittees are known in each | as we'll as the names of the | persons or firms which actually did | the work. The majority of the frauds were in favor of non-union workers and firms, but several union men and firms were involved. A dastardly feature of several was that the per mits were secured by union licensees and turned over to the rankest kind of incompetent non-union workers.