b'But what I do rememberUnion dues were being garnished every payday. Then we were given the choice to decide ifwe wanted the union to deduct dues or we could have more take home pay. I opted for more take home pay.The union took the matter to court and won.\x02John SepulvedaLong Island Division School Groundsman, Maintenance Mechanic, Business AgentMember since 1968In his own wordsIn 1967 the union was organizing in the Brentwood School District. I was in high school and worked as summerhelp. I was a 17 or 18-year-old kid. Summer help couldn\'t be in the union, but I heard talk: The managers didnt\' t wantpeople signing cards. People were threatened with losing their jobs.In 1968 I graduated high school, but I was still summer help. I became permanent full-time on September 9. I got ajob on the grounds crew. The manager told me not to be "too friendly" with the Teamsters. He said he didn\'t think theywould be there long. At that time, the Teamsters were there for a year. The manager told me, "I\'d appreciate it if youwould not fraternize with strong pro-union people." I just smiledand got involved with the union. They should haveknown that if you tell a young adult not to do something, he\'s going to do it.Contract negotiations were sometimes difficult. There was a wildcat strike in 1974. Nick Cifuni came to help with contract negotiations. They weren\'t going well. The District was trying to ram a contract down our throats. The ladies andgentlemen got fed up and walked out.The union didn\'t officially sanction the strike; there was never a strike vote. Everyone was suspended for violating theTaylor Law. They were subject to penalties and fines. Then, I\'m not sure what happened, but suddenly the District turnednice and offered us a good contract.When I started at the District, CSEA was our union. Quite a few of the supervisors were CSEA officers.Many of the younger groundsmen were dissatisfied and said they wanted a "real union." The leaders were FreddieSalvadore, a driver/ messenger in Brentwood (he later became a Local 237 trustee), Fredrick Kennedy (he helped organizeBrentwood and Babylon, and he also became a trustee in New York), and Harry Hamilton, a storekeeper in Brentwood.Salvadore and Kennedy went to Barry Feinstein and Barry said he would help.Salvadore became a liaison for Babylon and Kenned y became a liaison for Brentwood. That was around 1967. Ralph Prossimo also did a lot of workwhen we were trying to organize into 237. He helped with grievances.During the organizing campaign, people were harassed and told if they signed the cards, they would be fired. Themanager insisted CSEA was doing a good job, but the workers complained that they could be fired if they looked at amanager cross-eyed or the wrong way.When 237 came in, we got more holidays-before we had only10; now we have 16. We got uniforms and launder-ing. We got more vacation, the salary structure improved. Many younger members today enjoy salary and benefits butthey don\' t know how they got them.Our first director was Jack Fametti, then Nick, who was there for about a year and a half. Then Lou Partenza became direc-tor, and he did a great job. Richie Hendershot became the director in 1993, when Lou became the vice-president of Local 237.199 '