b'Was this while you were still at work?That\'s when I was still at work. Joe was the president. I dont speak Spanish, but my first wife was Spanish and mysecond wife was Spanish. My kids speak Spanish.Did you go to union business meetings?No. To tell you the truth, I just went when there was a raise or when we were working without a contract to find outwhat was going on and stuff like that. I went down to quite a few meetings downstairs.What about any rallies or events?Well, one time we had a rally in City Hall. I forgot what it was about, but in was in the 80s, late 80s. It was a Local237 rally, and everybody met down in City Hall, but I dont remember exactly the reason.Do you have any recollections of negotiations or benefits that were fought for by the union that you received?I know they fought for us and got us always what we wanted and I was happy about that. If we needed some percent-age or if we were getting say 10% in three years or whatever they gave us four, four and two. They made sure that we gotour money. Like everybody else, I was happy with everything.Can you tell me what a typical day on the job would be like for you?A typical day: I get up in the morning, I go to work, I have my coffee, I get there little early, I checked the elevators. I had to make sure they\'re working, so the people could get in and out. I go to the office to get tickets. We used to work onthe regular tickets. I would go by Emergency to see if they have any jobs. I put them in front to make sure they get done.Sometimes in the Projects that I worked in, it was bad early in the morning if I wanted to get some jobs done. I went to doa stoppage and there\'s junkies all hanging around in front of the door. I couldn\'t even get in the door and theyre saying:Hey, don\'t step on me, got to do your job, Im paying my taxes, Im paying you" And all the stuff I used to have to putup with them. Sometimes I would go and they would say: My stove ain\'t working, look at my stove. And the stove wasfull with dirt and grease. I used to shut it off and walk out then go down and tell my supervisor: I shut their stove off, it\'sgonna go on fire. It\'s gotta be pulled out of that apartment. Id let the super know what\'s going on. You were responding to the requests the tenants themselves made?Right. Like my stove isnt working, but how\'s it going to work if its packed this high with grease? Or, I got a stoppagein my bathtub and they got all kind of junk floating in the bathtub, food and everything. I asked: Why are you washingdishes in the bathtub? Yeah, because the sink was stopped up, so we use the bathtub now. And I used to have to stay inthe greasy bathtub doing it. But I liked it, I enjoyed talking with the people and everything, most people. Some people I used to just turn around and walk out. A lot of tenants knew me already like that. If you were a good tenant and you hada problem, I\'ll make sure it gets fixed. But if you\'re going to be a nasty tenant, you\'re not getting that fixed, I\'m shutting it off and walking out. You can go tell whoever you want to tell. That\'s how I was for almost 30 years in that Project.73 '