MASON CITY – It rained, it poured, but it wasn’t enough to slow down the hard-working blue collar folks in Mason City who held a picnic to mark Labor Day.
The annual Labor Day picnic held again this year at Georgia Hanford Park started rough, as there was no power in the shleter house, the trash cans were full, there was a problem with the catering, and Mother Nature sent torrents of rain down from the heavens.
But, as labor leader Charlie Wishman, said, “we got it all worked out, and now it’s a beautiful day, with a nice turnout.”
The North Iowa Nine Labor Council, AFL-CIO sponsored the picnic, held almost every year. There was plenty of food, live music and conversation to go around. The picnic was a no-show last year, sources say, because Mayor Eric Bookmeyer and his crony Travis hickey had been sternly taken to task at the 2012 picnic for their anti-worker innitiatives, and did not want to take a chance in showing up at the labor picnic in the middle of hotly-contested city elections. Bookmeyer, sources tell NIT, pressured labor leader Mike Hermen to call off the picnic last year to avoid more embarrassment for himself and his stooges and to dodge criticism for not attending. Bookmeyer, Hickey and the rest of the council – save Alex Kuhn – did not attend this year.
Politicians who did attend are all known-supporters of the working man, including Sharon Steckman, Amanda Ragan, Kuhn, Doug Nelson and others.
There were no fiery speeches and little political talk – as there was at the last picnic held in 2012 – outside of a few Democrats looking to get elected who had papers they wanted signatures on. Mr. Wishman told NIT that the picnic really isn’t a political platform, it’s just for fellowship and to show support for the plight of workers. He said that low wages and deteriorating benefits continue to be a concern for the labor movement.
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