![[Dobrzenski Picture]](Dobrzenski_01.JPG)
Dobrzenski, Paul
When the call came for United Steelworkers Local 135 Financial Secretary Paul Dobrzenski to travel to Cincinnati to negotiate a new contract with Dunlop late last year, he didn't hesitate, even though he knew the physical toll it would take on him.
"We had been through these negodations twice before and I know he knew what it would be like," said Local 135 President Mark Kurkowski. "He knew that we would be working around the clock, seven days a week for months far away from home so our members could go back to work. We worked three months in Cincinnati on our latest contract. But, 'Digger,' which was the nickname we called hm by. 'Digger' never hesitated.
"Working to help our 1,072 members along with spending time with his four grandchiidren, those two things were Digger's whole life. Very often he'd be working late and then you'd see him in his office at 7 a.m. the next morning working hard to help our retirees or some individual member." As a result, when his union brothers and sisters buried their friend, Digger on Jan. 4 of this year, only a short time after the contract Dobrzenski had helped negotiate was ratified, the membership put on a remarkable demonstration of their love for him.
"After Digger's funeral, we passed by the plant on the way to the cemetery and when we passed by, there was just about the entire membership of our union in front of the plant standing there to pay tribute to him," Kurkowski recalled. "It was a wonderful testament to just how our members felt about him. They knew that the hard work he had put in negotiating our latest contract might have shortened his life."
An employee of Dunlop since Nov. 11, 1968, Dobrzenski, the Am-Pol Eagle Citizen of the Year for Labor for 2006, had taken a strong interest in the welfare of his fellow union members from the start. When he passed away at the age of 60 of a heart attack right around the first of the year, he had served as financial secretary of Local 135 for 17 years.
"Our membership always wanted Digger to continue as our financial secretary because they knew he was always someone they could trust," Kurkowski explained. "Above all, they knew that he was a straight shooter whp would always tell them the truth whether the truth was something they would want to hear or not.
From: Labor Citizen of the Year, "Am-Pol Eagle," Buffalo, March 22, 2007