[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 49 (Friday, March 18, 2022)]
[House]
[Pages H3842-H3843]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1100
                        REMEMBERING SHAR KNUTSON

  (Ms. McCOLLUM asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Speaker, I rise today to remember Shar Knutson, 
former president of the Minnesota AFL-CIO, who passed away last month. 
Shar was a bridge-builder, trailblazer, and mentor.
  Shar was a lifelong advocate for workers in St. Paul and across 
Minnesota. A trailblazer herself, the first woman to lead the Minnesota 
AFL-CIO, she mentored women in the labor movement and urged them to run 
for leadership.
  She was a strong booster for pro-women labor supporters seeking 
public office. Her early and steadfast support and encouragement was 
instrumental to me in helping to run for Congress and advance our 
common values together.
  Hosting Shar as my guest for President Obama's first official State 
of the Union address in Washington, D.C., was a privilege.
  Madam Speaker, I include in the Record a February 22, 2022, article 
from the Union Advocate newspaper in St. Paul paying tribute to Shar 
Knutson's life and work.

                            [Feb. 22, 2022]

Remembering Shar Knutson: `Her Presence Will Be Missed, but Her Legacy 
                               Lives On'

                          (by Union Advocate)

       Shar Knutson ascended the ranks of Minnesota's labor 
     movement, starting as a member of AFSCME Local 1842 in St. 
     Paul and retiring after six years in the state's highest 
     union office. Remembered by colleagues and friends as a 
     bridge-builder, trailblazer and mentor, Knutson died Feb. 2 
     at the age of 72.
       A native of Fridley who made St. Paul her home, Knutson 
     made history in 2009 as the first woman elected president of 
     the Minnesota AFL-CIO, the federation of over 1,000 affiliate 
     unions representing 300,000 working people statewide.
       Knutson held the office until 2015, during a tumultuous 
     time for American unions. Efforts to weaken workers' 
     bargaining power and roll back labor standards succeeded in 
     other states, but not in Minnesota. Under Knutson's 
     leadership, Minnesota unions not only kept ``right to work'' 
     and other anti-union measures at bay, but they lobbied to 
     expand collective bargaining rights and pass the first 
     statewide minimum-wage increase in a decade.
       ``Shar played an active role in the successful campaign to 
     increase labor's voice in national, state and local issues, 
     including raising awareness and promoting community debate 
     about social and economic justice,''

[[Page H3843]]

     U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum said. ``This shift laid the 
     groundwork for important progress being made today that 
     benefits all Minnesotans.''
       Labor leaders who worked with Knutson recalled her 
     attention to detail, quiet resolve and ambition.
       ``She got her facts, and she moved forward,'' said Ray 
     Waldron, Knutson's predecessor as president of the state AFL-
     CIO. ``She was very decisive.''
       It showed, Waldron remembered, when he approached Knutson 
     in 2009 with the news that he planned to retire. Knutson had 
     been serving as president of the St. Paul Regional Labor 
     Federation and, previously, the St. Paul Trades and Labor 
     Assembly for more than a decade. ``I walked into her office 
     and said, `How would you like to run for president of the 
     Minnesota AFL-CIO?' '' Waldron said. ``Shar didn't hesitate. 
     She just said yes, reached across her desk, shook my hand, 
     and I walked out.''
       Though self-assured, Knutson ``was never a bully,'' said 
     Harry Melander, former head of the St. Paul and statewide 
     Building Trades councils. Rather, she built her career on a 
     knack for bringing people into the decision-making process 
     and working in coalition.
       ``We all love each other, we're family,'' Melander said. 
     ``But families have fights. Shar made a point to make sure 
     everyone, whether you got along within the labor family or 
     not, was at the table when we had a big item to discuss, so 
     we could figure this out together.''
       Knutson grew up in a union household, but her ties to the 
     labor and political communities deepened after leaving a 
     public-health job with the City of St. Paul in 1990 to work 
     for Mayor Jim Scheibel. At City Hall, she shared an office 
     and a budding friendship with Molly O'Rourke, who said the 
     two ``bonded over that experience of working in a very fast-
     paced and energized office.''
       Knutson was the mayor's liaison to organized labor and 
     other constituent groups, including the emerging immigrant 
     and refugee communities. It was a good fit, O'Rourke said, 
     given Knutson's ``belief that everyone, no matter their 
     station in life, needed to be treated with dignity and 
     respect.''
       Scheibel declined to run for re-election in 1993, and 
     Knutson went to work for the Trades and Labor Assembly. 
     Delegates elected her president in 1998, and within weeks of 
     taking office, St. Paul's new mayor, Norm Coleman, stunned 
     the city's unions with a proposal to privatize a swath of 
     city services, from golf courses to the water department.
       Coleman's ``Compete St. Paul'' plan threatened hundreds of 
     city jobs, and union leaders looked to the Assembly to fight 
     back, said Barb Kucera, then editor of The Union Advocate 
     newspaper. Knutson worked quickly to convene the St. Paul 
     Works Alliance, a coalition of groups that would oppose the 
     privatization scheme.
       ``Right away, Shar brought in as many stakeholders as 
     possible to be part of the discussion, leading with the 
     unions but inviting other organizations too,'' Kucera said. 
     ``She really decided to mount a public campaign, and that's 
     what eventually stopped the whole idea in the fall of 1999. 
     ``Shar really pushed the organization to focus and get a 
     clear message across, and she did a lot of media appearances 
     and events and public speaking. They talked about jobs, but 
     they didn't make it about jobs only. They very wisely chose 
     to make it clear this was going to be a real threat to public 
     services in the city, particularly the water service.''
       Defeating Coleman's plan drew national attention, and 
     Knutson was among a handful of local labor council presidents 
     invited to serve on an advisory committee to the AFL-CIO 
     Executive Board. ``She was willing to try to do some things 
     differently, and she projected a different image, being the 
     first woman and first public employee in that job,'' Kucera 
     said.
       ``She surprised a lot of people in Washington, D.C.,'' 
     Waldron added. ``She was courageous.'' Knutson's profile 
     continued to grow after another successful, coalition-based 
     campaign in 2006, this time to save 500 jobs at a paper 
     recycling plant in the Midway. The plant, then owned by Rock-
     Tenn, needed a new power source after Xcel Energy stopped 
     burning coal at its High Bridge plant. But opposition from 
     neighborhood groups put Rock-Tenn's future--and the jobs of 
     Steelworkers like Bob Ryan--in doubt.
       Ryan, who now works as the rapid response coordinator for 
     his union, called Knutson ``instrumental'' in keeping USW 
     Local 264 members working in St. Paul.
       ``It was a lot of public meetings, and Shar was at a lot of 
     them with us, speaking on our behalf,'' he said. Both Knutson 
     and her father had worked at the facility, he said, ``so Shar 
     could talk to people with true emotion about how long the 
     plant had been there and its connection to the city. She just 
     delivered.''
       By then, the Assembly had merged with surrounding labor 
     councils to form the Regional Labor Federation, with Knutson 
     as president. She won a three-way race for president of the 
     state AFL-CIO in August 2009, and guided the union campaign 
     to elect Minnesota's first labor-endorsed governor in 20 
     years, Mark Dayton, a year later.
       As her list of accomplishments grew, Knutson continued to 
     prioritize her work to mentor women and young workers 
     pursuing leadership roles in the labor movement and in 
     politics.
       Those fields were even more male-dominated 22 years ago, 
     when McCollum became just the second Minnesota woman elected 
     to federal office, than they are today. The 4th District 
     congresswoman remembered Knutson and longtime friend Robin 
     Madsen, an AFSCME leader who died in 2017, teaming up to host 
     a ``Working Women for Betty'' campaign-kickoff event after 
     McCollum announced her first run for Congress.
       Knutson and McCollum remained friends as their careers 
     progressed. Knutson attended President Barack Obama's first 
     State of the Union address as McCollum's guest, and the 
     congresswoman presented her friend with a flag flown over the 
     U.S. Capitol upon her retirement from the Minnesota AFL-CIO.
       ``I am thankful I had the opportunity to know and work with 
     Shar Knutson,'' McCollum said. ``Her presence will be missed, 
     but her legacy lives on.''
       Jennifer Guertin, president of AFSCME Local 2508, called 
     Knutson a source of ``quiet support'' going back to the days 
     when delegates to the Trades and Labor Assembly were ``75 to 
     80 percent men.''
       ``There were times when I was so frustrated by the guys 
     that I was like, `I'm done, I can't do this anymore,' '' said 
     Guertin, now the federation's sergeant at arms. ``Shar would 
     take me aside and say, `You have to learn how to deal with 
     people that don't know what you're capable of. You can't let 
     them win.' ''
       Current Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson 
     counts herself among the countless other union members 
     Knutson took time to mentor.
       ``President Knutson helped us grow as people, advocates and 
     leaders, and she fostered connections among us,'' Peterson 
     said. ``I don't know that many of us realized it at the time, 
     but Shar was building a network of union and community 
     activists with an eye towards our future. ``I'm grateful that 
     she took a long view on what our labor movement can 
     accomplish together, and for the investments she made in all 
     of us.''
       Knutson was also quick to remind young activists about the 
     importance of work-life balance. ``A lot of times during 
     campaigns, when I was pretty much living at the Labor Centre 
     because that's what we did, she was the one to tell me that I 
     needed to go home sometimes, too,'' Guertin said. Knutson, 
     who raised two daughters as a single working mother, ``was 
     really dedicated to her family,'' O'Rourke said. ``I think 
     they gave her a lot of strength.''
       Although Knutson spent more time with family and friends 
     after retiring in 2015, Alzheimer's disease progressively 
     limited her independence.
       ``It was hard to see such a strong and powerful and 
     articulate woman not really know the amazing impact she had 
     on people around her,'' O'Rourke said.
       ``She was a friend of mine, a good friend to me and to a 
     lot of people,'' Melander added. ``It's hard because she 
     didn't have enough time to enjoy the fruits of her labor.''
       Knutson's family has published an obituary at 
     BradshawFuneral.com. They plan to hold her memorial service 
     later this spring.

  Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Speaker, I am thankful for the opportunity to 
work with Shar Knutson and to call her a friend. Her presence will be 
missed, but her legacy lives on.

                          ____________________