Ronnie Green to Be Awarded President’s Award at Maine AFL-CIO Convention

Retired Bangor firefighter Ronnie Green (IAFF 772), District Vice President of the Professional Firefighters of Maine, will be awarded the 2025 President’s Award at our Biennial Convention on October 23. Green has earned this award for serving on the Maine AFL-CIO Executive board, always engaging the legislative process, keeping the IAFF connected with the Maine AFL-CIO, supporting IAFF locals and members across a large region and doing the important work of serving on the Maine Workers’ Compensation Board.

A native of Plymouth, Green had never envisioned himself getting involved in unions. In fact, before he joined the Bangor Fire Department in 1990 he had pretty negative opinion of unions. When he was kid he remembers going to his grandmother’s house for Christmas, but a number of times their plans were foiled because his uncle who worked for Great Northern Paper would take an overtime shift on Christmas Day to take advantage of the generous union-negotiated overtime.

Then in January, 1978, there was a bitter strike at the Fayscott Co. tool manufacturing plant in Dexter when over 200 Machinists Local 1696 members walked out in a contract dispute over wages and working conditions. Green’s grandfather, who was a longtime manager at the facility, began getting threats against him and his family.

“People who worked for him thought he was a good guy and some of the strikers actually took care of him,” Green recalled. “They watched out for him, made sure nobody messed with him, but I just remember that strike being nasty.”

After graduating from high school, Green attended Northern Maine Vocational-Technical Institute (now known as Northern Maine Community College) in Presque Isle to study forestry and small business administration. After graduating college in 1985, he began working in the logging industry. In 1987 Green found himself in the thick of the International Paper strike in Jay while delivering pulp wood.

“I really didn't understand then what was going on there,” he recalled. "I just knew they made a lot of money and got a lot of good benefits and they should have been happy with what they had. I was just a kid working 20 hours a day driving a truck and making less than minimum wage.”

He arrived late in the evening with a load of wood and began driving through the strike line. Suddenly strikers surrounded the truck and began yelling at him and banging on the doors. They twisted the mirrors and unlatched the hood, but Green came out unscathed. When he got home, he called his boss and got him out of bed.

“I said, ‘I don't know what the f—- is going on with these a—holes down in Jay, but don't f—- send me back!’” said Green.

And he didn’t go back to Jay for 38 years until last month’s Maine AFL-CIO executive board meeting at the Local 14 Solidarity Center. While in college, Green fell into the job of volunteer firefighter completely by accident. One day, he got a phone call from his mother telling him the house was on fire. When he arrived back at Plymouth in the middle of the night, every bit of furniture, pictures, laundry, groceries and everything else that was in the house was sitting in the neighbor’s driveway.

“They brought a bulldozer in to push everything away so the firefighters could get it out,” said Green. “So the house was saved through the process.”

The fire chief then said to Green, “Hey, you see what we did for you and your family? I think you ought to come down and help out.”

Green never had any interest in being a firefighter, but he accepted the chief’s offer and joined the volunteer fire department. He soon developed a passion for the work, so when a job came up as a full-time firefighter at the Bangor Fire Department in 1990, Green applied and was hired. At the time, the man doing the fire training was in management and had no love for unions. He told Green someone would ask him to join the union. He informed Green, “‘I think it's kind of a waste of money, but you can do whatever you want.’” But Green went on to be a strong union man and leader, both in his union and the broader labor movement.

At the time, Green was focused on the new contract that IAFF 772 was negotiating. A lot of young firefighters had recently been hired, so union leaders realized that several new members would reach the top of the pay scale in a few years. Therefore, they proposed raising the top step pay and accepting lower pay raises for members on the bottom steps. The city approved of the proposal because it wouldn't have to make a larger immediate pay out since most of the firefighters were younger.

Some of the younger members didn’t like it, but as Green pointed out, in a few years they would greatly benefit from the higher step increases for the rest of their careers. These kinds of lessons served him well when he started serving on bargaining committees. When a position on the union’s executive board opened up in 1993, Green decided to run for the position so he could keep up on what was going on. After being elected to the board, he got more involved in the Professional Firefighters of Maine, especially in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on 9/11.

It was under the leadership of former PFFMaine President John Martell that the organization became more involved in politics. Green was among the PFFMaine members who organized and helped defeat the notorious 2004 Paleski Tax Cap referendum that would have resulted in mass layoffs of firefighters and other public safety personnel. Green was also part of the major fight to win retiree health care for first responders, strengthening mental health programs for firefighters with PTSD, banning toxic flame retardants from household furniture, and allowing first responders to receive workers’ compensation for work-related PTSD certain types of cancers. In recent years, Green has been instrumental in helping firefighters negotiate shorter work weeks across Central and Northern Maine.

We congratulate Brother Ronnie on his well-deserved award. You are an inspiration to us all!