Fighting Back: Building the Stewards Army Walker Jones Shows How it's Done

Walker Jones, Jr., has been the "go to" guy in northern Virginia for CWA members and locals and the AFL-CIO central labor council since he first signed up with the local telephone company in 1971.

He has stepped up to do anything and everything his union needed. "He's a tireless, energetic union activist and that makes him a model member of the Stewards Army that we're building," said Ralph Maly, CWA vice president for Communications and Technologies.

Originally an installer with Western Electric, Jones was laid off after just a few months, then started work with Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Co., now part of Verizon. He recalls that he didn't know anything about unions when he started working, but "early on, the guys in shop convinced me to join. I joined for solidarity purposes and started going to union meetings. I liked what I heard and what I saw, and pretty soon, I became a steward and kept on from there." After divestiture, he became a chief steward at AT&T and also served as a steward at Lucent and Avaya.

Jones did much more than that. "If every worker in the union lived the life that Walker has, we would be so strong," said Vince Cody, executive vice president for Local 2222, Jones' local. "He knew what it was all about. He didn't expect anything, but he always showed up, and that's 99 percent of everything," Cody said.

In his years as a steward, Jones was responsible for getting many people their jobs back, said Cacci Greenfield, Local 2222 secretary-treasurer. Jones also served a term as vice president for Local 2323, before its merger with Local 2222.

"He is one of the very few (of the former ATT unit) who stayed all the way through. He's a smart man, and everyone — from the local to the central labor council to the Northern Virginia. Democratic Party — adores him because of his willingness to always be there," Greenfield said.

Jones, 56, has been under a doctor's care since 2004 for a degenerative eye condition that a few months ago required him to retire from Avaya. But that didn't slow him down and over the past several years, his wife Laurene has been a full partner in his union work, getting him to meetings and supporting him 100 percent.

Before his health problem, "Walker made the phone calls and walked the precincts and was especially active with the local's political and legislative committees," Cody said.

That's just one reason that Jones recently was honored by Virginia's 11th District Democratic Party with the John Sturdivant Community Service Award, in recognition of his longtime contributions to the community, the labor movement and legislative action.