"Simple. Like I said, he was the most dedicated guy on the team. When it came time to choose between football and me, I was always second. I couldn't deal with that any more, so we just broke it off amicably," I said. "But enough on me. Gene, have you been catching flack from Francine Berkowitz?"
"If you mean have we had Union reps around here trying to get everyone from the janitor to the popcorn vendor trying to join the various unions, then yeah, but nothing different than usual," Gene replied. "They've been trying to crack us ever since the strike back in '99. The owners are standing pat though, no unions other than the Player's Association. They don't care if it costs us twice as much to do things. I assume you don't quite have that much leeway in your operations budget."
I tilted my head, chuckling. Mark had plenty of money, but he didn't have the operating budget of a professional football team backed by a textile manufacturing powerhouse. Then again, we didn't have shareholders to answer to either. "Not quite. I'm trying to take a balanced approach to this. I've told her, I'm not outright rejecting any participation by union workers. Hell, if they do good work at a good price I'll have nothing but union workers. But I'm not going to hamstring the non-union companies with the Union's bid-rigging crap either."
"So she's trying to drown you in paperwork," Gene replied. "She did the same to us last year when we renovated the bathrooms on the upper deck. Simple enough job, just going to modern urinals and toilets, should have been a simple two month job from start to finish. City inspectors and everyone else turned that thing into a six month headache. We barely got the damn thing finished less than a week before the first preseason game."
"But you kicked off on time," I said. "So is that a pattern?"
Gene nodded. "Pretty much. If you have power, she'll hamstring you, delay you, try and just wear you down until she can expose a weakness to exploit. Thankfully the league is supportive of us, and the players are fine with it as long as we take care of them. The stadium workers know that, by law, we can't prevent them from unionizing. Did you know that the security guard who let you in the door, he makes fifty six thousand a year with full team benefits? Guy goes to the same doctor I do. Anyway, my advice is to continue the same way. Treat your contractors well, and you'll find workers for you. The Union works off of public perception just as much as the Spartans do. They know this. As long as they can harass and frustrate you without coming off looking like assholes, Berkowitz is going to be a bug in your ass the whole time. But as soon as she thinks that public light will make them look bad, she'll have the Union guys fall back until the next fight."
"And how long will that fight go on?" I wondered.
Put it like this, I’ll tell you when ours is over, and that might give you an idea. So far we've been fighting them for nearly two decades."
"Damn."
Gene nodded, and we watched the field for a while longer. It was a lot simpler, football that is, compared to the headaches I was dealing with at the time.
* * *
I got home late that night, nearly nine at night, as I wanted to start looking over contractors for the first of the community centers. The first building, in the heart of The Playground, needed to be cleaned out, and I wanted to find a general contractor to get that done as soon as possible. If Francine Berkowitz was going to continue to be a thorn in my side, I might as well damn the torpedoes and go full speed ahead, after all.
I was surprised when I came in to see Patrick's car parked in front of Mount Zion. I knew that Mark had recovered it from Filmore Heights earlier in the week, discovering as he did that Patrick had not only painted the old Civic, but had tuned it up to the point it was a cheetah under the hood, but hadn't expected Patrick to be back so quickly. We hadn't talked that day, and I figured he was overloaded with catching up on what he had missed at City Hall. Parking my Mercedes SUV, I made my way inside, curious.
I found Patrick and Sophie in the gym, sweat dripping off his face as she pushed him through a workout. "God's sake woman, I'm a week removed from getting shot!" he groaned as she pushed on his back, his legs stretched out in front of him. "You trying to kill me?"
"The gunshot has nothing to do with the fact that you've got hamstrings that are weak and stiff, along with enough knots in your hips you should be a Boy Scout merit badge," Sophie replied matter of factly. "Now be quiet and breathe out."
I suppressed a chuckle as Patrick tried his best to comply, Sophie pushing more until his body wouldn't go any further. "I think I saw God there as the air left my body."
"I'll remember that. I've been called a lot of things, but never God before," Sophie replied, dressed conservatively in sweat pants and a t-shirt. She was being no-nonsense, but I could tell by her facial expression she was amused. He must have worked hard, because if he hadn't, she wouldn't have replied except to push him harder.