Earlier this week, the Alberta Labour Relations Board published their second new applications report of August 2026, which includes summaries of all applications they received between 2 August and 9 August 2026.
One of the applications was for union certification.
Local 92 of the Construction and General Workers’ Union—also known as Laborers’ International Union of North America, or just LIUNA—filed the application on 4 August 2026 on behalf of workers employed by Willowridge Site Services Ltd.
The company is a division of Alexander Willowridge Industrial Services LP, a Fort Saskatchewan-based partnership between Willowridge Construction and Alexander First Nation.
Liuna 92’s application was actually 4 applications, all of which were nearly identical except for the job titles listed in each one:
- Maintenance labourers
- General construction labourers
- General construction operating engineers
- Maintenance operating engineers
As well, the two applications for labourers were for 110 workers and the two applications for engineers was for 90 workers.
Workers employed by Willowridge Site Services had been unionized with United Workforce Group of Alberta since July 2024, but have yet to ratify their first collective agreement.
That is not surprising.
United Workforce Group took over negotiations for work camp workers several years ago, after the workers refused several rollbacks will unionized with the United Food and Commercial Workers. The employer at the time laid everyone off, then UWG came in and accepted several of the rollbacks that the workers had voted to reject.
They are a multi-sector union that appears to undermine the work of trade unions.
UWG actually has two active certificates, one for maintenance labourers with Willowridge and one for general construction employees.
For a union to file an application certification, they must demonstrate support from at least 40% of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit.
That would be 44 labourers and 36 engineers.
The labour board has scheduled a hearing for 24 August regarding these applications. Representatives from UWG and the employer will be able to present arguments, if they have any, as to why these workers should be unable to unionize with LIUNA 92.
Listed in the application summary as employer contacts are Tyler Gabert, the CEO of Alexander Willowridge, and Jordan Rumohr, president of Alexander Willowridge.
Also listed as employer contacts are Jasmine Billing-Smit and Gabriel Joshee-Arnal, both of whom are lawyers with Neuman Thompson and practice employment law on behalf of employers.
Should the ALRB approve the application, both groups of workers will vote on whether to unionize. Assuming the 44 labourers and 36 engineers follow through with their initial support and actually vote in favour of unionization, they would need to convince another 11 workers and 9 workers, respectively, to vote with them.
If these workers vote in favour of unionization, they will have a lot of work ahead of them negotiating their first collective agreement.
Because the ALRB does not archive their new application reports, I have included a copy of this week’s report below for your convenience.
