It goes without saying that within the past month, Teamsters Local 901 in Puerto Rico has been through quite the ordeal.

Hurricane Maria left their headquarters without any electricity. After the storm, three generators were brought into the building, and the local was converted into a temporary disaster response center. The building now has phones, lights, and computers, but still no air conditioning in the blistering heat of the island.

In the immediate aftermath of the storm, Local 901 was unable to contact their membership, but they have since been able to speak with a majority of their workforce. They are now in the process of attempting to bring some level of normalcy back to the lives of Teamster members in Puerto Rico.

Local 282 member Pedro Maldonado has been working with Teamsters Disaster Relief to help not just Local 901, but Teamsters back in the mainland who are trying to contact their families.

“We just get the job done,” Maldonado said. “We don’t ask ‘what’s your rank, what’s your title,’ we just ask what the job is that needs to be done and we get on it. A lot times we’re working next to guys where we don’t know their name, we don’t know where they’re from, we just get to it, no questions asked.”

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