A lot of Wyoming union workers had more to celebrate on Labor Day than the free food and drink at City Park on Monday.

The energy boom has boosted employment and income, union membership and the accompanying health and retirement benefits as well, said Nathan Hunter, a member of Sheet Metal Workers International Assocation Local No. 103.

"Anyone with a family, kids, needs it," Hunter said.

At a tent sponsored by local ironworkers, he hawked T-shirts emblazoned with "Proud to be Union: Labor Day Picnic 2007 Casper, Wyoming."

Hunter figured he'd sold at least 30 of them at the annual event that is sponsored by the Casper Area Trades and Labor Assembly and the Casper Building and Trades Council.

Casper has three union sheet metal shops, and Hunter attends an apprenticeship class in one of them, he said.

The number of apprentices has doubled in recent years, and they want to be union members, he said.

Although Hunter didn't know the numbers, he said union membership has been growing, he said.

John Faunce, former director of the Wyoming AFL-CIO, agreed the economy has helped workers compared with the glum years of a decade ago.

But not all Wyomingites share in the rising fortunes, Faunce said.

"We still have a lot of people not making enough," he said.

Many businesses - hotels, restaurants and mental health facilities to name a few - continue to suffer because they won't pay higher wages to keep their employees, he said.

Faunce, too, has seen a greater interest in labor organizing although some Wyoming business attitudes die hard as do employees' fears of termination for wanting a union, he said.

"The biggest problem is employers staying within the law about organizing," he said.

Faunce would like to see Congress pass the Choice Act, he said.

The bill would allow employees to set up a collective bargaining unit by just signing cards, and forgo the bureaucratic foot-dragging for organizing through the National Labor Relations Board and opposition from employers, he said.

"Unions have a product people want," Faunce said. "But they're afraid for their jobs so they shy away."

Reach Tom Morton at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@casperstartribune.net.