The first official quarterly meeting of the President Economic Recovery Advisory Board (PERAB) took place this morning at the White House. SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger and the fifteen other board members discussed green jobs and energy with the President, sharing their perspectives and expertise on how the U.S. can enhance the strength and competitiveness of the nation's economy through the creation of a comprehensive energy plan that will generate millions of clean energy jobs.

During the meeting, Burger shared her perspective on how business, labor and government can work together towards creating a low-carbon, green economy and a movement into sustainable good, green jobs--citing SEIU Local unions that are leading the way on green initiatives within real estate commercial properties to illustrate her point.

"Now, when workers have a voice, they can actually implement their ideas about how they can do things better. Our Locals in New York and California now bargain in energy efficiency standards. They have a whole training program where they train their janitors and their engineers in terms of how to retro-fit [buildings], how to save energy. And they set a goal in their contract about saving 20 percent of the energy in their buildings through a certain set period of time." Read the rest of Anna's comments during the meeting.