About Us

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Union 490 represents workers in the electrical construction, maintenance, and telecommunications industry.

The Objects of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers are:

• To organize all workers in the entire electrical industry in the United States and Canada, including all those in public utilities and electrical manufacturing, into local unions,
• To promote reasonable methods of work,
• To cultivate feelings of friendship among those of our industry,
• To settle all disputes between employers and employees by arbitration (if possible),
• To assist each other in sickness or distress,
• To secure employment,
• To reduce the hours of daily labor,
• To secure adequate pay for our work,
• To seek a higher and higher standard of living,
• To seek security for the individual,
• And by legal and proper mean to elevate the moral, intellectual, and social conditions of our members, their families and dependents, in the interest of a higher standard of citizenship.

Our union was founded in 1891 by a group of electricians who wanted a safer workplace, fair wages and, in general, respect for the service they rendered their communities through their labors. In 1891 there were no training programs, no safety regulations, no medical plans, no pension or retirement plans, and nearly half of all electricians were being killed on the job. Because the IBEW nourished the needs of these workers, it has grown from a handful of pioneers to the largest electrical union in the world. However, the IBEW is not about a growing business or organization, it’s a fraternity. The IBEW is made up of working men and women, in the electrical industry, committed to bettering themselves and the industry. Neither the IBEW nor the electrical industry is made better unless all who labor in the industry are secure in their employment, receive a fair wage, have training programs, pension plans, dental and medical plans for themselves and their families. For over a hundred years the IBEW has been about offering all these things to electricians. All electrical workers deserve the IBEW’s standard of living, the highest in the industry!