Jonathan Ashwell, a recovery specialist with the Massachusetts Laborers' Benefits Fund and a member of LIUNA Local 999 in Springfield, Mass., joined the America's Work Force Union Podcast as part of the Labor 132 series to discuss the LEAN program — Laborers Escaping Adversity Now — and what peer-based recovery support looks like from the inside of the building trades.
Ashwell has been in recovery since 2009. He joined the Laborers in 2014 after years working in addiction treatment and became one of three recovery specialists covering approximately 22 Locals and 11,000 to 12,000 members across Massachusetts. When the program launched in 2018, it was the first of its kind in the Laborers Union.
Ashwell discussed the culture shift underway in construction around substance use and mental health, the LEAN program's model of peer outreach, vetted treatment access and recovery meetings across the state and what he told the member who handed his card back and said he did not want it.
- The LEAN program — Laborers Escaping Adversity Now — launched in 2018 as the first program of its kind in the Laborers Union. Ashwell was one of three recovery specialists who were assigned to cover approximately 22 locals and between 11,000 and 12,000 members across Massachusetts. The three specialists conduct cold outreach to members with existing substance use claims, make presentations at apprenticeship programs, visit job sites and union halls, operate a hotline and personally follow up with members placed in treatment to build the kind of intimate connection that keeps people engaged in recovery.
- Ashwell described the peer model as the most effective tool available for reaching workers because it removes the gap between the person asking for help and the person providing it. When a union Brother, who worked in the elements, worried about making his pension credit and felt the pressure of providing for his family, tells a struggling member he understands what that life feels like, the walls come down in a way that a clinical referral alone does not produce, he said. The Massachusetts Building Trades Recovery Council has extended that model by listing an identified peer contact for all 15 trades on its website at massbuildingtrades.org.
- The program does not measure itself by claiming to save lives because that standard also requires accounting for every person who did not make it, Ashwell said. Instead, the goal is to make an impact in someone's life — getting them into treatment quickly through vetted facility relationships, visiting them a week later, helping them plan aftercare and creating a platform through recovery meetings where members can build relationships with each other and give each other hope.
A Path Into the Trades That Started in Recovery
Jonathan Ashwell did not come to the building trades through the traditional pipeline. He came through recovery. After years working in addiction treatment — work he described as mentally exhausting in its own right — he decided that while he still had the physical capacity, he wanted to make a living with his body and get solid benefits. He lived next to LIUNA Local 999 in Springfield, Mass. and knew the business manager from using the parking lot. He joined the union in 2014 and figured he had an advantage over most of the field. He could pass a drug test, had a driver's license and could show up and work a full day.
His first job was a demolition project in Boston. On his first break, he watched workers “snorting drugs off the back of a flatbed truck.” Later on the same job, two workers came over on a scissor lift. One had a 12-step fellowship sticker on his hard hat. Ashwell asked about it. The worker told him he had been sober for some years. On the first day on a union job, Ashwell saw both ends of the spectrum.
He never hid his story on job sites. He was open about his history — the drug use, the incarcerations and the homelessness. Workers noticed. By lunchtime on a given day, people who had started conversations in the morning sometimes no longer wanted to continue. But they knew they could come back. And sometimes they did, he said.
What LEAN Does and How It Works
When the opportunity to join the LEAN program came up, Ashwell was not sure he wanted to return to that world. He had two young daughters at home. He could finish a job and walk away. He was pushed to interview by his Local and ultimately took the position. That was 2018, the year the Massachusetts Laborers' Benefits Fund launched Laborers Escaping Adversity Now (LEAN). Ashwell described it as the first program of its kind in the Laborers Union.
The structure is straightforward. Three recovery specialists cover the state: Ashwell in Western Massachusetts, Mark Lyle on the North Shore and Glenn Troy on the South Shore. Together, they cover approximately 22 Locals and between 11,000 and 12,000 members. That total balloons to approximately 23,000 when family members are included. In the beginning, without a clear sense of direction, they started cold calling members who had existing substance use claims with the health and welfare fund. Ashwell recalled his first call. The member challenged him immediately. “Who are you?” “Why are you calling me?” Ashwell explained he was out of Local 999, that he was in recovery, and that this was his new role. The walls dropped, and they had a conversation.
From there, the program grew. Presentations at apprenticeship programs ensured that every new member who came through training knew who the recovery specialists were and that the resource existed, even before they had earned their health coverage. Hard hat stickers with the hotline number were distributed. Bracelets with the number were handed out at union halls and job sites. Relationships were established with vetted treatment facilities so that when a member calls in crisis, the specialist can get them into treatment quickly, rather than leaving them to navigate a system that might take days to respond.
The follow-up is where Ashwell said the program earns its trust. He visits members in treatment a week after placement, sits with them, builds a relationship and helps plan what comes next. “Does the member need to go home? Into sober living? Into a step-down treatment program? What does the return to work look like?” He and his colleagues advocate with contractors on behalf of members, and some contractors have supported the program at job site standouts and committed to holding a member's position through treatment.
During COVID, the program pivoted to Zoom recovery meetings, which ran twice daily and drew 25 to 40 members per session. Ashwell described watching members exchange phone numbers on screen, build relationships and show up for each other outside the meetings. In-person meetings have since been established in Boston, Holyoke and Pittsfield and continue to run.
The Culture Is Changing — But the Work Is Not Done
Ashwell described a genuine shift in construction culture around substance use, while being clear that the old culture has not disappeared. The narrative of work hard, play hard — beer 30, liquid lunch — is less condoned than it was even a decade ago. The stories of workers returning from a bar to sleep at a job site until work resumed are largely relics. The stories of workers showing up hungover or asking a trusted coworker for a private conversation by lunchtime are still common.
He was direct about the suicide rate in the trades, which runs approximately four to five times higher than the general population. Two New York Laborers had recently died by suicide, he said. He described LIUNA General President Brent Booker and General Secretary-Treasurer Michael F. Sabitoni pushing the message through social media and national communications that it is OK to not be OK — that asking for help is not weakness but the right call. That participation was a meaningful step toward reducing the stigma that keeps workers from reaching out, Ashwell said.
He described handing his card to a member, who returned it and said he did not want it. Ashwell did not argue, but said, “Can you hold onto it anyway? God forbid your coworker, your kids or your spouse need it.” That, he said, is the job.
The Massachusetts Laborers' Benefits Fund is adding an in-house clinician so members can speak directly to a professional through the fund, rather than through an external referral, Ashwell said. The Massachusetts Building Trades Recovery Council has identified a peer contact for each of the 15 trades listed on its website at massbuildingtrades.org, giving members across every trade a person they can reach who understands the work and the life. The LEAN peer movement is expanding across LIUNA, with programs and meetings developing in St. Louis, Wisconsin, New York, Ohio and Indiana, he added.
Ashwell said success is hard to define, and he and his colleagues do not measure themselves by claiming to save lives, because that standard requires accounting equally for every person who did not make it. What he measures instead are the moments: a member celebrating years of sobriety, a member getting his foreman truck back, a member returning home to his family, members at a recovery meeting exchanging numbers and giving each other hope.
If you or someone you know is in crisis, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is available by calling or texting 988. More information on the Massachusetts Laborers' Benefits Fund and the LEAN Program is available at mlbf.org.
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