President
Santos Crespo became the fourth president of Local 372 in March 2011 and was elected to a full term by the Local 372 membership in July 2011.
Santos Crespo, Jr. started in the labor movement in 1975 when he and his co-workers helped to organize the Substance Abuse Counselors in the New York City Board of Education. He was elected shop steward by his coworkers in district four (East Harlem) after they succeeded at becoming members of the New York City Board of Education Employees Local 372, District Council 37, AFSCME.
He was first introduced to labor unions at about the age of ten, when his father who was a delegate and Executive Board member of Local 6 of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees union (HERE), took him to a union meeting. The excitement, unity, and power at that meeting left him with a positive impression and a desire to fight for worker’s rights which would forever remain at the core of his principles.
Santos was born in East Harlem and raised in the Bronx. He attended J.H.S. 133 and graduated from Samuel Gomper’s Vocational & Technical High School. He went on to Bronx Community College where he was a founding member of the Puerto Rican Student Union and also actively participated in the implementation of Puerto Rican Studies at the college. Later, he enrolled in the CUNY Baccalaureate Program where he majored in psychology with minors in sociology and philosophy. He is a Vietnam veteran having served in the United States Navy as a Boiler Technician and later as an Intercommunication Technician. He was honorably discharged from service.
Santos was recently elected as a vice chair of the Steering Committee of the Municipal Labor Committee (MLC). He has served on various state and local task force committees dealing with issues of substance abuse among adolescents, including The White House Conference on Drugs. He is also a founding member and is currently the chairperson of the DC 37 Latino Heritage Committee. Sanots served for 6 years as President of the New York City Chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA). He is a member of the New York City Hispanic Labor Committee and he is also serves on LCLAA National Executive Board. He is also a member of the New York City Chapter of Coalition of Black Trade Unionist (CBTU) and a former Teaching Fellow for the Organizing Institute of the AFL-CIO.
Santos has received numerous awards among which are; The Humanitarian Assistance Award for his assistance during the recovery efforts at the World Trade Center tragedy, The New York Daily News Viva New York as a 2004 Latino Influential, The New York Dominican Officers Organization for Outstanding Service in the Labor Movement and the New York LCLAA Labor Award, The New York Hispanic Labor Committee Friambrerra Labor Award, The New York State Puerto Rican/Hispanic Legislative Task Force Somo El Futuro Labor Award, and the 111 U.S. House of Representative paid tribute to his leadership & commitment in the labor community by entering his accomplishment into the House Records.
Santos has had many highlights during his nearly four decades in the labor movement, but the two that stand out most for him was when he helped organize public employees in Puerto Rico for his international union AFSCME and having met and spoken at length with the great labor leader, Cesar Chavez..
