Gaylan Z. Prescott

Director District 12

The USW International Executive Board named Gaylan Z. Prescott the District 12 Director in December 2019, and he was elected to the post in 2021.

After graduating from high school in Kelso, Wash., Prescott attended community college, completed EMT certification, and drove a tractor on a hop farm alongside migrant farm workers in the Yakima Valley.

He then followed in the footsteps of his father and other family members, working for nearly 20 years at Reynolds Metals Co., producing primary aluminum from alumina in the pot rooms and casting aluminum ingots in the casting facilities at the company’s Longview Reduction Plant.

Prescott was originally a member of the Aluminum, Brick and Glass Workers (ABG) International Union, which merged with the USW.

Prescott launched his career as a union activist in 1986 as a shop steward at Reynolds. In 1990, he was elected to his first of three terms as president of the Longview Federated Aluminum Council, which represented about 750 workers in multiple unions throughout the facility. In 1996, Prescott was elected president of the Northwest Conference of Aluminum Councils, leading contract coordination efforts at 10 aluminum smelters in Washington, Oregon and Montana. He was elected to the ABG Executive Council in 1997, just before the merger with the Steelworkers. 

In January 1999, the USW hired Prescott to assist 2,900 members locked out at five Kaiser Aluminum plants in Washington, Ohio and Louisiana, in what proved to be one of the most contentious work stoppages in union history.

The USW named Prescott a staff representative in December 1999. He served as District 12 Rapid Response coordinator from 2007 to 2009, and was assigned to oversee District 12’s Sub-District 3 in 2012, covering Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Alaska and Hawaii.

He served as assistant to the previous director, Robert LaVenture, for nearly two years.

Prescott leads the multi-union negotiations in the U.S. non-ferrous mining sector and recently negotiated a historic settlement with Asarco. That agreement favorably resolved a contract dispute that began in 2018 and provided workers with improved wages, benefits and job security.

The District 12 headquarters is in Longview, Wash.