8/24/93
MICHAEL REMEZ ; Courant Staff Writer
LABOR LEADER TIED TO COLONIAL GIVES UP POST
A Hartford labor leader tied to the Colonial Realty Co. has given
up the top job with the Connecticut Laborers District Council, the umbrella group for
state laborer locals.
Dominick Lopreato, longtime leader of the state council and
Hartford-based Local 230, stepped aside from the council's business manager position
Friday.
Charles LeConche, president of I Local 230 since 1978, was elected
the same day to succeed Lopreato as business manager.
Lopreato will keep the title of
secretary-treasurer, essentially the second in command at the council representing about 8,500 workers across the state. He also continues to serve as business
manager for Local 230.
LeConche said Lopreato also will keep his seat on the Connecticut
Laborers Union Pension Fund.
LeConche said union leaders decided to separate the two jobs that
had been held by Lopreato -- business manager and secretary-treasurer -- so as better to
handle the increasingly complex issues confronting the union.
He said the change in leadership was not
connected to investigations into Colonial.
The laborers pension fund invested $5 million in two Colonial
partnerships before the real estate syndicating company went bankrupt in l990. The fund
has filed a federal lawsuit against Colonial, charging the company oversold bonds on the
partnership that owned the Gold Building in Hartford.
In a deposition for that case, Lopreato admitted that he had
received a $14,000 gold watch from a Colonial partner about six weeks after the fund made
its $3 million investment in the Gold Building bonds. Lopreato said he
returned the watch.
Lopreato testified that he believed Jonathan
Googel gave him the watch for helping Googel make contacts with other union officials to
try to sell them Colonial investments. At least one other laborer's local -- one in
Albany, N.Y. -- invested millions of dollars in a Colonial bond issue after conferring with Lopreato and others
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