Shar Knutson, became the first woman to be elected president of the Minnesota AFL-CIO in 2009 and served through 2015. Before leading the AFL-CIO, she spent a decade at the head of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation.
Growing up in a union family and working a union job as a single parent showed Knutson how much of an impact the labor movement has in improving peoples’ lives. Knutson remarked, “It has been a humbling experience to lead a movement that was there for me and my family.”
Her achievements continue to leave a lasting effect on Minnesota workers and the economy.
Knutson co-chaired a broad coalition that successfully advocated for a statewide minimum wage increase. She also successfully passed legislation extending unemployment benefits for locked-out workers in Minnesota, and helped secure historic improvements in the state’s worker’s compensation system that increased benefits to injured workers.
She increased union member political participation and opened up new avenues for women and young workers to be involved in the Labor movement, and built an infrastructure to support affiliate unions in their organizing efforts.
Knutson first got involved with organized labor as a St. Paul city employee, where she was an active member of AFSCME Local 1842. She was a skilled organizer and coalition builder.
Knutson, who grew up the daughter of a union paper worker in Fridley, went to work for the city of St. Paul in the early 1980s after a divorce. As a city employee, she became a member of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 1842. “Growing up in a union family and working a union job as a single parent showed me how much of an impact the labor movement has in improving people’s lives,” Knuston told the Minneapolis Labor Review in 2015.