James R. "Ronald" DeJuliis has been well-known in Maryland political circles for a long time, at least since 1994. That's when he married former Dundalk state delegate Connie Galiazzo, who lost that year's Democratic nomination for the 2nd District U.S. House seat, and two years later was trounced when she tried to unseat then-congressman, now-Gov. Robert Ehrlich. But all has been quiet on the DeJuliis front in recent memory, including over the past year, when much ado has been brewing in his corner of the world: Local 37 of the International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE), where DeJuliis and his wife have long held sway, she as controller and he as business manager.
DeJuliis is not the Local 37's business manager anymore. An Aug. 3 letter from IUOE President Vince Giblin to members of Local 37 announces that DeJuliis resigned July 31 after the union local became the subject of a U.S. Labor Department investigation. Giblin states in the letter that the local's "apparent focus on political activities to the detriment of other matters have been a concern for some time" and was "heightened earlier this year in light of reports of a physical altercation" at one of the local's meetings. As a result, and because of the Labor Department probe, the letter notes, Local 37 was placed in under monitorship by the international union, which has hired an accounting firm to audit the local's books.
Don't sweat over DeJuliis, though: He still has his position next door, as president of the Building and Construction Trades Council of the Baltimore AFL-CIO. So, he left his job at 5901 Harford Road-Local 37's address-but stayed on at the council at 5913 Harford Road. At least his commute hasn't changed, even if his fortunes seem to be darkening.
