The Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission appointed a new Chairman effective Monday, August 27, 2007.  Michael A. Byrnes, who worked for the past six years as a business agent for the National Conference of Firemen & Oilers, Local 3, SEIU, AFL-CIO, has been appointed to a five-year term at the LRC. Former Chairman John Jesensky is now a commissioner and will serve out his term until 2010. Commissioner Paul O’Neill’s term ends next summer.

Before becoming a union business agent, Mr. Byrnes worked for the Massachusetts Department of Corrections and then the MBTA as a management representative. At the start of his legal career, he worked as an associate at the management-side law firm of Murphy, Hesse, Toomey & Lehane. He was admitted to the bar in 1996, after earning his B.A. from Harvard University and his J.D. from Northeastern University Law School.