Perhaps more so in construction than in many other industries, a company’s expectation of success is usually pinned to the skill and efforts of its work force.

“That’s an unarguable fact,” Sam Fujikawa will endorse. After almost 40 years with the firm that hired him out of college and much later becoming its sole owner, the chief executive of Continental Mechanical of the Pacific proudly points to a crew that has for the most part loyally stayed until time for retirement.

“It’s not saying employees haven’t had to face occasional layoffs given the industry’s ups and downs, but by and large, we’ve been fortunate,” he said, alluding to the company’s licensed specialties that help maintain a reasonable work load: plumbing, sheet metal, air conditioning, refrigeration, fire protection, and boilers.

Like his unionized competitors, Fujikawa credits the stellar workmanship lauded by owners to the training his employees endured “the best that can be found anywhere.” The PAMCAH-Local 675 apprenticeship curriculum is remarkably equivalent in intensity and depth to what he says he underwent while earning his mechanical engineering degree. “That sold me early in my career I could rely on graduates of the local program and was the encouragement to go after a variety of work – commercial, industrial, residential, maintenance in both public and private sectors,” he emphasized.

Fujikawa plans to turn over day-today reins to eldest son Robert, also an engineering graduate, sometime next year. He will stay on board as chairman, chuckling he is a few years yet from social security status. His office laden with photos of six grandchildren, the youngest in a bassinet placed next to his desk offers a clue to where much of his time will later be spent.

“Keeping our people busy will always be a priority even after changing my status,” he says. What gnaws him is the continuing increase in project bidders and the rising calls from recruiters for job openings. But he sees through this grim period one silver lining: the prospect of stations planned in conjunction with the City’s rail project. “But that’s quite awhile away,” he sighs.