OCT. 16, 2009:NWLP
10/13/09
10:21 AM
Page 4
Vancouver area labor council issues
endorsements for general election
Takes no action in
mayor’s race as unions
are split between
Pollard and Leavitt
VANCOUVER — Ballots have
been mailed to residents eligible to
vote in Washington’s general election.
The Clark, Skamania, Klickitat
Central Labor Council has issued en-
dorsements in several races in South-
west Washington.
The labor council supports Jack
Burkman for an open seat on the City
Council, Position 1. Burkman is run-
ning against Bill Turlay for the seat
being vacated by incumbent Pat Jol-
lota.
The labor council also endorsed
Anne McEnerny-Ogle for Position 3.
She is challenging incumbent Jeanne
Harris. Harris has endorsements from
Amalgamated Transit Union Local
757, Vancouver Fire Fighters Local
452, and the International Brother-
hood of Electrical Workers Local 48.
The labor council did not take a
position in the hotly-contested race
for Vancouver mayor. That race pits
incumbent Royce Pollard against City
PAGE 4
Councilor Tim Leavitt.
Leavitt outpolled Pollard by 43
votes in the August primary, out of
20,493 ballots cast.
Pollard has been endorsed by Van-
couver Fire Fighters Local 452, Dis-
trict 6 Fire Fighters Local 1805,
IBEW Local 48, the International
Longshore and Warehouse Union Lo-
cal 4, Teamsters Joint Council No. 37,
Painters and Allied Trades Council 5,
Iron Workers Local 29, Iron Workers
Shopmen’s Local 516, Cement Ma-
sons Local 555, Laborers Local 335,
and Teamsters Local 58..
Leavitt has support from Amalga-
mated Transit Union Local 757,
American Federation of State, County
& Municipal Employees Local 307
VC, the Vancouver Police Officers
Guild, and UNITE HERE Local 9.
The Vancouver City Council is
nonpartisan.
In Battle Ground, the Clark, Ska-
mania, Klickitat Central Labor Coun-
cil supports incumbent Michael
Ciraulo for City Council, Position 1;
Michael Dalesandro, Position 4;
Adrian Cortes, Position 5, and in-
cumbent Bill Ganley, Position 6.
The Battle Ground City Council is
nonpartisan.
...AFSCME says relations are frayed
(From Page 1)
involved in decision-making around
the cuts was preempted and rebuffed by
management.
City Commissioner Randy Leonard,
a former president of Portland Fire
Fighters Local 43, had a different ac-
count. Leonard said he took measures
to ameliorate the layoffs. He hired a
laid-off AFSCME member to answer
phones in his office, and placed others
in jobs he created in the Water and Fire
bureaus, and in the Bureau of Environ-
mental Services. And he said he took
his own two-week unpaid furlough, di-
rected managers to do the same, and
dedicated that the savings go to BDS.
Leonard faulted the union for not
taking a proposal to BDS members to
vote on a furlough — which he said
would have generated enough savings
to avoid nine layoffs.
Local 189 President Carol Stahlke
said the union agreed to a two-week
furlough, but negotiations stalled over
how the furlough days would be taken.
Stahlke said the union’s relationship
with Leonard, normally considered a
pro-union stalwart, has frayed since the
beginning of summer.
AFSCME endorsed Mayor Sam
Adams, and Commissioners Nick Fish,
Amanda Fritz and Leonard in last
year’s general election.
Local 189’s current four-year con-
tract runs through June 2010.
Stahlke said about 60 of the laid off
BDS employees are represented by Lo-
cal 189 members. To help them access
benefits and weather the transition, La-
borers Community Services Agency
has hired laid-off BDS worker Pat
Philpott as a “peer advocate.”
Philpott is also a member of Com-
munications Workers of America Lo-
cal 7901 and has chaired the Allied
Printing Trades Council. In the mid-
1990s he worked at the Northwest La-
bor Press.
Philpott’s first day as a peer advo-
cate was Oct 8. He can be reached at
503 539-7677 or by e-mail at PDX-
peer@gmail.com.
...Boeing wants no-strike clause
(From Page 2)
their power,” said Bob Petroff, directing
business representative of Portland-
based IAM District Lodge 24. “They
know that they can stop the company
from producing an airplane. They pos-
sess the skills that Boeing needs, and
Boeing can’t go anywhere else to get
them.”
And the work they do is extraordi-
narily profitable for the company: Boe-
ing posted a $2.7 billion profit last year,
$4 billion in 2007, and $2.2 billion in
2006. The combination of the com-
pany’s profitability and their skills en-
ables Machinists to make up to $39.89
an hour under the most recent contract,
plus generous health and pension bene-
fits.
But union leaders say they couldn’t
have gotten or kept those gains without
the strike. Boeing Machinists struck for
48 days in 1989, and for 69 days in
1995. In 1999 they reached agreement
days before a strike was to begin, and
in 2002, gave major concessions after
the 9/11 attacks dealt a blow to the air-
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
line industry. They struck again in 2005
for 28 days, and in 2008 for 58 days.
“My members have asked me what
my opinion is, and I’ve been very can-
did about it,” Petroff said. “I will not
give up the right to strike. The only
weapon we have is our right to strike.”
Strikes aren’t an act of sabotage,
Kelleher says.
“These strikes are always triggered
because Boeing comes at us with take-
aways,” Kelleher said, “not because
we’re trying to get more.”
Boeing, despite its profitability, has
proposed that union members give up
benefits like retiree health care and
spousal survivor benefits. Yet union
member wages and benefits account for
less than 4 percent of airplane costs,
Kelleher said.
“A strike is a grave step,” Kelleher
said. “People don’t make that decision
lightly. Anybody who believes other-
wise hasn’t walked a picket line and
went without a paycheck.”
IAM general president Tom Buffen-
barger has said the union is “all ears” if
Boeing wants to talk about a no-strike
pledge or any other issue. But it would
be a negotiation, and Boeing would
have to be prepared to give something
substantial in return. Boeing Machinists
current contract doesn’t expire until
2012, and the union is under no obliga-
tion to modify or extend it.
The union has faced tremendous
public pressure from politicians and
newspaper editorial boards worried that
Boeing will locate elsewhere. But some
labor leaders think the union is being
targeted as a distraction from Boeing’s
real problems with the 787: Its much-
vaunted global supply chain isn’t work-
ing out, and customers have already
canceled 75 orders. Parts are arriving
late, or are defective and have to be re-
made. Parts from different suppliers
aren’t fitting together properly. For the
union, it’s a case of “I told you so.”
“I can remember saying as early as
1983 that if you continue outsourcing
more and more of the plane, eventually
you’re going to lose control of your
product and you’re going to become
hostage to your vendors,” Kelleher said.
The one 787 part that’s on time,
Kelleher said, is the vertical fin, and it’s
built in Fredrickson, Washington, lo-
cated 11 miles southeast of Tacoma, by
IAM members. For the Dreamliner to
succeed, the union argues, Boeing will
need to consolidate more operations in-
house.
Still, Machinists leaders say they
take the threat of locating elsewhere se-
riously, and are ready to hear proposals.
As Kelleher points out, Boeing already
has a no-strike clause — the current
agreement. It can unilaterally guarantee
labor peace by dealing fairly with the
union come negotiation time.
In April, both sides committed to im-
prove the relationship to break the cy-
cle of strikes.
“Wouldn’t it be great,” Kelleher said,
“if at the contract opener we announced
we had a tentative agreement for mem-
bers to vote on and did it all without the
media focused on us?”
“Like everyone else in Washington,”
Kelleher said, “we want to grow aero-
space jobs and make sure this stays the
largest aerospace cluster in the world.”
OCTOBER 16, 2009