Steelworkers ratify 4-year
contract at Cascade Steel
Ten weeks after ending their strike,
members of United Steelworkers Local
8378 ratified a new four-year labor
agreement at Cascade Steel Rolling
Mills, a subsidiary of Portland-based
Schnitzer Steel Industries.
The steel mill’s roughly 300 work-
ers will get annual raises of 2, 2, 2.5,
and 2.5 percent under the new contract.
Before the strike, the company was of-
fering 0.5 percent annual raises. By the
end of the agreement, hourly wages
will range from $20.54 to $32.47 de-
pending on classification — up from
the previous range of $18.79 to $29.70.
The agreement’s start date is April 1,
...Taxi
(From Page 2)
rules, and they want to get it right the
first time.
Butler said staff are researching
other cities’ practices, finalizing the
January labor market study, summariz-
ing and compiling months of public
comment about it, refreshing a 2008
market demand study, and evaluating
new models for that study. [The City
concluded after the 2008 study that
there wasn’t enough market demand to
justify issuing additional taxi permits,
since that would result in more drivers
competing for the same business and
lower individual earnings. But condi-
tions could have changed since then.]
Butler told drivers she’ll do every-
thing in her power to have the propos-
als ready for the Board’s Sept. 19 meet-
ing. It could then be taken up by the
mayor and City Council in October.
The mayor and City Council plan to act
by year’s end, Butler said.
Butler wouldn’t say exactly what
the proposal will include, but said it
will include performance standards by
which companies would be rated for
customer service, environmental im-
pact, and services they provide to driv-
ers. Companies that failed to meet stan-
dards could lose permits, while
companies that met or exceeded them
could gain them.
“It doesn’t make sense to issue the
same amount of permits every year
without taking a look at how the com-
pany is performing up to community
standards,” Butler told the Labor Press.
2012, when the previous contract ex-
pired, but pay increases are not retroac-
tive.
The new contract also increases the
company match to workers’ 401(k) re-
tirement plan by 1 percent in the final
year.
But workers’ share of health insur-
ance premiums will also increase — to
13, 12, and 10 percent, respectively, for
plans that workers currently pay 10, 5,
and 0 percent of.
Cascade Steel, in McMinnville,
Oregon, melts scrap metal from
Schnitzer’s recycling business to make
re-bar, wire, and other products.
Workers walked out April 8 to
protest bad faith bargaining, and stayed
out for 12 days, shutting down the mill.
USW staff representative Ron
Rodgers said the new contract goes a
long way toward rebuilding the rela-
tionship with the employer.
As part of the settlement — which
workers approved June 29 — the union
dropped two unfair labor practice
charges it had filed with the National
Labor Relations Board alleging labor
law violations — including repudiating
the contract and failure to bargain in
good faith.
But a third charge is still being in-
vestigated — that the company tram-
pled workers’ right to strike “by au-
thorizing, participating in or ratifying
… vehicular attacks or threats on pick-
eters.” The charge stems from two inci-
dents in which picketing strikers were
struck by vehicles entering or leaving
company property. Melt shop worker
Lee Frakes was injured when he was
bumped by a car driven by a security
guard, and fellow striker Kurt Kirk-
patrick was struck by a truck leaving
the mill. Both received medical treat-
ment and physical therapy and are back
on the job.
...Clackamas
County
(From Page 3)
Paper factory lab technician Jeannie Schell (left) with her retired co-worker
Barbara Robbins, oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a still-in-negotiation
trade treaty covering the entire Pacific Rim.
is her first political campaign. Damon’s
opponent in November is former Re-
publican state representative Tootie
Smith. Smith, who received money
from some of the same donors as Lud-
low, finished second behind Damon in a
four- person primary. NOLC endorsed
Damon in the primary.
In other races for Board seats, labor-
endorsed Martha Schrader won outright
in a three-person primary race for Posi-
tion 3. Schrader is a former county
commissioner and Democratic state
senator.
Clackamas County commission
seats are nonpartisan, with commis-
sioners and the chair elected at-large.
Come 2013, in addition to Schrader and
Savas, Jim Bernard, a Democrat, will
have seats on the Board.
Millworkers protest free trade at Obama event
Members of a beleaguered indus-
trial union held protest signs July 24
outside a $500-a-plate campaign
fundraiser in Portland for President
Barack Obama.
“Trade agreements have continued
to destroy working class jobs, espe-
cially on the manufacturing side,” ex-
plained Greg Pallesen, vice president
of the Association of Western Pulp and
Paper Workers (AWPPW). “After
every trade agreement, we see the
repercussions as plants close here,
many times profitable plants.”
“We’re very concerned that if Rom-
ney (presumptive Republican nominee
Mitt) gets elected, it would be 10 times
worse,” Pallesen said. “But I don’t be-
lieve we should cut Obama any slack.
When he campaigned the first time, he
said NAFTA-style agreements needed
to be changed and that they were de-
stroying the economy and middle class.”
But in office, Obama reversed that
stance and pushed Congress to pass
NAFTA-style treaties with South Ko-
rea, Panama, and Colombia — deals
which were negotiated during the
George W. Bush Administration. Now
the Administration is negotiating, in se-
cret, a NAFTA-style treaty known as
the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which
would cover the entire Pacific Rim.
Trade-related layoffs and closures
have cost the jobs of thousands of
Northwest paper mill workers in recent
years.
Said AWPPW member Jeannie
Schell, a lab technician at Graphic Im-
aging, a North Portland manufacturer
of paper packaging: “We are protesting
to save our jobs.”
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NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
AUGUST 3, 2012