NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | July 15, 2016 | PAGE 3
COLLECTIVE BARGAINING
UNION ORGANIZING
Contract, not strike, for Portland janitors
At a Boeing paint contractor, workers vote to join Machinists union
A new union contract will raise
wages to at least $15 an hour
over a four-year period for
nearly 2,000 Portland-area jan-
itors. Service Employees Inter-
national Union Local 49
reached the agreement with its
signatory contractors associa-
tion June 29, and it was ratified
by members July 9. Under the
new contract, wages will rise
by $1.80 an hour in four incre-
ments, reaching $15.25 an hour
in downtown Portland July 1,
2019, and $15 elsewhere. The
contract also preserves existing
health benefits through 2018.
And it increases short-term dis-
ability benefits and improves
vacation and work rules. The
settlement came about five
days after members voted to
authorize the union bargaining
committee to call a strike.
Portland-area union janitorial contractors
Able Building Maintenance
ABM Janitorial Services
CBM Systems
Expresso Building Services
GCA Services Group
Millennium Building Services
N&C Services
National Maintenance Contractors
Portland Habilitation Center
Service Master of Swan Island
Skyline Building Maintenance
Somers Building Maintenance (SBM
Site Services)
State Building Maintenance
Township United Building Services
— ResponsibleContractorGuide.com
Portland airport retail workers get raises
in first union contract with UNITE HERE
UNITE HERE Local 8
reached agreement July 7 on a
first-ever union contract for 53
retail workers at the Portland
airport. If ratified as expected
in the coming weeks, the
agreement will provide raises,
job protections, improved
health insurance, and a pen-
sion to employees of World
Duty Free. World Duty Free is
an Italian multinational that
runs retail outlets in over 100
airports worldwide. At Port-
land International Airport, it
runs Kiehl’s, Rich’s News,
The Oregonian, and two “The
Market” kiosks.
Workers there asked for
union recognition in February
2015, but the company refused
at first. In October, it termi-
nated four union supporters,
including three members of
the union organizing commit-
tee. The company called the
terminations layoffs, but con-
tinued to hire new employees.
The workers were reinstated
with back pay in January after
the National Labor Relations
Board determined that the ter-
minations violated federal la-
bor law.
CONTRACT HIGHLIGHTS
■ Wages: 20 cents above
minimum wage for cashiers,
$1.20 for leads, $2.20 for
warehouse workers
■ Health insurance: Workers pay
one quarter of the premium for
insurance that covers 90 percent of
costs after a $250/$750
deductible
■ Retirement:Workers vest in the
HERE pension plan after five years
of service
■ Rights: No discipline without
just cause, a grievance process to
challenge wrongful discipline, and
seniority rights
■ Other: Two weeks paid vacation a
year after five years service; 6 paid
holidays a year; those working on
holidays earn 2.5 times normal
pay rate
At University of Oregon, graduate student
workers reach tentative agreement
Graduate Teaching Fellows
Federation Local 3544, an af-
filiate of the American Feder-
ation of Teachers, has reached
tentative agreement on a new
three-year contract for 1,500
graduate-student employees
after nine months of negotia-
tions with University of Ore-
gon admninistrators. If ratified
this fall, it will raise minimum
salaries by 3.5 percent a year
the first two years, and 3.7 per-
cent in the third year.
Workers at Commercial Aircraft
Painting Services (CAPS) voted
80 to 68 on July 8 to join Ma-
chinists District Lodge W24.
CAPS hired union-avoid-
ance consultants American La-
bor Group and brought in up to
eight union-busters, including
speakers of Spanish and Viet-
At PeaceHealth in
Longview, support
workers unionize
At PeaceHealth St. John Med-
ical Center in Longview, Wash-
ington, a group of 136 patient
access representatives voted 70
to 43 on July 6 to join Service
Employees International Union
(SEIU) Local 49.
Local 49 already represents
CNAs, housekeepers, food serv-
ice workers and other support
workers at the hospital. Their
contract expires Sept. 30.
SEIU Local 49 also repre-
sents support workers at Peace-
Health Sacred Heart Medical
Center in Springfield, and it’s
engaged in a union organizing
campaign at Peacehealth South-
west Washington Medical Cen-
ter. In April, the Springfield unit
ratified its first union contract,
winning health insurance im-
provements and raises that the
union says average 21 percent
over the life of the three-year
agreement.
namese, for one-on-one anti-
union meetings with workers.
But their efforts fell flat. About
58 percent of the 165 workers
had signed union cards when the
union called for an election. So
the 54 percent pro-union vote
suggests that the high-paid out-
of-state union-busters talked as
few as five workers out of sup-
porting the union. That might be
because CAPS — which uses
Boeing hangars at the Portland
airport — is a sky-high-turnover
outfit where workers paint Boe-
ing planes in 12-hour graveyard
shift for half the pay and bene-
fits Boeing workers get.
LOCAL MOTION ] MAY-JUNE 2016
The following are Oregon and Southwest Washington workplaces where workers have decided
whether to be represented by a union. The thumbs-up symbol means workers will be union-
represented. Thumbs-down means they’ll be on their own. Decert means a decertification
election, where union-represented workers vote whether to remain union. The information comes
from the National Labor Relations Board and the Oregon Employment Relations Board.
Union election results
Employer (Location) Union
Paragon Systems security (Portland) UGSOA Local 371
Applied Integrated Technologies (Portland) UGSOA Local 371
Shred-It (Portland) Teamsters Local 305
Ultimate RB rubber factory (McMinnville) USW Local 8378
PeaceHealth SW Medical Center techs (Vancouver) AFT Local 5017
First Student bus operators (Corvallis) ATU Local 757
DECERT
First Transit dispatchers (Beaverton) ATU Local 757
First Transit dispatchers (Portland) ATU Local 757
Cemex (Vancouver) Operating Engineers Local 701
Columbia Ford (Longview) Machinists District Lodge W24 DECERT
General Distributors (Oregon City) Teamsters Local 162 DECERT
Yes-No =
36-1
37-4
7-16
34-23
288-77
41-21
4-1
3-0
27-14
0-7
32-40
^
^
%
^
^
^
^
^
^
%
%
Unionization by majority signup
Employer (Location) Union
Portland State University (Portland) AFT/AAUP
■ 793 graduate administrative, research and teaching assistants
Lighthouse Charter School (North Bend) Oregon Education Association
■ 14 teachers
...At KGW-TV, unions stand against 'Uberization'
From Page 1
do something similar. To discuss
that idea, IATSE and IBEW are
hosting a town-hall-style meet-
ing 6:30 p.m. July 27 at First
Unitarian Church in downtown
Portland.
KGW takes aim at IBEW 48
union steward
Meanwhile, negotiations be-
tween KGW and IBEW Local
48 took a pause June 29 when
management announced that
two master control operators
will be laid off this fall, includ-
ing the station’s IBEW union
steward, Steve Smith. The sta-
tion won’t need those workers
because their work will be done
from a hub in Jacksonville,
Florida, except during live
broadcasts of local sports
events.
Under the union contract, lay-
offs are supposed to start with
“They’re tearing down the local news
and replacing it with amateurs.”
— IATSE Local 600 rep Dave Twedell
the least senior employees, and
Smith has been at KGW 25
years. But the contract also says
seniority is a factor only when
workers are equal in merit and
ability. KGW management
points out that Smith lacks a
commercial drivers license,
something a much less senior
worker has, so he has to go.
IBEW attorney Diana Winther
thinks that’s a paper-thin pretext
— the station’s satellite news
truck, which requires a CDL to
operate, hasn’t been driven in a
year, and KGW could have
Smith get a CDL if it wanted to;
a decade ago he offered to get
one and was turned down by the
station. Maybe not coinciden-
tally, Tegna has proposed a vol-
untary early retirement package
in bargaining — two weeks pay
per year of service, plus health
insurance, for members 55 or
over who’ve worked there 15 or
more years. The two sides next
meet on Aug. 2. They’ve been
without a new union contract
since June 2014.
ONLINE EXTRA
See the Seattle City Council resolution
at http://bit.ly/29t1MoI