NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | March 16, 2018 | PAGE 5
...New Seasons
From Page 1
Business magazine on the day of the an-
nouncement, Collie said she loves New
Seasons and was trying not to cry, but de-
nied point blank that she was being
pushed out.
Could Collie’s handling of the union
situation have had something to do with
her departure? New Seasons spent 18
years cultivating a reputation as a pro-
gressive employer, and there’s no bigger
stain on that record than its decision to
hire a union-buster within days of the
public announcement of the union cam-
paign. New Seasons hired California-
based Cruz & Assoc- iates, the same firm
employed by the Trump Organization in
its failed 2016 fight against union organ-
izing at its Las Vegas hotel.
At what must have been considerable
expense to New Seasons, Cruz & Associ-
ates dispatched a pair of attorneys to hold
hour-long meetings with nearly every
Portland-area store employee in groups of
5 to 15. Employees were scheduled for the
meetings by their managers, and many
didn’t realize they didn’t have to attend the
meetings. [Oregon law requires that such
meetings be voluntary.] Given a local
workforce of around 3,300, even if the
lawyers’ rate was as low as $200 an hour,
that would suggest New Seasons spent
over $1 million on the campaign. The ac-
tual figure won’t be known until required
disclosure forms are filed with the U.S.
Department of Labor, likely next month.
Union supporters aren’t sure what to
make of the news of Collie’s abrupt de-
parture, but their union, New Seasons
Workers United, did issue a statement in
response: “Wendy Collie’s tenure was
marred by poor decisions that hurt em-
ployees, drove down morale in the stores
and challenged the very ethos of the gro-
cery chain. In response to workers’ efforts
to fight for pay equity, safe staffing levels,
affordable healthcare and transparency
New Seasons worker Chris Heim distributed flyers March 1 outside the Multnomah Athletic
Club, where New Seasons board member Stephen Babson was giving the keynote address at
an event organized by a group called Association for Corporate Growth. Babson is a managing
director of the private equity firm Endeavour Capital, which owns a controlling interest in New
Seasons. The union fliers criticized Endeavour for misdeeds of companies it’s invested in, includ-
ing New Seasons.
from management, Wendy chose to hire
the same union-busting firm as the Trump
Hotels and fire workers beloved by cus-
tomers simply for speaking up.”
The firing the statement refers to were
of pro-union workers Adrian Mendoza
and Terra Bosart. In charges filed with the
National Labor Relations Board (NLRB),
the union alleged the two were fired ille-
gally for having supported the union ef-
fort, but the NLRB dismissed the charges
Feb. 28 on the grounds there was insuffi-
cient evidence to establish a violation. A
spokes-person for New Seasons Workers
United said the union disagrees with that
decision and will be appealing.
Will New Seasons’ new leaders shift
course?
With Collie out, two new “co-presidents”
are now in charge of the company: New
Seasons “chief people officer” Kristi Mc-
Farland and chief financial officer For-
rest Hoffmaster. Both are fairly new to
the 18-year-old company: Hoffmaster
came to New Seasons in 2016 from
Austin, Texas, where he was an execu-
tive at Whole Foods. McFarland came to
New Seasons in 2014 from Emeryville,
California-based Peet’s Coffee.
Does the new leadership intend to take
a new approach toward the union effort?
A representative of the Metropolitan
Group, New Seasons outside public re-
lations firm, said the new co-presidents
were too busy for an interview with the
Labor Press, but would answer questions
by email. They did, in some detail. You
can see their responses in full at nwlabor-
press.org/2018/03/new-seasons.
But the short version is that the new
co-presidents are willing to meet with
pro-union employees, though not with
any “outside organization” (such as
United Food and Commercial Workers
Local 555, with which New Seasons
Workers United is affiliated).
McFarland and Hoffmaster say
they’re in the process of setting up a
meeting with the pro-union worker
group, and hope to have it scheduled
soon.
“We have pledged to stand by our em-
ployees’ decision if an NLRB election is
held, and will do our utmost to ensure
they have the opportunity to make their
decisions in a democratic manner with
full information, no intimidation, and a
secret ballot,” McFarland and Hoffmas-
ter wrote.
That last item — ensuring that em-
ployees make the decision about union-
izing via a secret ballot administered by
the National Labor Relations Board — is
a seeming rebuff to hopes that New Sea-
sons might agree to recognize a union if
and when a majority of its employees
sign cards saying they want a union.
Safeway-Albertsons did that very thing
several years ago at stores around Ore-
gon (and even let union organizers talk
with employees in break rooms) which
led to 4,400 grocery workers joining Lo-
cal 555.
McFarland and Hoffmaster also said
Cruz and Associates is no longer em-
ployed by New Seasons (having com-
pleted its work last year). But they of-
fered a profoundly disingenuous
explanation of why New Seasons hired
Cruz & Associates in the first place —
the same explanation Collie gave in a let-
ter to employees.
McFarland and Hoffmaster write:
“When this all started New Seasons was
asked by many staff members to provide
information on the overall process and
specifics around the National Labor Re-
lations Act. This is unfamiliar territory
for all of us and we felt it best to bring in
experts who could inform and educate
properly and objectively. To provide staff
Turn to Page 8
RETIREMENT
Bipartisan panel tasked with finding solution to multiemployer pension crisis
Tucked into the “Bipartisan
Budget Act of 2018” is language
that establishes the Joint Select
Committee on the Solvency of
Multiemployer Pension Plans, a
bipartisan House and Senate
panel tasked with finding a so-
lution to the looming multiem-
ployer defined benefit pension
crisis.
Roughly 10 million union
workers and retirees are enrolled
in 1,400 multiemployer pension
plans in the U.S. About 110 of
those plans are considered in crit-
ical and declining status and are
projected to run out of money
within the next 20 years. Once a
plan becomes insolvent, it turns
to the Pension Benefit Guaranty
Corporation (PBGC) to pay out
benefits, albeit at a much reduced
level. However, with so many
plans facing insolvency, PBGC
says it is likely to run out of
money by 2025.
To help prevent a catastrophe,
lawmakers passed the Multiem-
ployer Pension Reform Act of
2014 (also known as the Miller-
Kline law). It allows troubled
plans to cut the accrued benefits
of most participants—even those
already retired. Fifteen plans have
applied for permission to cut ben-
efits—some by as much as 50
percent. The Treasury Depart-
ment has approved four applica-
tions and denied five others. Four
applications have been with-
drawn and two are under review.
Among those under review is
the Western States Office and
Professional Employees Interna-
tional Union (OPEIU) Pension
Fund, whose participants include
members and retirees of OPEIU
locals in several western states,
including Local 11 based in Van-
couver, Wash. Pension trustees
are proposing cuts of 30 percent.
As you might imagine, partic-
ipants are up in arms about the
reductions, especially retirees,
who put money into pension
plans year after year, sometimes
forgoing larger wage increases or
other benefits because they
wanted to make sure they had
enough to maintain their middle-
class lifestyle in retirement.
The goal of the new commit-
tee is to find a way to prevent
cutting the pensions of workers
in troubled plans, while also
avoiding tapping into the PBGC.
Members of the panel have
until Nov. 30 to craft a plan. Co-
chairs are authorized to hold at
least five meetings, including one
public hearing outside of Wash-
ington, D.C. It will take agree-
ment by a minimum of five of
the eight members of both parties
to send any proposal to the full
House and Senate for up-or-
down votes. Neither chamber
will be permitted to amend the
agreement.
The first meeting was held
March 9. Committee members
are:
■ U.S. Senate: Democrats Sherrod Brown of
Ohio (co-chair), Joe Manchin III of West Virginia,
Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Tina Smith of
Minnesota. Republicans Orrin Hatch of Utah (co-
chair), Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Michael
Crapo of Idaho, Rob Portman of Ohio.
■ U.S. House: Republicans Virginia Foxx of North
Carolina, Phil Roe of Tennessee, Vern Buchanan
of Florida, David Schweikert of Arizona.
Democrats Richard Neal of Massachusetts,
Bobby Scott of Virginia, Donald Norcross of New
Jersey, Debbie Dingell of Michigan.