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Giant Cement, union still at odds after strike ends
By Shelia Watson
Contributing Writer
Many union workers at Giant Cement in Dorchester County found they didn’t have a job when they ended their five-week strike.
The company began hiring replacement workers and only about 33% of the 137 members of the United Steelworkers Union still had jobs with the company.
The USW union members walked off the job Aug. 20, charging the company with taking away insurance and retirement benefits.
John Von Tress, Giant Cement’s vice president of operations, said the disagreement between management and the union had to do with health care issues and co-payments.
“For nearly two years they had been working under an agreement reached through negotiations in 2003, in which the company required the workers to pay 10 percent of health care,” Von Tress said.
The union wanted to go back to the old contract, the one in force prior to 2003 in which the company paid 100 percent of health care, he said.
Richard Thomas, international representative for the union, offered a different perspective.
“The health insurance contributions they were requesting from employees were unfair. They also were wanting to eliminate retirees’ insurance, and that would require the retirees to take more of their pension money to pay for insurance. They also wanted to eliminate the 30-and-out retirement option.”
Another point of contention, Thomas said, was a word change in the contracts. Current contracts allowed for work to be outsourced to contractors if not done properly by employees.
“(Management) wanted the word ‘efficiently’ put in the contract instead of ‘properly.’ That would open the door to replace workers with contractors if they deemed the contractor could do the work more efficiently.”
The company and the union negotiated twice, but they were unable to reach any agreement. “The union unconditionally offered to return,” Von Tress said.
After giving notice of its intention to the union, the company began hiring replacement workers.
“We offered to return to work after the company threatened us with the potential for permanent replacement,” said Thomas. “The timing was awful. They sent a letter threatening permanent replacements. The letter was received on the 22nd and was dated the 20th. It said they would proceed soon. Then on the 24th, they were hiring replacements.”
By the time the union workers agreed to return, Thomas said, only 46 jobs were available.
“That afternoon the workers went to the plant and were turned away by supervisors and security. On Sunday, they went there at their designated shift times again, and the company sent notification by fax that they had 46 openings. It’s our belief and contention that basically what they did is get rid of 91 employees.”
Those who did not get called back to work will be put on a preferential call list and will be called first when openings occur, Von Tress said.
The 91 workers that were not called back, Thomas said, have filed for unemployment.
“They’re fighting that battle as we speak. The problem is the unemployment office demanded that ‘labor dispute’ be put as the reason for unemployment. But the labor dispute has ended,” Thomas said.
The company made several offers to the union, Von Tress said.
“We offered the 30-year-and-out retirement. We offered the modified health care insurance plan that’s identical to the salaried people’s plan. And we offered a modification of the 95 percent wage protection (a contractual issue) that they were looking for. All of the things we offered were rejected,” he said.
However, Thomas contends that the company has been bringing people in even after the union called off the strike.
“New hires are still coming in. We have enough (union workers) in there to see this. We will obviously follow up with the National Labor Relations Board,” Thomas said.
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