Vol. 64/No.18 May 8, 2000
Steelworkers hold solidarity rally in Kansas City
BY RAY PARSONS
KANSAS CITY, Missouri—Some 100 unionists gathered here April 18 at a rally that linked up three Midwest labor struggles.
The event was sponsored by United Steelworkers of America (USWA) Local 13 at GST Steel as a solidarity event for struggles by members of Steelworkers Local 1028, who are locked out at the MEI foundry in Duluth, Minnesota. Both plants are owned by GS Industries, based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Members of the Teamsters and United Auto Workers union also participated.
The action won new support for the Duluth fighters, who went on strike August 25 in a fight against mandatory overtime and unsafe working conditions. At the end of February the union offered to end the strike and return to work while continuing contract negotiations. MEI bosses refused, locking out all 143 unionists. Not one union member has broken ranks and crossed the picket lines over the course of the eight-month struggle. The company has 70 scabs working in the plant.
Eight members of USWA Local 164 on strike at Titan Tire in Des Moines came to the action, and invited everyone to attend an April 29 rally in Des Moines marking the two-year anniversary of their fight. Fifteen members of Teamsters Local 955, locked out by Associated Wholesale Grocers (AWG) in Kansas City, Kansas, came to back the steelworkers and build support for their fight.
Six members of USWA Local 310 from Bridgestone/Firestone, came from Des Moines to the rally. The action was of interest among unionists in the plant looking for ways to build support as their contract talks take place. The negotiations, which affect more than 8,000 workers at nine plants around the country, have continued beyond the April 23 expiration of the old pact.
Stuart Smith, one of 10 Duluth fighters in attendance, spoke at the rally. He started at MEI 12 years ago, after losing a 27-year job at an iron mine that went bankrupt in northern Minnesota. "I saw fellow workers at MEI get their legs crushed others who got carpal tunnel. Once they did, they were out the gate," he said. "We want contract language to ensure this doesn't happen."
Local 1028 member Julie Kromschroeder was impressed by the solidarity expressed at the rally. "If we continue to get together and the companies have to deal with all the unions, that will put a different light on things. Individually we can't do anything," she said.
Kromschroeder noted that she started out at MEI 15 years ago, working the front office telephone switchboard and later moved into production. When the union was voted in by a slim margin only seven years ago, she voted no, thinking it wasn't needed. "Then I saw how they treated us. I was wrong. A vote for the union today would be 143 to nothing!"
She said the fight at MEI has changed how workers view their union. "Since I've gotten involved, I've been saying there's got to be change. We can't have a few people dictating what goes on in the union. Everyone has to be involved. It's our union. We're a family now. We won't be the same when we go back."
Since the beginning of the strike the union has organized potluck dinners every other Thursday where the steelworkers and their families can meet to discuss where the struggle is at.
The Teamsters at the April 18 rally are among some 1,200 locked out by AWG bosses in Kansas City, Kansas, and Springfield, Missouri, April 2. When Teamsters at AWG in Oklahoma City honored picket lines thrown up by the locked-out locals, another 300 workers were fired at that facility. The unionists are distributing flyers at grocery stores around the area urging a boycott of supermarkets supplied by AWG.
On the same day as the Kansas City action, Local 1028 rallied in Duluth, and other fighters leafleted the GS Industries plant in Georgetown, South Carolina, MEI and union negotiators also announced that a new round of contract talks will begin May 18.
Ray Parsons is a member of USWA Local 310 at Bridgestone/Firestone in Des Moines.
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