Vol. 81/No. 21      May 29, 2017

 

Victory! Firings during strike at Momentive reversed!

 
WATERFORD, N.Y. — Workers won an important victory here May 11 when International Union of Electrical Workers-Communications Workers of America Local 81359 announced Momentive Performance Materials bosses had been forced to back off the firing of two dozen unionists during their bitter 105-day strike against the company.

“We stuck to our guns,” Frank Izzo, a maintenance worker at the plant, told the Militant May 13 over his kitchen table in nearby Clifton Park. “Our attitude was that they all go back.”

Izzo is one of 700 workers who struck against concession demands by management at the Albany-area chemical plant. When the unionists returned to work in February, they continued fighting to reinstate 26 strikers the company charged with “sabotage” or “misconduct” on the picket lines.

“We were able to achieve resolution on 25 of the 26 members as of last night,” Local President Dom Patrignani said in a May 11 union statement. The agreement means 16 of the fired workers return to work May 15, five chose to retire and four reached severance agreements. The union will continue to “commit every effort” for the one worker who awaits a hearing date for arbitration on his firing, Patrignani said.

The unity of the unionists and the solidarity they won during the strike put pressure on the company. “We wore insignias and wristbands on the job, we had a billboard near the plant and signs in the windows at the ‘hot dog’ union headquarters,” Izzo said, referring to the former fast-food stand across from the plant the union used as its strike center.

“They carried out retaliation on us when we went back to work, including telling us we can’t wear ‘26’ stickers on our hard hats,” Les Wheeler told the Militant when we visited him in Johnsonville. “The company tries to persuade public opinion that unions are bad. I can’t believe how arrogant they were in their attack on us, but it backfired, and we said, ‘Enough is enough!’”

The strike “brought to me stronger bonds with other union members who I had never met,” he added.

“I’d like to thank everyone who pushed so hard to stand with the 26,” Patrignani told the Militant May 15. The fight continues for the remaining fired union member, he said. “We’re standing strong on it.”
 
 
Related articles:
On the Picket Line
 
 
 
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