BY JOHN SARGE
DETROIT - "Strength in Solidarity" declared bright orange buttons worn on the coats and caps of over 1,000 auto workers who rallied here and then marched around Chrysler's strike bound Mound Road Engine Plant May 2. The action was called by United Auto Workers Region 1 in solidarity with the UAW members, who have been on strike since April 9.

Some 1,800 members of UAW Local 51 walked out because the auto maker refused to sign a local agreement. Chrysler has settled local contracts at all their facilities except Mound Road. On May 7, company officials and UAW negotiators announced a tentative settlement; a ratification vote is scheduled for May 9.

"We're striking over outsourcing and management not carrying out their word," is how Jeff Blaney, an inspector with four years in the Block Department, explained the strike. "It's not money, I'm working seven days a week, 12 hours a day, anytime I want to, but they want to ship our work out to nonunion shops." The union is protesting plans by the car maker to shift work out of plant, affecting between 200 and 300 workers, and sending it to Dana Corp., a lower cost, mostly nonunion parts supplier.

The union is also protesting discriminatory policies of plant management. "Women are being denied promotions because they are women," Sam Nardicchio, Local 51 president told the rally. "Blacks are being denied promotions because they are Black."

The May 2 rally included auto workers from many other plants in the region, including a contingent of Canadian Auto Workers members from the Chrysler truck plant in Windsor, Ontario.

Up to 22,900 North American Chrysler workers were idled during the strike at other plants in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Before the settlement was announced, Chrysler had moved to block unemployment compensation for workers laid off due to the strike.

In other developments, two strikes by UAW workers continue at General Motors assembly plants in Pontiac, Michigan, and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. About 25 GM locals still are without a contract. A number these local unions at parts plants have requested strike authorization. Over 2,700 members of UAW Local 909 at the Warren Powertrain in Michigan, which makes transmissions, are waiting for authorization from the international union to issue a five- day warning of strike action. The major issue there is the same as Oklahoma City and Pontiac - staffing levels.

On April 30, 3,600 members of UAW 31 at GM's Fairfax Assembly Plant near Kansas City approved a strike vote after failing to negotiate a local agreement. Some areas of the plant are running 12-hour shifts, six days a week. The strike vote now allows the local negotiating committee to request strike authorization from the international union.

BY BETSY FARLEY

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - After two weeks on strike, workers at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. will be voting on a tentative agreement. The agreement, reached May 3 between negotiators for the company and the United Steelworkers of America (USWA), reportedly includes a six-year contract and coordinated expiration dates for workers at three plants operated by Goodyear's Kelly-Springfield division.

The tentative pact would also establish a two-tiered wage system, which would allow Goodyear to hire new workers at 70 percent and then increase wages over three years until they reach full pay. Workers remain on strike at plants in Akron, Marysville, and St. Marys, Ohio; Gadsden, Alabama; Lincoln, Nebraska; Topeka, Kansas; Danielle, Virginia; Union City, Tennessee; and Sun Prairie, Wisconsin until the vote is taken.

Talks resumed in a separate strike by more than 2,000 workers at Kelly-Springfield in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

BY JIM ROGERS

FAYETTEVILLE, North Carolina - "We really surprised management when we walked out. Their mouths dropped open. They were all watching us and talking frantically into their walkie-talkies, they just couldn't believe it. People felt like they had to fight because of all the takebacks in the company's proposal," said Buck Gainey a worker at the Kelly- Springfield plant here at USWA Local 959's "Solidarity day" picnic May 3.

Several hundred strikers and their families attended the solidarity event, "to provide a way for strikers and their families to get together, talk about the strike and reinforce each other," said Molly Revels, an officer of the local and a line servicer. "There are quite a few women working in the plant but it is still a mostly male workforce. If the strike goes on for long we want to set up a women's strike support group."

The main issues in the strike are the company's attempt to go to a 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week operation; increase the time it takes a new employee to get to full pay from 24 weeks maximum now, to three years; increase co- payments for medical insurance; and probes against the cost- of-living clause in their contract

The plant has about 2,500 production workers. At the time of the strike, about 2,100 were union members but most of the nonunion workers walked out too. According to Gainey, "at least 140 of them have joined the union since then."

John Sarge is a UAW Local 900 member in the Detroit area. Betsey Farley is a member of USWA Local 12014 in Birmingham, Alabama. Jim Rogers is a member of UNITE Local 294-T in Eden, North Carolina.  
 
 
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