The struck McKinley mine is on the Navajo reservation, and more than 90 percent of the mine workers are Navajo. P&M owns mines in Alabama, New Mexico, Wyoming, and Texas. The union contract at the company's Kemmerer mine in Wyoming is set to expire May 26.

Mine workers here organized a rally of 100 strikers and family members to "greet" company officials of the Pittsburg and Midway Coal Co. meeting at the McKinley mine. Pickets assembled at 6:00 a.m., chanting, "No contract, no work" as the caravan of company officials under police escort crossed the line along with local mine management.

Joining the miners on the picket line were several members of the Laborers International Union, who are contracted by P&M to do reclamation work at the McKinley mine.

The miners held their expanded picket along busy Route 264. A majority of the truck drivers and cars that went by honked in support of the strikers. Miners wore T-shirts saying, "Behind every light switch is a coal miner" and "UMWA Strike Force 2000--Whatever It Takes."

A total of 311 of the 387 nonmanagement employees at the McKinley mine went on strike May 15 over major concession demands by the company, including health care, overtime pay, and pensions.

The company, owned by Chevron Corp., is pressing for union members to give up double-time pay for work on Sundays and triple-time pay for holidays and birthdays. The bosses also demand an end to overtime pay except after 40 hours' work.

One of the central issues in the strike is P&M's move to set aside the company medical plan, which covers 100 percent of miners' health-care costs. The company wants to take that away from Native American miners and give them $100 a month instead, along with the suggestion they use the government health care provided under Indian Health Services.

Although the plan would be voluntary, the unionists point out the move is discriminatory. The company denies this, claiming its proposals were "special incentive plans."

The UMWA miners at McKinley must reach the age of 62 to retire with full pensions or 55 for a partial pension, no matter how many years they have worked in the mine. The union is demanding a retirement plan after 20 years of service and that the company contribute the same amount of money to the pension fund as do companies under the Bituminous Coal Operators Association (BCOA). According to an article in the May 18 Navajo Times, BCOA member companies contribute $50 a month for each year of service while Pittsburg and Midway only gives $28. The McKinley mine left the BCOA in 1995.

The company says it will increase the contribution to the pension fund to the BCOA standard if workers will agree to the changes in overtime pay. The Navajo Times reported that UMWA Local 1332 president Lawrence Oliver rejected this trade-off.

"Oliver said P&M informed the union that the money that the company saved from not paying premium benefits to its workers would go into their pension plan to raise it to the national standards," the paper reported. "P&M's proposal to raise pension benefits is nothing because the money is coming from the pockets of the workers, he said."

Georgia Ashley, who has worked at the McKinley mine for 17 years, told the Militant that her response to the company's offer on health care was, "We're not using glass beads anymore."

The union wants a six-year contract instead of five because the company says the coal seam will run out in 2006 and it plans to close the mine. The union does not want to negotiate a contract for one last year.

In addition, the "20 years and out" demand will allow miners who now have 20 years' service but are not at the company's current retirement age to collect a pension when the mine closes in 2006.

Unionists here started strike preparations many months in advance. Local union leaders visited the 110 chapters (communities) on the Navajo Nation, urging miners to save up money and make preparations for the strike.

No new negotiations have been set.  
 
 
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