Tony Melo, a member of the negotiating committee, said he thought the union had accomplished something with the strike, pushing back some of the company’s initial demands. “We hurt the company bad,” he said, but the workers were faced with “the company threatening to bring in scabs.”

The textile workers, who are members of Local 1226T of UNITE HERE, struck when the company pushed a contract that included hiking the payments workers would make for health insurance and eliminating a guarantee of a 40-hour work week, replacing it with the “flexibility” to run three shifts in the plant for only four, or in some cases, only three days a week.

Explaining why they had unanimously rejected the initial company offer, Ronald Melanson, one of the 190 workers in the walkout, said, “We want to go ahead, not back in time. We don’t want to go back to work for less money, which is what this would amount to.”

Five weeks into the strike and facing solid opposition by the workers to its proposals, the company stepped up pressure on the workers to settle. It sent all union members a letter signed by CEO Larry Himes, threatening the company would begin hiring new people to take their jobs. The bosses also placed a large want ad in the Fall River Herald News.

The company had succeeded in reaching a contract settlement with the local in an adjacent plant, the Duro print shop. With the contract for the 100 unionists there due to expire at the end of October, the company offered them a sweetened version of what had been turned down by the Duro Finishing plant workers. It included a bigger raise, workers said, of 50 cents an hour the first year and 30 cents for the next two years. It also introduced a demand for workers to pay a substantial percentage of their health-care coverage—12 percent the first year and 20 percent for each of the next two years.

Workers from the striking local gathered outside the union hall on the first day of the vote by the print workers, asking them to hold off on voting for the offer, or to reject it, so the two locals could face the company together. The print shop local rejected the first offer in a 37-33 vote. Several workers said they viewed the company’s offer of a $150 signing bonus as a bribe to get them to settle before the striking local, putting more pressure on their fellow union members.

The next week the company offered the print workers basically the same contract they’d rejected, but added the proviso that if the striking Duro Finishing local won better terms these would automatically be added to the print shop contract. Print workers passed this contract October 31 by a vote of 57 to 16.

The company then offered the strikers a slightly improved package, including a raise of 47 cents the first year, and a demand for payments of 13 percent on insurance the first year, and 20 percent the next two years. This was voted down 178 to 1. Steve Holmes, one of the strikers, said he voted no because, “They still want to stick on the 32 hours and the health care. At the end of three years, we’d be paying $80!”

This reporter talked to union members at the Chace Street plant gate who had just received the company letter, and were discussing the challenge that would be posed if the company did try to bring scabs in. Some said it’s not legal to stop scabs from entering the plant, while others said the best way to stop them is to have large numbers of people at the picket lines. A delegation of workers from UNITE HERE Local 377 in New Bedford visited the Chace Street picket line to deliver $115 from a plant collection and to extend solidarity.

In the wake of the threats to bring in scabs, the union negotiating committee asked for another meeting with the bosses. The new company offer, which was the one unionists accepted November 10, includes a raise of 50 cents an hour the first year of a three-year deal, and 30 cents for each of the next two years. Under the terms of the agreement, the company may run up to six 32-hour workweeks every three months. Union members will now pay 12 percent of the cost of their health insurance, which is $20.15 per week, and 20 percent the next two years of the contract. New hires will pay 20 percent from the start.

Laura Garza is a member of UNITE HERE Local 377 in New Bedford. Sarah Ullman, a garment worker in Fall River, contributed to this article.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home