Labor leaders, managers and a smattering of regular employees at the Owens-Illinois Glass Containers' bottling plant sit down most months to discuss how the plant's output stacks up to its 23 sister factories.
Jason Rearick / The Citizen
Union worker Mark Ratliff brazes the refrigeration unit to a ventilator being assembled at the McQuay International plant in Auburn last week. Local unions report more cooperative relationships with employers these days.
Union worker Mark Ratliff brazes the refrigeration unit to a ventilator being assembled at the McQuay International plant in Auburn last week. Local unions report more cooperative relationships with employers these days.
They troubleshoot past problems, and they communicate about the Auburn plant's future, including a current initiative to start production runs of bottles larger than the plant's beer bottles. The president and the vice president of the union are on the company's safety committee.
“We form a partnership with the company to secure all our livelihoods,” said Mark Gauthier, president of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local 2671. “That's the main thrust.”
As organized labor membership has declined nationwide, unions are starting to find more cooperative relationships with employers may be a key to survival. Unionized labor has dropped nearly 50 percent over the past 20 years.
At the Owens-Illinois plant, the union successfully negotiated a new contract in December that included a 3-percent raise and retained health care benefits, but included some deductible increases, said Gauthier, a 24-year veteran of the plant, who heads up a local representing 210 hourly workers. The union has never gone on strike, and only had one strike vote, which failed when the plant was owned by Miller Brewing several years ago.
“It's the union's job, along with the company, to try to get those things ironed out so they don't fester ... because of the difficulty of manufacturing in the Northeast, everyone can pick up the paper and find out that (the plant's) closed or cutting back,” Gauthier said.
While unions must never sacrifice the best interest of its workers and a contract is important for the protection of workers, it is also vital for unions to work with managers to keep the company viable, said Gerri Cregg, president of the United Steel Workers' Local 32 that represents around 400 workers at McQuay International.
At McQuay's Auburn plant, management and the union have combined forces to lobby the state to buy McQuay's heating, ventilating and air conditioning equipment products instead of out-of-state or out-of-country competitors. It has meant a USW official coming in once a month to host health and safety training that raises the competitiveness of the plant's workers. It has also meant management's support of an internal voter registration drive.
“Given the climate of today, we're all evolving into different ways,” said Cregg, who is also employed as a quality specialist at McQuay.
A union-management relationship that involves good communication facilitates McQuay's flexibility to secure a competitive advantage, said James Cullen, the general manager at McQuay. A recent example of that, he said, was hacking out a letter of understanding in a monthly management-union meeting.
That understanding arranged ahead of time for the training of workers subbing for coworkers' vacations.
“That's the kind of thing we need in a business, particularly in New York,” said Cullen. “We're competing with manufacturers from all over the world.”
William Catto, a former Cayuga County legislator and longtime member of the county's Democratic Party which traditionally has found support from labor unions, agrees that unions must work cooperatively with the management in today's competitively tough economic environment.
“Unions started because they were being abused by management,” Catto said. “That certainly has changed now. The very best unions work with their employer. If they don't, if they constantly want to fight with their employer, neither group will be successful.”
Catto, who headed up the county's Department of Health and Human Services before his retirement, followed a similar partnership model by inviting the head of the county workers#, union to meetings with all of his department managers.
Herb Marshall, a Republican who just retired from the Cayuga County Legislature's chairman post, said a partnership between his office and the heads of the county's various unions allowed him to be an outside arbiter in intradepartmental labor issues.
“If the employees had a problem with who they consider their boss, I think they presented their case and I could be someone who could look at it somewhat independently. I think we solved several labor problems,” Marshall said.
Thomas McNabb, a Democratic Auburn city councilor and a union member prior to his retirement from the city's civil service, said that in the age of automobile manufacturers and airlines seeking compromises from their unions, partnership measures like this are important.
“There has to be a common understanding. They can't outspend the economy,” McNabb said.
Although private sector union membership has declined, public sector unions have held relatively steady. The same can be said for organized labor in New York state. New York has the top national percentage of union members, with 25.3 percent of all workers logged as a member of a union.
In Cayuga County, at least 5,000 American Federation of Labor/Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) member unions and another 3,000 of the county's 26,872 workers are unionized. A total of 20,879 workers are employed by private companies, and 5,993 employees, including teachers, work in public sector jobs, according to preliminary 2004 data from the federal government.
Unions are also present within some of the county's major manufacturers, including Bombardier, which produces diesel engine blocks and fabricates and assembles aircraft components; Goulds Pumps/ITT Industries; Hammond and Irving, which manufactures seamless rolled rings and open die forgings for heavy industry; McQuay International, which manufactures heating, ventilating and air conditioning equipment; Owens-Illinois; the Stroehmann bakery plant; Sunnycrest, which manufactures construction, wastewater treatment and funeral supply products; and TRW Automotive.
“The thing about Auburn is, it still has an industrial base,” said Mark Spadafore, a field coordinator for the Central New York Labor Federation, AFL-CIO. “Having an industrial base is interesting. Where you saw the most exciting organizing in the 1930s was in an industrial plant. It's easier to organize in those plants because they're within four walls and they work standard shifts.”
However, as manufacturing jobs are decreasing and service jobs are rising, local unions have focused their energy on critiques of businesses they say don't offer health benefits, full-time hours and reasonable wages.
When those companies receive tax breaks to come into a community, it's not fair to a company like McQuay that pay pensions and health benefits and “is good cooperative citizen that is attempting to create a stable, vital economy,” said Baschki Leo, the president of the Cayuga County Labor Council, which represents 29 unions that are members of the AFL-CIO.
Leo and Spadafore worry that if employers do not provide health care and other benefits, it shifts their employees onto the government welfare rolls for food stamps, Medicaid and Section VIII housing. They say that their guaranteed benefits ensure a quality of work that non-unionized employers don't provide.
“We work a lot harder than we have to,” because of better pay and because of a pride in getting a job done, said Ted Skowron, the union steward for the United Food and Commercial Workers Local One, which represents employees at Indelicato's Meat Market, P&C, Rite Aid and Tops.
Skowron, a reedy assistant bookkeeper at P&C with slant and pepper hair, said he will be able to retire in two years after 36 years of employment at the grocery chain. Part-timers are guaranteed a minimum of 20 hours per week, and full timers are guaranteed 40 hours. They have health care without co-pays. They have scheduled raises. They are guaranteed payment for the hours they are scheduled.
Skowron brushes off the concern that non-unionized grocers like Wal-Mart or Wegmans might undercut P&C or Tops.
“If you're a smart business operation you're going to stay in operation. If you're foolish, you'll go under,” and unionized workers are not part of that potential foolishness, he said.
Christopher Poole, an organizer with the Sheetmetal Workers International Association's Local 58, wonders if the less stringent training for non-unionized workers in his industry might not end up being more costly.
“What is the quality of their knowledge is what comes to mind. We don't feel the non-union sheetmetal worker as a whole maintains the level of experience our members may have. Are you paying more? You're paying what you get.”
The benefits for a unionized sheetmetal worker are generous. Their schooling is free. They work on a sliding scale that increases as their time in the union goes on. They can retire once they've hit 30 years of service and are age 55 with a defined pension and a 401(k). They make about $37.88 per hour in addition to benefits, while nonunionized workers make around $15 to $20.
About a dozen of the sheetmetal union workers live in Cayuga County and work at job sites all over the state for more than 20 companies that have contracted with the union.
City councilor McNabb thinks that the “good wages” negotiated by unions means more money can be spent in the local economy. Labor leaders also argue that unions provide workers with a better chance of higher salaries and better benefits and add a competitive presence to raise the level of non-unionized workforces#, wages.
Owens-Illinois#, Gauthier said the main challenges for labor in Cayuga County is organizing younger workers who are not exposed to the benefits of working in a union plant.
“(They) go by hearsay,” he said. “Unions are not perfect organizations, I'll be the first to admit that, but a lot of the press and lot of people have negative outlook about unions. Many of the gains every worker in the county experiences as far as benefits and decent wages is a direct result of a union's sacrifices to go out on strikes and to get their just rewards.”
Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net
“We form a partnership with the company to secure all our livelihoods,” said Mark Gauthier, president of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local 2671. “That's the main thrust.”
As organized labor membership has declined nationwide, unions are starting to find more cooperative relationships with employers may be a key to survival. Unionized labor has dropped nearly 50 percent over the past 20 years.
At the Owens-Illinois plant, the union successfully negotiated a new contract in December that included a 3-percent raise and retained health care benefits, but included some deductible increases, said Gauthier, a 24-year veteran of the plant, who heads up a local representing 210 hourly workers. The union has never gone on strike, and only had one strike vote, which failed when the plant was owned by Miller Brewing several years ago.
“It's the union's job, along with the company, to try to get those things ironed out so they don't fester ... because of the difficulty of manufacturing in the Northeast, everyone can pick up the paper and find out that (the plant's) closed or cutting back,” Gauthier said.
While unions must never sacrifice the best interest of its workers and a contract is important for the protection of workers, it is also vital for unions to work with managers to keep the company viable, said Gerri Cregg, president of the United Steel Workers' Local 32 that represents around 400 workers at McQuay International.
At McQuay's Auburn plant, management and the union have combined forces to lobby the state to buy McQuay's heating, ventilating and air conditioning equipment products instead of out-of-state or out-of-country competitors. It has meant a USW official coming in once a month to host health and safety training that raises the competitiveness of the plant's workers. It has also meant management's support of an internal voter registration drive.
“Given the climate of today, we're all evolving into different ways,” said Cregg, who is also employed as a quality specialist at McQuay.
A union-management relationship that involves good communication facilitates McQuay's flexibility to secure a competitive advantage, said James Cullen, the general manager at McQuay. A recent example of that, he said, was hacking out a letter of understanding in a monthly management-union meeting.
That understanding arranged ahead of time for the training of workers subbing for coworkers' vacations.
“That's the kind of thing we need in a business, particularly in New York,” said Cullen. “We're competing with manufacturers from all over the world.”
William Catto, a former Cayuga County legislator and longtime member of the county's Democratic Party which traditionally has found support from labor unions, agrees that unions must work cooperatively with the management in today's competitively tough economic environment.
“Unions started because they were being abused by management,” Catto said. “That certainly has changed now. The very best unions work with their employer. If they don't, if they constantly want to fight with their employer, neither group will be successful.”
Catto, who headed up the county's Department of Health and Human Services before his retirement, followed a similar partnership model by inviting the head of the county workers#, union to meetings with all of his department managers.
Herb Marshall, a Republican who just retired from the Cayuga County Legislature's chairman post, said a partnership between his office and the heads of the county's various unions allowed him to be an outside arbiter in intradepartmental labor issues.
“If the employees had a problem with who they consider their boss, I think they presented their case and I could be someone who could look at it somewhat independently. I think we solved several labor problems,” Marshall said.
Thomas McNabb, a Democratic Auburn city councilor and a union member prior to his retirement from the city's civil service, said that in the age of automobile manufacturers and airlines seeking compromises from their unions, partnership measures like this are important.
“There has to be a common understanding. They can't outspend the economy,” McNabb said.
Although private sector union membership has declined, public sector unions have held relatively steady. The same can be said for organized labor in New York state. New York has the top national percentage of union members, with 25.3 percent of all workers logged as a member of a union.
In Cayuga County, at least 5,000 American Federation of Labor/Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) member unions and another 3,000 of the county's 26,872 workers are unionized. A total of 20,879 workers are employed by private companies, and 5,993 employees, including teachers, work in public sector jobs, according to preliminary 2004 data from the federal government.
Unions are also present within some of the county's major manufacturers, including Bombardier, which produces diesel engine blocks and fabricates and assembles aircraft components; Goulds Pumps/ITT Industries; Hammond and Irving, which manufactures seamless rolled rings and open die forgings for heavy industry; McQuay International, which manufactures heating, ventilating and air conditioning equipment; Owens-Illinois; the Stroehmann bakery plant; Sunnycrest, which manufactures construction, wastewater treatment and funeral supply products; and TRW Automotive.
“The thing about Auburn is, it still has an industrial base,” said Mark Spadafore, a field coordinator for the Central New York Labor Federation, AFL-CIO. “Having an industrial base is interesting. Where you saw the most exciting organizing in the 1930s was in an industrial plant. It's easier to organize in those plants because they're within four walls and they work standard shifts.”
However, as manufacturing jobs are decreasing and service jobs are rising, local unions have focused their energy on critiques of businesses they say don't offer health benefits, full-time hours and reasonable wages.
When those companies receive tax breaks to come into a community, it's not fair to a company like McQuay that pay pensions and health benefits and “is good cooperative citizen that is attempting to create a stable, vital economy,” said Baschki Leo, the president of the Cayuga County Labor Council, which represents 29 unions that are members of the AFL-CIO.
Leo and Spadafore worry that if employers do not provide health care and other benefits, it shifts their employees onto the government welfare rolls for food stamps, Medicaid and Section VIII housing. They say that their guaranteed benefits ensure a quality of work that non-unionized employers don't provide.
“We work a lot harder than we have to,” because of better pay and because of a pride in getting a job done, said Ted Skowron, the union steward for the United Food and Commercial Workers Local One, which represents employees at Indelicato's Meat Market, P&C, Rite Aid and Tops.
Skowron, a reedy assistant bookkeeper at P&C with slant and pepper hair, said he will be able to retire in two years after 36 years of employment at the grocery chain. Part-timers are guaranteed a minimum of 20 hours per week, and full timers are guaranteed 40 hours. They have health care without co-pays. They have scheduled raises. They are guaranteed payment for the hours they are scheduled.
Skowron brushes off the concern that non-unionized grocers like Wal-Mart or Wegmans might undercut P&C or Tops.
“If you're a smart business operation you're going to stay in operation. If you're foolish, you'll go under,” and unionized workers are not part of that potential foolishness, he said.
Christopher Poole, an organizer with the Sheetmetal Workers International Association's Local 58, wonders if the less stringent training for non-unionized workers in his industry might not end up being more costly.
“What is the quality of their knowledge is what comes to mind. We don't feel the non-union sheetmetal worker as a whole maintains the level of experience our members may have. Are you paying more? You're paying what you get.”
The benefits for a unionized sheetmetal worker are generous. Their schooling is free. They work on a sliding scale that increases as their time in the union goes on. They can retire once they've hit 30 years of service and are age 55 with a defined pension and a 401(k). They make about $37.88 per hour in addition to benefits, while nonunionized workers make around $15 to $20.
About a dozen of the sheetmetal union workers live in Cayuga County and work at job sites all over the state for more than 20 companies that have contracted with the union.
City councilor McNabb thinks that the “good wages” negotiated by unions means more money can be spent in the local economy. Labor leaders also argue that unions provide workers with a better chance of higher salaries and better benefits and add a competitive presence to raise the level of non-unionized workforces#, wages.
Owens-Illinois#, Gauthier said the main challenges for labor in Cayuga County is organizing younger workers who are not exposed to the benefits of working in a union plant.
“(They) go by hearsay,” he said. “Unions are not perfect organizations, I'll be the first to admit that, but a lot of the press and lot of people have negative outlook about unions. Many of the gains every worker in the county experiences as far as benefits and decent wages is a direct result of a union's sacrifices to go out on strikes and to get their just rewards.”
Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net
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