Steelworkers Ratify Contract After Six-Month Lockout

After a six-month lockout, 2,200 members of the United Steelworkers Union (USW) at specialty steelmaker Allegheny Technologies, Inc. (ATI) have ratified a four-year contract at 12 facilities across six states.

The relationship between USW and ATI was tumultuous even before bargaining for a new agreement began in April 2015. ATI launched a dirty campaign of intimidation and manipulation, recruiting strikebreakers and security guards for the lockout even before negotiations began. ATI’s contract demands included 145 deep and permanent concessions, including creating a two-tier benefit system.

After months of negotiating, ATI demanded that USW members vote on its last offer. But before a vote could be held, ATI locked workers out of their jobs at eight plants in Western Pennsylvania, as well as plants in Albany, OR; Lockport, NY; Louisville, OH; New Bedford, MA; and Waterbury, CT, on Aug. 15.

On Dec. 19, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) announced that it would issue an unfair labor practice charge against ATI, in connection with the lockout. The 31-page charge was officially filed on Feb. 12, asserting that the lockout was illegal and that the company had bargained in bad faith, committing more than 20 different violations. The complaint also contended that ATI supervisors threatened to fire USW members if they went on strike, and illegally interrogated employees. The two sides continued to bargain.

Ten days later, after a tentative agreement was reached, USW members voted by a 5-1 margin to approve it. The contract “protects retirement benefits and maintains affordable, quality health care for active workers and retirees. It protects union jobs against outside contractors, maintains the grievance procedure and other important contract language, and introduces a new profit-sharing system that allows USW members a bigger share in ATI’s future success.

“The strength and solidarity of our union paid off with a fair contract that contains virtually none of the drastic concessions ATI sought to arbitrarily impose,” said USW International President Leo W. Gerard.

USW International Vice President Tom Conway, who led the union bargaining team, added, “The company’s plan from day one was to starve us out, to push the lockout into February when unemployment benefits would begin to run out, and then force us to accept its insulting ‘best, last and final offer,’” he explained. “Instead, we stood strong on the picket lines, in our communities and at the bargaining table.”