High Price Discourages Union Defections
Caught between their union and their employer, a few wary United Parcel Service workers are both willing and afraid to go back to work.
“In good conscience, I can’t walk the picket line. I think we have been made a good offer,” said Lee Richmond, a Coeur d’Alene driver and 19-year UPS employee. “At the same time, I don’t want to cross that line.”
At risk, he said, are his benefits, his union membership and his pension, as well has his relationship with his fellow Teamsters, many of whom solidly support the national union leadership.
On Wednesday, the UPS center in Spokane posted a hand-written sign in view of the pickets which said: “Want to work? We have work available. Please report inside the building if you wish to work.”
In response, striking Teamsters posted their own sign: “Going back to work? Please deposit union card here.”
Early this week only about 50 Teamster workers had gone back to UPS statewide and 4,400 nationally, said Al Rapp, spokesman for the company out of Seattle.
In Spokane and North Idaho through Wednesday afternoon, apparently none of the 650 striking workers had yet crossed the lines.
A few, though, have talked with attorneys and called UPS headquarters to ask about possible penalties if they do go back to work. A Teamster spokesman said they could be fined the equivalent of their pay for each day they work and they might jeopardize their union status.
Rapp said UPS “will continue to make contributions for the pension and health and welfare plans for those who come back to work. How the union administers that, it’s out of our hands.” It’s also uncertain if the workers will keep their jobs after the strike, he said.
Though the Spokane center has the sign inviting workers back, managers aren’t trying too hard. “We’re not overly encouraging it,” said Rich Hanlon, center manager. “We’re telling them they need to clear it with the union first and see what penalties there are.”
Meanwhile, more than 100,000 packages still sit in trailers at the Spokane UPS center. Tricia Trail, a Spokane Valley resident, has spent the past few days trying to track down a care package for her five-year-old son. “It left Salt Lake City last Thursday,” she said. “Where is my package? We don’t know.”
She drove to the Spokane center Wednesday hoping to retrieve the gift from grandma, but was turned away at the gate. “People should have the right to go down there and get their stuff,” she said. “It’s just sitting there.”
UPS is storing thousands of packages in 40 to 48-foot trailers on the Spokane center lot. The managers and supervisors doing the jobs of the drivers and sorters will start processing those deliveries today.
They’ve been working non-stop to take care of the international and air deliveries first, said Hanlon. It isn’t easy with no work force. Now 15 of the familiar brown trucks a day leave the Spokane center. Under normal circumstances 100 vehicles go out.
Not everyone is suffering because of the strike. Colville-based Borderline Stage, a freight carrier that operates between Eastern Washington and Montana, is picking up extra cargo from its customers who generally use UPS.
“We’re not overwhelmed, but we’ve put two extra vehicles on the road,” said owner Dan Hildahl.
, DataTimes