Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 16, 1992 TAG: 9203160096
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAVID REED ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: ABINGDON LENGTH: Medium
It's not a coincidence that the man in the middle is U.S. District Judge Glen Williams, who grew up in the coalfields of Lee County and has been ruling on perplexing labor conflicts for 16 years.
Attorneys told Williams the coal industry faces widespread picketing by retired miners and wildcat strikes unless he stops the suspension of health benefits for 120,000 retired miners and their dependents next month.
On March 4 Williams stopped administrators of the troubled funds from notifying recipients that their health benefits would be cut off on April 15.
There also are several related federal lawsuits pending in Washington, and Congress is considering a plan to bail out the debt-ridden insurance funds.
But James Elliott, the lead attorney for the miners, said they wanted to get the labor dispute out of Washington, into the coalfields and before a judge familiar with the complicated history of union labor agreements.
"Judge Williams probably has a greater knowledge than any judge in the country about the relationships between the United Mine Workers union, the Bituminous Coal Operators Association and how the funds operate," he said.
The 1950 and 1974 UMW funds have a $115 million deficit because of a drop in contributing companies in the BCOA, which represents 14 of the nation's largest coal companies in negotiations with the UMW. The administrators of the funds are independent of the UMW and the coal companies.
Pittston's decision to drop out of the health funds in 1988 and stop paying the benefits led to the strike involving 1,200 miners in Appalachia. Before ending in 1990, the labor dispute caused unprecedented levels of civil disobedience and court fines, sporadic violence and international labor support.
Williams got negotiations between Pittston and the UMW back on track in a mountainside motel in Southwest Virginia after they were derailed by the health-care issue.
At one point when Williams was mediating, Pittston Vice President Joe Ferrell pounded the table and declared, "We can talk until doomsday but we will never, never go into that health fund again. That is over."
Williams, who is on senior status but still keeps a big caseload, said he hoped everything was negotiable and told both sides that he knew they had not "laid all your cards on the table." The 10-month strike ended after Pittston agreed to a lump sum payment into the funds in exchange for leaving the BCOA.
It was hard to read Williams' hand during the strike.
The judge threw three UMW leaders in jail for failing to get miners to obey his orders against blocking Pittston's coal trucks and fined the union $228,000 for misconduct. But that was nothing compared with the $52 million in state fines issued against the UMW by Russell County Circuit Judge Donald McGlothlin Jr.
When striking miners raided and occupied a coal processing plant, Williams said in court that there would be jail terms and heavy fines if they didn't meet his deadline for getting out. But he offered them amnesty and worked behind the scenes to end the stalemate.
In 1977, Williams ruled that the government had gone too far in 1977 when it required strip miners to return mined mountains to their approximate original shape. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed him.
Elliot said Williams may end up deciding the fate of the industry's retiree health funds because his court is the only one with the fund administrators, the coal companies and the union involved.
"We don't know what Judge Williams has in mind or what he's going to do, but he certainly has all the parties before him," he said.
Williams was attending a judicial conference in Florida and could not be reached for comment.
by CNB