Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, May 25, 1993 TAG: 9305250088
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CHARLESTON, W.VA. LENGTH: Medium
The union said it would strike mines owned by CONSOL Inc., Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal Co. and C.L.I. Corp. at midnight Monday.
CONSOL "is one of the prime players in the shell game designed to deny mine workers job security," said union President Richard Trumka.
The company's president is Bobby Brown, lead negotiator for the Bituminous Coal Operators Association, which represents the nation's 12 largest coal companies.
Trumka said Brown is among the chief proponents of "double-breasting," in which a company creates a nonunion subsidiary to avoid complying with a union contract.
"The bottom line is that CONSOL and the other BCOA-represented operators gave their word in 1988 to give our members what they had earned - jobs with a future," Trumka said.
Talks broke down May 3 between the union and the association. Negotiators had been trying since November to work out a contract covering 60,000 miners in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, Illinois and Indiana.
The walkout began May 10 in Indiana and Illinois and expanded a week later to West Virginia.
The union has accused the operators of evading a provision of the expired agreement that guaranteed 60 percent of newly created jobs to laid-off union miners.
But operators, who say they must compete with low-cost nonunion and overseas producers, maintain that agreement didn't apply to nonunion subsidiaries that didn't sign the agreement.
No new talks are scheduled.
by CNB