Home
Official website of the IAM/Woodworkers District W24 Lodge. Please visit the News page for up-to-date information on important news and events within your Lodge.
Second Annual W24 Salmon Fishing Derby for Guide Dogs Set for April 7, 2012!
The second annual W24 Salmon Fishing Derby will be held Saturday, April 7, 2012 at the Red Lion on the River at Jantzen Beach in Portland, Oregon. Details on event registration information can be found by clicking on the links below. A very special thanks to our sponsors and prize donors from last year for helping make our first event a great success. With their help, we raised $11,500 for Guide Dogs of America (GDA). Guide Dogs relies solely on fundraisers such as these to continue its mission to provide guide dogs and instruction in their use, free of charge, to blind and visually impaired men and women in the United States and Canada so that they may continue to pursue their goals with increased mobility and independence. GDA receives no government funding. More information on this tremendous organization can be found on their website at www.guidedogsofamerica.org.
News flash!!
Attention Diamond Sponsors:
Diamond sponsors are eligible to choose their own team of three and fish
with a celebrity! Stan Brock, former NFL player with the New Orleans
Saints and San Diego Chargers, will join us, along with other celebs to
help raise money (and have fun) for GDA.
If you would like to fish with a celebrity, please indicate so on your
registration form, or contact me at 503.702.9879 and we’ll be sure to
set that up.
If you have additional questions, please email communicator@iamw24.org or contact Dan Sass at the Union Hall.
Report from the President/DBR, January 2012
By Bob Wilson
In the last quarter of 2011 District W24 had plenty of activity that kept the staff busy.
The Boeing contract extension was bargained and approved by the membership in December. Assistant Directing Business Representative Bob Petroff and John Hall from the Boeing plant in Portland were on the negotiating team that secured this extension and did a very good job to secure the jobs for our members. This agreement will allow our 1400 members the opportunity to know what they can expect during the next four years without the possibility of a labor dispute. It also assures our members some added support work for the 737MAX.
We had three successful arbitrations at Georgia Pacific in North Bend, Oregon. These arbitrations were handled by District W24 Business Representative Marvin Abbott, the advocate for the Union, and were all for unjust terminations of our members at G.P. The arbitrators in each of these three cases agreed that the employees had been unjustly terminated and had each reinstated with lost benefits and wages. Marvin also won an arbitration at Weyerhaeuser Company in Pe-Ell Washington. Weyerhaeuser had terminated a Log Truck Driver unjustly and through the arbitration process, Weyerhaeuser was instructed to reinstate the driver with lost wages and benefits.
Our District had some organizing success at the end of 2011 as well. We organized The Cosmopolis Police Department in Cosmopolis, Washington. This is a unit of five new members to our Union. Business Representative Wayne Thompson will begin Contract bargaining on January 23rd. We were also successful in Sunnyside, Washington organizing the nurses at Sunnyside Hillcrest Manor. There are nearly 20 new members at that facility and Business Representative Ron Teigen will begin bargaining that first contract in February.
Wayne Thompson finished bargaining on a first contract at Simpson Lumber in Longview, Washington in early December. This added 94 new members to our District and the contract was overwhelmingly approved by the membership.
We also had some setbacks in the last quarter that have had significant impacts on our members. Clearwater Lumber in Lewiston, Idaho sold their mill in November to Idaho Forest Products. This move cost over 200 of our members their jobs as the mill closed. Some have been rehired by the new owners as the mill is restarted, but many have not been offered a job. Lewiston, Idaho does not have a lot of industry so this has had a significant impact on these members. Crown Cork and Seal has now announced they will close operations in our area. Business Representative Scott Lucy will be bargaining the effects of that closure and as details develop we will report on them.
In Montana, our members at the Department of Transportation have been bargaining as their contract expired. Bargaining is not going well and the outcome could easily be a labor dispute. The Montana State Government has recessed and did not appropriate any money for increases for State workers. Montana clearly does not have a “labor friendly” government in place and have done what they can to break the spirit of the State workers, some of whom are our members.
As the year 2012 begins, we are as committed as ever to growing our District. Servicing our membership and organizing new members continue to be the goals in 2012. We also will be very busy bargaining as contracts expire. Over sixty of our contracts expire in 2012 as well as some we are still finishing up on from 2011.
I wish each of you a prosperous year and look forward for an upswing in the economy as the year advances.
