| Conoco Group NEGOTIATION UPDATES |
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| January 23-28, 2002 |
| January 23-28 |
| January 26 2002 Many thanks go out to all the members and their families who came to the Union Hall today and helped make picket signs. It was not only productive, but we had fun too. |
| January 24, 2002 Denver Is Ready!! The Denver group held their Strike Authorization vote this evening. 86 percent of their membership showed up At The Union Hall and voted unanimously to authorize the negotiating committee to call a strike if needed. That means that virtually everyone except the people on shift were at the Hall. Is this Company ever going to figure this out? No one will stand for being treated like second class citizens. Now we can prove it in two states! Guess what? Management is still telling their people that things are moving along fine with the Billings negotiations! One other serious note, the plant manager approached Wade Johnson today concerning some lists that have appeared around the refinery showing the names and addresses of many of the salaried people who work in the plant. We ask anyone finding one of these lists to immediately tear it into small pieces and throw it away! This is just the sort of thing someone would do to sabotage the legitimate efforts of the entire Union to accomplish our goal of a fair and equitable contract. Picket Sign Party at 2PM This Saturday Make plans this weekend to attend the Picket Sign Party at the Union Hall. We will have all the materials and plenty of refreshments and snacks. We will even have the playoff game on the tube! This is a good chance to hang out with your friends for a couple of hours and get caught up on all the latest negotiations gossip. See you there!! |
| This last week was a tough one with your Committee spending much of the time trying to address the stated concerns of management while management’s true concerns appeared to be in a state of flux. After several days of addressing management’s stated concerns of flexibility and contract clarity, management changed gears and decided that a clear and concise contract would be secondary to screwing day workers out of a call out to save a few dollars. Very, very frustrating! We would like to express our heartfelt thanks to our brothers and sisters at the Ponca City and Lake Charles refineries. Realizing that the boss has had dozens of them stepped up to cover scabs, they have notified management to return them to their own jobs. When management is finished showing Denver and Billings how much they “value all people”, we expect them to move on to Ponca City and Lake Charles. They can certainly expect our support when it’s their turn! Some of our members report what appears to be a very serious breech of business ethics. It seems that employees calling MaxLine to get answers to insurance questions were told that MaxLine had instructions not to give any information to the folks from Billings. The callers were then told that they would need to get any information from their Human Resources Director in the plant. If this has happened to any of you, immediately contact one of your Committeemen with the time and date of the occurrence! As many of you already know, the Company brought in a hatchet man to disrupt the negotiation process. True to his reputation, he has served to only alienate the parties at the bargaining table and insult the intelligence of the membership of this Union. That being said, we still hold out hope that this Company is not on a mission to put us out the gate. Even though they have shown absolutely no inclination otherwise, we are planning to spend four very long days trying to reach settlement. For that reason, we will not have a Tuesday Update meeting this week. Your Committee will try to find other ways to keep you informed, however. Be watching this site for more updates! We also plan to make it into the plant to talk with you all. Stay Together! Stay Strong!! |
| January 27, 2002 |