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Published: July 9, 2009 3:00 a.m.
Union, builders hammer pact out
Local carpenters abandon strike that slowed area projects
Sherry Slater
The Journal Gazette
FORT WAYNE – Carpenters were back on the job Wednesday after their striking union reached a new contract agreement late Tuesday.
Indiana-Kentucky Regional Council of Carpenters Local 232 represents about 800 members, whose previous contract expired May 31.
The
carpenters’ strike, which began June 8, slowed the construction of Eel
River Elementary School in northwest Allen County, the expansion of
Carroll High School and countless other projects.
Among
the high-profile local construction sites that drew pickets were the
$7.5 million Fort Wayne Museum of Art expansion; the $20 million,
250-room Courtyard by Marriott, part of the Harrison Square
development; and the $536 million expansion of Parkview North Hospital.
Gloria
Shaman
off, Northwest Allen County Schools’ interim superintendent, said
she’s staying optimistic that Eel River will open on time in August.
District officials won’t decide until the end of July whether to create
a temporary, alternate plan.
“We’ll see what the next couple of weeks brings,” she said.
Bill
Mallers, the district’s business director, said some construction
schedules were changed to keep the project moving along during the
four-week carpenters’ strike.
If Eel River students and
teachers are unable to start the school year in their regular
classrooms, the makeshift arrangement would be brief, he said.
“We’d get them in there as soon as we could,” Mallers said.
Parkview
Health officials are confident their regional medical center project
will be finished on time in December 2011 and be an economic stimulus
for the region.
“We’re pleased to be moving forward,” spokesman John Perlich said Wednesday.
The
carpenters’ union had been negotiating with the Building Contractors
Association of Fort Wayne’s labor relations council, which20represents
18 northeast Indiana contractors.
Larry Weigand, chairman
of the association’s labor relations council, said council members will
vote this morning on whether the agreement will last three years or
four. All other details have been settled, he said.
The
carpenters will receive “a package increase” that union leaders can
decide to allocate to wages or benefits, said Weigand, president of
Weigand Construction Co.
“There were no concessions” by
the striking carpenters or members of two other local unions whose
contracts also expired May 31, he said.
Laborers’
International Union Local 213, which represents construction workers
including pipe layers, and Operative Plasterers’ and Cement Masons’
International Association Local 692 ratified contracts with the
Building Contractors Association in mid-June after originally honoring
the carpenters’ union’s pickets.
Larry Moran,
carpenters’ union business manager, previously said his members were
asking for money to keep their pension afloat; to pay for their health
and welfare insurance program, which covers workers and their families;
and for educational training. It costs about $17,000 to educate an
apprentice.
Moran declined to get into specifics Wednesday.
“We’re not asking for big wage increases,” Moran said in June.
Under
the old contracts, carpenters earned $23 an hour, laborers earned
$18.75 an hour and plasterers and cement masons earned $22.75 an hour,
Weigand said. Those average rates were for journeymen who had completed
apprenticeship programs, which last four years for carpenters.
Weigand
can’t calculate how much workers will earn under the new contracts
because he doesn’t know whether the higher compensation will be
funneled into wages or benefits.
Mark Jarrell, president of Laborers’ International Union Local 213, said none of the three groups received raises.
Copyright © 2009 The Journal Gazette. All rights
reserved. News service copy is used with permission. The information
contained in the report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or
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Gazette or granting news service.
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