Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, July 17, 1993 TAG: 9307170017
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VANSANT LENGTH: Long
The mine itself is 1,500 feet below, its tunnels stretching for miles in a coal seam under the town and surrounding countryside. On a normal workday, the mine produces 6,000 tons of high-quality coal, enough to fill a 60-car freight train.
But last Wednesday was not a normal workday.
It was the second day of a strike by the mine's 320 union coal miners against Consol Inc., which took over ownership of Island Creek Coal Co. - one of Virginia's largest coal producers - and its mines on July 1.
In all, roughly 800 members of the United Mine Workers walked out on strike at VP No. 3 and two other former Island Creek mines in Buchanan County early Monday morning. The walkouts were part of a seventh wave of "selective" strikes called by the union in its ongoing contract dispute with the Bituminous Coal Operators Association.
The union says the dispute is about job security. The operators association says it's about lowering health-care costs and having more flexible work rules in order to compete in the global marketplace. The average productivity of BCOA mines is still less than the industry average, an association spokesman says.
The last five-year contract between the two sides expired Feb. 1. It was followed by a 30-day strike, a 60-day contract extension and the current series of strikes, which began on May 10 and now involve 16,000 miners in seven states.
Although the strike may continue to grow nationwide, in Virginia it will probably be limited to the three former Island Creek mines. Virginia has two other big union companies, but the Pittston Coal Group is not involved in the current contract negotiations and Westmoreland Coal Co. has already reached an agreement with the union as a member of a separate bargaining group.
Buchanan County has seen other UMW strikes in recent years, including the acrimonious Pittston strike in 1989-90, but this walkout is the first at the former Island Creek mines since the UMW's general strike against the coal operator's association in 1981.
The scene Wednesday at the entrance to VP No. 3 was hot and noisy, but peaceful.
A dozen good-natured strikers, dressed in the camouflage clothing that - since the Pittston strike - has become the union's strike uniform, waved placards at passing cars and trucks. Drivers responded with long, loud blasts on their horns.
Although the mine's coal preparation plant was shut down, its two enormous exhaust fans across Virginia 83 emitted a steady roar reminiscent of a jet airliner readying to take off. VP No. 3 is one of the gassiest mines in the world - emitting 2.5 million cubic feet of explosive methane every day - and must be flushed with air constantly, whether miners are working or not.
Harold "Buck" Charles of Clintwood, 42, an equipment operator in the mine, said strikers would like to see a settlement soon.
"We're professional coal minrs; we're not professional strikers," Charles said. "We'd rather be running coal."
He and other miners saw the strike coming and prepared, eliminating as many debts as possible, Charles said. The union pays the strikers $150 a week in benefits and provides them with medical insurance during the strike.
At the nearby Virginia Pocahontas No. 5 mine, the talk was just as determined, even if the atmosphere was more laid back.
Strikers sitting on folding chairs gossiped as they sheltered themselves from the midday sun under a blue nylon canopy. Four of their fellows pitched horseshoes at metal stakes driven into the hard, graveled roadside.
"The most excitement you'll see around here is three ringers on one throw," said Henry Shortridge, looking at a trio of metal pitching shoes wrapped around one of the stakes.
"This is a non-violent strike," Shortridge said.
Arguing about jobs
Strike-related violence has been reported in other states, but the strike in Virginia is likely to stay uneventful as long as Consol doesn't try to produce coal at any of the struck mines. Union miners don't have a history of standing idly by and watching others threaten to take their jobs away.
During the 1989-90 Pittston strike, when Pittston brought in replacement workers to operate its mines, the UMW responded with mass sit-downs and other non-violent forms of civil disobedience, including a three-day takeover of a coal plant.
But several instances of rock-throwing and other violence against replacements and company supervisors were also part of the Pittston strike. The UMW leadership disavowed responsibility.
For the civil disobedience and the violence, a Virginia circuit judge hit the union with $52 million in fines. The UMW appealed and the fate of the fines now rests with the U.S. Supreme Court.
Lt. C.L. Bailey with the state police division office in Wytheville said Friday that the picket lines at all three Buchanan mines had been quiet all week. The state police have been monitoring the pickets with troopers regularly assigned to the county and have no plans to bring in extra troopers, as has been the case in past strikes, as long as things remain quiet.
Del. Jackie Stump, D-Oakwood, a member of the UMW's International Executive Board, said he stopped by Gov. Douglas Wilder's office and state police headquarters in Richmond this week to fill them in on the strike. Stump said that he doesn't expect any trouble on the picket lines, but that the miners intend to protect their jobs.
For the UMW, protecting jobs is what the current strike is all about.
The companies and the union agree that pay is not a major issue. The average union miner makes $16.26 an hour, with health care and other benefits almost doubling that.
Coal operators and the UMW began contract negotiations last November. The union says no progress has been made because the BCOA has failed to provide the union with economic information that the union says it's entitled to and needs to pursue its goal of improving job security for union miners.
The union has accused union companies or their corporate parent companies of "double-breasting" - creating non-union companies and transferring the coal lands of union companies to them - thus depriving union members of jobs when their current mines are closed. The union wants corporate officials at the bargaining table who can speak for both union companies and their non-union affiliates.
In 1988, the UMW thought it had negotiated a contract that would guarantee jobs to laid-off union miners, but the operators argued that the contract didn't apply to their non-union affiliates.
Now, the UMW is demanding every new coal mining job even with non-union companies, said Bobby B.R. "Bobby" Brown, chairman of Consol and chief negotiator for the operators.
"This demand put the negotiations badly out of balance," Brown said. The BCOA has proposed hiring formulas that would give both active and laid-off union miners a chance at some jobs - but not all - at both union and non-union mines, he said.
The union won't recognize the BCOA until it brings people to the bargaining table who have the authority to negotiate over coal lands, said Stump, who as a union board member gets regular briefings on the progress of negotiations.
"Nobody wants a strike," Stump said. Usually, though, "we've had to fight and struggle to get anything we could get."
Divide and conquer
While the union is willing to fight, a smaller, less influential UMW has changed tactics from those used when the union dominated coal labor.
Four or five decades ago, the UMW could call national strikes that would cripple the nation's industrial output. The union sought national contracts that would provide the same living wage for all union miners.
The union's strategy now seems to be divide and conquer.
The change in emphasis from wages to job security as a major contract issue has allowed the UMW to turn to the selective strike as a weapon, said Dane Partridge, an assistant professor of labor management at Southern Indiana University. The union uses the selective strike to "whipsaw" or pick off individual coal companies one by one, he said.
Since the strike began, the union has signed separate agreements with four BCOA companies, three of which dropped out of the association.
The union has also negotiated a separate interim pact with four moderate-sized coal companies that dropped out of the association last year. They sought a cooperative agreement with the union that mirrors the management style of worker involvement now popular in other industries. Included in that group was Westmoreland Coal Co., which has extensive operations in Wise and Lee counties.
There's no question the union membership will accept the new way of doing things, Stump said. "The only way to stay in business nowadays is employee involvement."
Stump said the union has been trying to get its message out, and he believes the rest of the coalfield community understands what the strike is all about.
"I think the community understands it: We're a different union than we used to be."
by CNB