Teamsters, Meat Cutters Return to Bargaining Table

Striking Teamsters and meat cutters returned to the bargaining table Thursday in hopes of ending their three-day-old strike against more than 1,000 Southern California supermarkets.

Meanwhile, strike supporters unveiled new tactics--taking a busload of union officials to several Vons stores in Los Angeles and Orange counties who persuaded retail clerks to walk off the job. Store managers and some consumers were angered by the strategy.

Federal mediator Frank Allen summoned the two sides back into negotiations at the Breakers Hotel in Long Beach. Both labor and management said they were entering the talks with an open mind, but neither side was particularly optimistic.

Blockbuster Items

“I don’t think we’re going to get any fast settlement,” said Jerry Vercruse, chief negotiator for the 12,000 striking Teamsters. “We’ve got so many major items still to negotiate--maybe 75 items, and several are blockbusters,” he said.

Similar sentiments were expressed by David Willauer, a spokesman for the Food Employers Council, which represents the supermarket chains. “It would surprise me if much was accomplished.” But he said he hopes that the strike will end before it “escalates into an all-out war.”

The Teamsters and the Food Employers negotiated for three hours Thursday afternoon, then recessed before resuming talks at 9 p.m. Allen said there were too many issues to be covered for a settlement Thursday night.

The strike began at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, an hour after talks broke down.

Employees Locked Out

The unions chose Vons as their initial strike target. In response, six other chains--Albertson’s, Alpha Beta, Hughes, Lucky, Ralphs, and Safeway--locked out employees belonging to the striking unions. Stater Bros., a Colton-based chain with 94 stores, has not locked out any workers yet, and company president Jack Brown declined to state why. He denied reports that his company is about to sign an interim contract with the unions.

On Thursday, Foods Co., a City of Commerce-based chain of nine stores, signed such a pact with the unions. This means that the chain has agreed to abide by whatever settlement is ultimately reached. Earlier, Boys, Gelsons, Mayfair and Big Bear signed interim pacts, called me-too agreements.

Picketing activities were calmer Thursday in most locations than they were the day before, although the total number of arrests rose to 25 in Orange County and more than a dozen in Los Angeles. On Thursday afternoon a small explosive device was thrown at a Vons truck pulling up to a loading dock at one of the company’s stores in Palmdale, sheriff’s deputies said. No one was hurt.

Six people have been injured in skirmishes precipitated by the lockout of union workers at supermarket warehouses in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

In the latest incident, an apparent sniper shooting Thursday evening on the Santa Ana Freeway in Tustin left an independent trucker with a broken arm.

Police in the Orange County city said Howard Brine, 44, of Vista was driving south when he was hit once in the left arm by a .22-caliber bullet.

Flags Down Police

Brine drove the Alpha Beta truck off the freeway at Newport Avenue and flagged down police. He was treated at a nearby hospital and released.

“We suspect the shooting is related to the labor dispute, since he was driving a delivery truck that was clearly marked . . . and he was en route to make a delivery” in Mission Viejo, a police spokesman said.

There were no suspects or witnesses.

A guard at the Alpha Beta warehouse in La Habra narrowly escaped injury Thursday night when a passing motorist fired a gunshot that struck the security shack. There were no suspects, police said.

Two non-striking drivers were arrested for brandishing guns at pickets, one at a Ralphs warehouse in Glendale, the other at a Safeway warehouse in Santa Fe Springs.

Rock-throwing incidents prompted management lawyers to file court actions Thursday. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Irving A. Shimer issued a temporary restraining order limiting pickets to five per entrance at warehouses and requiring the pickets to stay at least five feet apart and keep moving. Additional pickets must remain at least 30 feet away from entrances.

Active on Legal Front

The court order does not apply to retail store picketing.

Unions also were active on the legal front. Late Wednesday, officials of retail clerks’ locals in Rialto and Santa Barbara, represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers, filed separate complaints with the National Labor Relations Board alleging that Vons violated federal law by threatening union members with demotion and salary cuts if they honor the picket lines of the striking meat cutters.

Dan Swinton, a spokesman for the Food and Commercial Workers, which also represents the meat cutters, asserted that close to half of the clerks at the 164 Vons stores in Southern California had left their jobs in support of the strike. A spokesman for Retail Clerks Local 234 in Orange County estimated that one-third of the local’s 16,000 members have walked off the job to honor picket lines. Management sources continued to maintain that these figures were highly exaggerated.

Dan Granger, a Vons spokesman, said 95% of the chain’s clerks are working. He said there had been “isolated cases” of large-scale walkouts. He said 75% of the clerks in a Lancaster store walked out Wednesday, but operations were back to normal Thursday. He said several Ralphs checkers had volunteered to work at a Vons store in Simi Valley, and he added that some Alpha Beta checkers are working at some Vons stores.

He said all the clerks who walked out “will not be allowed back in and will be replaced.”

Granger said that Vons will make “normal” meat deliveries Thursday “but (that) the variety won’t be there.” He asserted that warehouses are operating at 50% to 100% of capacity and added that the chain is experiencing problems getting products to stores. Granger said he expects those problems to be cleared up by the end of next week.

At midday Thursday, strike supporters unveiled their novel tactics in the San Gabriel Valley and Orange County. About 25 members of Food and Commercial Workers Local 770, the large retail clerks local in Los Angeles, arrived by bus at a Vons store at 1421 E. Valley Blvd. in Alhambra. Dressed in suits, they entered the store and began urging retail clerks to walk off the job in support of the strikers.

Groups of four or five union members would surround an employee and urge the person to leave. They clapped their hands as they approached employees. One had a camera and photographed employees who were slow to depart.

Members Cheer

Each time an employee walked out, the union members cheered. Meanwhile, members of striking meat cutter and Teamster locals shouted into an open store door: “They can’t fire you! Come out here with your friends!” They also chanted, “Union, union!” and “Walk out, walk out!”

“We want to let as many people as we can know what their rights are,” said Andrea Zinder, research director of Local 770. “We’re telling them that they can’t be fired. Vons has posted notices saying that if you walk off the job, you can’t come back until the strike is settled. That isn’t true,” she declared.

After about an hour, about 20 clerks and food boxers had walked out.

Jerry Stotko, Vons district manager, said he had never seen anything like Thursday’s action in his 25 years with the company. “This is pure harassment.”

One customer in the checkout line got into a shouting match with the outside pickets.

Later in the day, the unions repeated the tactic at a Vons in Pasadena, and about half the store’s 40 clerks walked out.

Tells of Threat

Different locals used the tactic in Fountain Valley on Thursday afternoon. Clerk Sharon Allen said she had been threatened with firing as she walked out. “I believe we have to put it on the line now,” she said. “If we don’t strike now, then in two years when we have to negotiate, we’ll wake up with our throats slit. Vons is a good company, and we are proud when we put on the uniform. But it’s our right to strike if we want.”

Management said it needs contract concessions from the unions in order to remain competitive with non-union and unionized discount stores, whose contracts have lower wage rates than those of the major chains. Willauer said a number of the work rules are too restrictive and severely hamper management’s ability to operate.

Both the Teamsters and representatives of the 10,000 striking meat cutters say the changes management is demanding would severely erode job security and other protections.

“I don’t think management’s demands have anything to do with competition,” Vercruse said. “The management is simply trying to take advantage of what it considers the anti-labor climate in the country today.”

Times staff writers Sam Enriquez, Deborah Hastings, Thomas Omestad, Nieson Himmel, Nancy Skelton and Dorothy Townsend in Los Angeles County, Ray Perez in Orange County and Sebastian Dortch in San Diego County assisted in the preparation of this story.

THE SUPERMARKET STRIKE ISSUES

ISSUES INVOLVING THE MEAT CUTTERS The Issue Staffing What Management Wants Eliminate the requirement that a store have a journeyman meat cutter on duty from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.

What Union Wants Opposes the change as an erosion of job security.

Hours What Management Wants Eliminate the 8-hour day requirement, making it a 4-hours-a-day minimum guarantee on particular days.

What Union Wants Opposes the change as an erosion of job security.

New Job Category What Management Wants Creation of a meatcutter-clerk, who would perform approximately 70% of the duties now done by the meatcutter, but would be paid about $7.25 an hour, compared to the meatcutter’s $13.48 an hour salary.

What Union Wants Opposes the change as an erosion of job security.

Wages What Management Wants Wage freeze for the 3-year life of the contract. Payment of $625 lump-sum bonuses at the end of the second and third years of the contract. (Bonuses would not be added to base rate of salary). What Union Wants 50-cent hourly increase each year.

Medical Care What Management Wants Continue the current contribution rate ($268 a month per employee) for the life of the new agreement.

What Union Wants Maintain current level of benefits, which means employer would raise monthly contribution level if cost of health care rises. Otherwise, employees would start assuming some of the costs or have the level of benefits lowered.

New Stores What Management Wants Elimination of reqirement that if a new store is opened, the union would automatically be granted recognition as bargaining agent.

What Union Wants Opposes the change as erosion of job security.

Cost of Living What Management Wants Elimination of clause providing cause-of-living raises.

What Union Wants Maintenance of current clause calling for five 15-cent increases during a three-year period.

ISSUES INVOLVING THE TEAMSTERS Two-Tiered Wage Scale What Management Wants Creation of a new salary schedule for newly hired employees. They would receive, for example,$10.20 an hour, compared to the current rate of $13.85 for warehouse personnel. For drivers,they would receive about $12.25 compared to $15.25 now. For office workers, the average salary is about $11.46 an hour. Under the new scale, these employees would make $3 to $5 an hour less, depending on the job.

What Union Wants Opposes creation of the new scale.

Sub-Contracting What Management Wants Wants to increase its ability to subcontract work now done by union members in order to give management greater operating flexibility.

What Union Wants Opposes the change as an erosion of job security.

New Plants What Management Wants Wants the ability to relocate a warehouse without automatically granting the union recognition at the new location, or to move employees. Says it would grant some preferential hiring rights to veteran employees in the event of a move.

What Union Wants Opposes the change an erosion of job security. Says management guarantees are insufficient.

Wages What Management Wants Wage freeze for the 3-year life of the contract. Payment of lump sum bonuses of $625 at the end of the second and third years of the contract.(Bonuses would not be added to salary base rates.)

What Union Wants Small increase each year. Exact amount not determined, because negotiations did not reach this issue before strike began.

Medical Care What Management Wants Freeze the current rate of contribution ($319 a month per employee).What Union Wants Gave employer choice of “maintenance of benefits” (increasing employer contribution) or granting a 20-cent hourly increase each year for three years.