Second Mediator Joins in Market Strike Talks

Negotiators for striking butchers, Teamsters and seven major supermarket chains who took Thanksgiving Day off will resume contract talks today with a second federal mediator on hand to help end the 24-day walkout.

The Teamsters will send its representatives back to the bargaining table this afternoon, while negotiators for 10,000 striking butchers have agreed to resume talks on Sunday. Some 12,000 Teamsters are on strike.

The only apparent strike-related development occurred on Thanksgiving Eve when police and fire officials were dispatched to a Ralphs market in Anaheim to investigate a box containing an irritating chemical discovered at the rear of the store.

An Anaheim police spokesman said employees of the store at 2394 W. Lincoln Ave. complained that the cardboard box, which contained an unknown liquid substance, was irritating their eyes and throats. The discovery was made about 7:15 p.m.

Employees and customers were evacuated and the store was closed for about 30 minutes while officials removed the box that was discharging the foul odors.

The police spokesman said no one was injured and there were no suspects in the case. Officials will run chemical tests to determine what the liquid was, he added.

The strike against Vons market and a lockout by six other chains--Alpha Beta, Albertsons, Hughes, Safeway, Lucky and Ralph’s--began Nov. 5, affecting about 1,000 markets. It centers on supermarket industry attempts to weaken union work rules in an effort to reduce labor costs. Unions say the proposals threaten to replace veteran workers with newer, lower-paid employees.

After breaking off talks Saturday, negotiators for the markets and butchers resumed talking Wednesday but made no progress after 10 hours of off-and-on discussion, sources familiar with the talks said.

The Teamsters and supermarkets have not negotiated since Saturday.

The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service is attempting to strengthen its role in the talks by sending a second negotiator to Los Angeles from Washington. Mediator Frank Allen, who has been monitoring the talks, said Gayle Wineriter, special assistant to the director of the service, will join him today.

Negotiators for the United Food and Commercial Workers, representing the meat cutters, scheduled a bargaining session with management at 10 a.m. Sunday, Allen said. Talks broke off at 10 p.m. Wednesday with no agreement on major issues.

“They had some open discussions on the difficult areas that have been hanging up the talks,” Allen said. “And we continued to explore modifications of those proposals. But there was no agreement on the difficult areas.”

The key issue in the strike is job security, which the unions claim is threatened by management’s desire to create lower-paid classifications of workers and to cut guaranteed work weeks.

The latest bargaining sessions began shakily in Carson on Wednesday afternoon as representatives for the meat cutters presented a seven-point contract offer to end the strike, union spokesman Dan Swinton said.

More than 60 people have been arrested and 15 injured in strike-related violence.