Strikers Express Discouragement, Determination

Outside the Lucky Food Centers’ distribution center in Irvine on Thursday, pickets discussing the proposal that they had just rejected indicated that they were discouraged but determined.

After 53 days of haggling, the meat cutters and Southern California’s largest supermarkets were no closer to ending the strike and lockout. “They’re taking away our job security,” John Walker, a truck driver from Laguna Niguel, said with anger.

The dozen strikers in Irvine, to the man, said money was not the issue. What they wanted, they insisted, was to keep their jobs and prevent the supermarkets from hiring lower-paid workers.

“If they did that, how long do you think it would be before they get rid of us?” Walker asked.

Union member Perry Comeau said he drives every day from his home in Chino to walk the picket line at the Lucky warehouse at 9300 Toledo Way. He and the other pickets get $45 a week from the Teamsters’ national office; the local has no strike fund.

“We’re here and we’re going to stay,” Comeau said. “I drive 100 a miles a day to do this and I’ll continue to do this until hell freezes over, if that’s what it takes.”

Walker accused the Food Employers Council of misinforming the public about the key issues of the strike.

‘We Want Job Security’

“We are not out here for the money. We want job security and the public doesn’t seem to know that. I think people will look at this situation differently if they know the truth, and the food council is not telling the truth,” Walker said.

At a Vons supermarket at 17950 Magnolia St. in Fountain Valley, meat cutters Jerry Koenig and Larry McKinney have been picketing since the first day of the strike. After their seven hours of picket duty Thursday, they said, they were going to Long Beach to cast their votes against the proposal.

“It’s not worth it . . . to walk for almost two months and still get offered the same contract,” Koenig said.

Koenig, a butcher for 25 years, said his $3,000 in savings is just about gone. He bought Christmas presents for his five children with credit cards, hoping the bills will not reach him until late next month.

The two butchers said they disapprove of the council’s proposal to give some of the work to lower-paid meat clerks. “I’m out here to keep my job. This is all I’ve ever done and I don’t know what else to do. I might lose my job,” Koenig said.

McKinney, who works at a Ralphs supermarket in Costa Mesa, looked grim at the prospect of driving to Long Beach to cast the nay vote. “It’s a shame to be out on the streets for two months and have to reject it,” he said.