New Road for Teamsters : Group That Split From L.A. Council Grows to 42,000

ORANGE — In his 35 years as a Teamster, the last six as leader of the 12,000-member Local 952 in Orange, Eddie J. Mireles has had his share of battles. But his latest stands out--and it is a struggle from within.

Last fall, Mireles, 51, led a group of five Teamster locals in Southern California that pulled out of the union’s Joint Council 42 in Los Angeles. By defecting and creating a new Joint Council 92, Mireles and others stripped the longtime West Coast power base of 32,000 members, pledging to provide better service at a lower cost to the locals. Since then, Joint Council 92 has enlisted two other locals, in Hollywood and Ventura, giving it a total of 42,000 members. The dissension has pit Mireles, who is president of the new joint council, against the region’s Teamster chieftain Mike Riley, who heads Joint Council 42 and its 90,000 members. And the defection has heated up an ongoing battle for power in Southern California, a Teamster stronghold with 140,000 members, as the union prepares for national elections next year.

Mireles has the support of Teamster national President Ron Carey, whose reform slate won a government-supervised election in 1991 despite opposition from longtime leaders such as Riley.

Mireles himself aspires to national union office. Son of a United Rubber Workers union member, Mireles became a warehouse man and truck driver while a student at St. Agnes High School in Los Angeles. By age 18, he was involved in organizing efforts for the Teamsters. Hired as a business agent for Local 952 in 1979, he was elected secretary-treasurer in 1989.

Question: What led you and others to form a new joint council?

Answer: It started in October, 1993, before we actually formed. We felt Joint Council 42 did not express the special interest in our members that should be there, the way it handled grievances, and the (dues) Joint Council 42 charged were not used to represent our needs. There was never a positive program for organizing.

So in this new joint council we all committed to solidarity, teamwork and better service to our membership.

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Q: What has the new joint council done so far?

A: We’ve already had two organizing meetings to encourage volunteer participation, and we had educational programs on how to organize and have given history lessons on the Teamster labor movement. Also, we’ve had seminars for shop stewards and others on how to handle arbitration, grievances and how to represent members.

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Q: What goals does the council have for this year?

A: In May or June, we plan to have a full-time organizer on staff, and also a full-time office-clerical staff. We have some targeted industries we’re going to go organize, such as the freight industry and general warehouse.

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Q: What is the reaction from members and others about the new joint council?

A: I think it’s been very positive. We’ve had a lot of participation in our programs. The council has had a distinct effect in our region. People are curious as to its formation, and how that took place. I think our council will become larger. (But) we are currently not soliciting locals to join.

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Q: Mike Riley, leader of Joint Council 42, has said that Ron Carey was behind the new joint council and that it was Carey’s way of weakening dissension in the union. Your comment?

A: That’s not accurate. It was a committed group of local leaders with support of the members to bring better service of members. It was not under the direction of the general president. Ron Carey was not involved. We went through the application (process) and the union’s executive board approved it.

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Q: What do you see happening in the union’s national elections for president next year?

A: I think Carey is going to be reelected by the rank and file. He’s a hands-on president. He’s shown the general public that he’s trying to clean the Teamsters up and he’s done a good job to make sure we are a clean union.

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Q: Will you be running for any office yourself?

A: At this point, I have not committed for any international office, but some day I would like to run for international office. But not in the near future.

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Q: What about the continued dissension in the union?

A: That is an obstacle. We do face some opposition within the internal organization. The fellows who were running the locals prior to Carey’s election (in 1991) throughout the country, some are obviously not happy because they have lost their clout. But I believe Carey is doing what the general president has to do, to represent members and be involved in major negotiations.

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Q: What’s the state of the Teamster membership in Southern California and the rest of the country?

A: Membership in Southern California is down about 15% from 4 1/2 years ago because of the recession. But that decline has leveled off.

Nationally, we were at a high of 2.2 million, but now it’s 1.4 million. We’re in for a fight, and it’s a struggle. We faced deregulation of the trucking industry that started in June of ‘80, and in a deregulated trucking market it’s tougher for the marginal carriers to survive. We have lost just in the trucking end 150,000 members since 1980. But the surviving companies that are organized are doing well, and we have created programs to organize.

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Q: Why did you join the Teamsters?

A: At an early age, I got involved in organizing. I felt like I accomplished something I thought was good. The Teamsters was a strong union that helped working people and I wanted to be a part of the labor movement.

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Q: What can the Teamsters offer a worker today?

A: We can bring job security, recognition for seniority at the work place, a decent wage and health care for workers and their family. Without representation, the individual would not have the clout, the support and expertise to get that job done. The hardest part is to articulate that to the unorganized worker. It’s difficult for the union to do that because it doesn’t have the access to employees.