Reasons for Strike by Operating Engineers

The International Union of Operating Engineers, Local 12 is grateful that our fight against the rock, sand and gravel producers in Southern California is finally getting the attention it deserves (“Feeling Steamrollered,” Oct. 25).

At a time when it is becoming widely recognized that the wages of American workers are falling even as productivity is rising, our current strike symbolizes everything that is wrong with American business practices in the 1990s.

Your article correctly noted that the rock producers reduced wages an average of 25% at a time when CalMat, the largest producer, was reporting an annual profit of $18.8 million to its shareholders and paying its CEO, Frederick Gerstell, $485,000 in salary and $200,000 in bonuses.

What CalMat won’t admit is that a highly trained, well-paid and loyal work force is far more productive. I challenge CalMat to show how they can maintain productivity with an entire work force of newly hired scabs together with a few demoralized employees who crossed our picket lines, not out of any love for the employers but rather because of the sheer terror of watching careers they took decades to build being discarded like yesterday’s garbage.

Your article did not discuss the truthfulness of CalMat’s claims concerning so-called non-union competition. Although it is true that there has been an increase in the number of non-union firms in the ready-mix part of the industry (which employs mostly Teamsters to deliver cement to job sites), the fact is that the overwhelming majority of the raw materials that go into the production of rock products are in quarries owned by CalMat, Hanson, Transit Mixed Concrete Co. and United Rock Products. It is at these quarries where most of our striking members are employed. We see this argument concerning so-called “non-union” competition as a mere excuse to cut wages.

No, the real reasons for this strike are employers’ greed and weak labor laws. Our members would never have struck if these employers truly needed concessions to stay in business, but they themselves admit this is not the case.

Only when our society changes our laws to create an even playing field between labor and management will strikes like this be avoided.

WILLIAM C. WAGGONER

Business Manager

International Union

of Operating Engineers

Local No.12

Pasadena