NY labor vows support for W-P strikers

by Tim Wheeler

This article was reprinted from the May 24, 1997 issue of the People's Weekly World. For subscription information see below. All rights reserved - may be used with PWW credits.

NEW YORK - Larry Mallas, a leader of the striking Wheeling- Pitt steelworkers, came here last week to urge the labor movement, as well as religious and community groups to come to the assistance of the embattled workers who have been walking the picketlines for seven months.

Mallas, president of United Steelworkers of America Local 1190 met with 20 leaders of the New York Labor-Religious Coalition who agreed to to help get the message out here of the need for solidarity with the Wheeling-Pitt strikers.

That evening, Mallas spoke to a meeting of the AFL-CIO Central Labor Council, explaining the strikebreaking strategy of Wheeling-Pitt Steel Corporation. Ronald LaBow, CEO of WHX, the holding company that owns Wheeling-Pitt, sold off 5.6 million shares of WHX stock, virtually all his holdings in his own company, before provoking the strike.

Michael Paluscek, an AFL-CIO organizer assigned to Wheeling Pitt solidarity work, accompanied Mallas during his visit here. He told the World he was happy that 150 delegates turned out for the meeting.

"The New York Central Labor council is now on record to give full support to the Wheeling Pitt workers," Paluscek said. Brian McLaughlin, president of the New York AFL-CIO "publicly endorsed what we're trying to do. He told us any future action we have in New York, they will help out any way they can."

Paluscek said the AFL-CIO is launching a nationwide campaign, beginning with meetings in San Francisco, St. Louis, Boston and New York, to mobilize support of the strikers. "So it is expanding. Sweeney is totally involved," he said, referring to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney.

The strike began last Oct. 1, when talks broke down over the company's refusal to restore a "defined benefit pension" that the workers agreed to temporarily give up when the company declared bankruptcy 11 years ago. Now one of the most profitable steelmakers, and sitting on a $406 million pot of cash, Wheeling Pitt and its boss, LaBow, refuse to make good on the promise.

The union's "Solidarity Alert" newsletter charges that the company, in the name of "workplace efficiency," demands the "unilateral right" to contract out virtually all jobs, including production and day-to-day maintenance, eliminate seniority and work rules, allow supervisors to perform bargaining unit work and eliminate all clerks, janitors, nurses and other non-steelmaking jobs.

The fact sheet charges that Wheeling Pitt proposes to gut the health insurance program, forcing workers to pay 20 percent of hospital and doctors bills, increasing deductibles to 35 percent and increasing maximum out of pocket costs by 66 percent.

The union proposed a defined benefit pension of $40 a month for each year of service. The company responded with an offer of $1,200 to $1,600 per month but the Steelworkers discovered it would apply to only to Wheeling-Pitt workers who reach 62 during the life of the contract.

"There is virtually nothing in the company's pension offer for anyone under age 58 ... nothing for anyone under age 50," the statement said. "At the end of the contract period, the company's pension plan would die; our plan is permanent."