Dresser-Rand Company Provokes Local 313, IUE-CWA to Engage in an Unfair Labor Practice Strike

 August 4, 2007
3:00am

 
    Negotiations between Local 313, IUE-CWA and Dresser-Rand broke down this morning at 2:15 a.m. The Company’s negotiators refused to make any meaningful movement on any of the Union’s proposals. Union President, Steve Coates said, “We were explaining to the company’s negotiators that their proposed health plan was unacceptable to the members and that our members simply could not afford the enormous costs that the plan imposed.” The Company’s chief spokesman, Louis DiLorenzo, replied “your members don’t have the fucking balls to strike. They won’t strike over this health plan.” At that point, the meeting ended. DiLorenzo is the managing partner of the law firm of Bond, Schoeneck & King. The law firm’s phone numbers is 646-253-2300.

    Steve Coates said, “This Company has seriously underestimated the resolve of our members. They acted to provoke this strike in an effort to break this union. They knew how upset our members were with the proposed health plan. Yet at the eleventh hour, they proposed a worse health plan than they proposed two days earlier.” At 4:30 p.m. on August 3, 2007, the Company proposed that employee out-of-pocket expenses would increase in each year of the contract. The Company’s prior proposals did not include these increased expenses in each year of the contract.
   
    Dresser-Rand’s profits doubled in the second quarter of this year. It has recently received over $1 billion in new contracts.

    In January, 2006, Dresser-Rand imposed a concessionary contract on their employees at their Wellsville plant that resulted in a 20% across-the-board pay cut for all employees, and a 37% overall decrease in pay and benefits. Soon thereafter, Dresser-Rand CEO, Vince Volpe, received a $12 million bonus. Dresser-Rand’s Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer, Elizabeth Powers, received a $900,000 bonus at the same time. Later in the year, Volpe received $21.8 million from the proceeds of a sale of common stock. Overall, at least seven executives received multi-million dollar payments. This is a company that rewards its executives for persecuting the employees who make it rich. Dresser-Rand executives want to break Local 313 so that they can receive even larger profits.

    Although Local 313 agreed to many of Dresser-Rand’s proposals to change the contract in an effort to respond to their desire to have more flexibility, the Company always wanted more. Glenn Painter, Local 313’s Chief Steward and a member of the negotiation committee, said, “The Company missed an opportunity to enter into a partnership with this union and its members, who would have gladly embraced the Company’s plans to move forward. Instead, our sincere attempts at compromise were met with the hostility and contempt that the rich and arrogant reserve for working people.”

    Brian Preston, the Union’s Picket Captain, said “Our members will not accept this unfair contract and are determined to strike until the Company stops its unfair labor practices and gives us a fair contract.”

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