A group of workers take up positions outside of City Hall on June 20, shortly after calling their strike. IBEW members intend to stake out four public sites eight hours a day, five days per week, until a more favorable wage settlement is reached.
It was out of the workplace and into the streets for many Wrangell city staff last Thursday, as two dozen unionized workers began a strike over prolonged contract negotiations.
The City and Borough has been negotiating for a new collective bargaining agreement with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1547 since the summer of 2014, when the previous CBA expired. The process has at times been tumultuous, with court proceedings through the fall of 2016 being settled prejudicially by both parties in December. The ongoing strike is the latest escalation as talks have reached an impasse.
That point was reached after a pair of meetings held this month. As part of December's settlement, the union was able to make a pitch directly to the City and Borough Assembly with its last best offer if the city's negotiating team rejected it. That came on June 8, and was rejected after deliberation with the city's attorney.
In the latest exchange, the union had conceded to the city's position that public employees contribute to health insurance costs for themselves, their spouse and dependents, up to 15 percent. A tentative arrangement where workers enrolled in a wellness program cover only 10 percent was scrapped when the city learned earlier this month that a related discount would no longer be offered through insurer Premera.
For its part, the city had likewise conceded to the union's request that the bottom six steps of the 16-step wage table be dropped, with three additional steps added to the top, and two-percent increments between steps across the board. Under the current table, the first six steps vary in their incremental increases.
The main disagreement between the two parties has been over wages, with IBEW contending that employees it represents ought to be compensated for the additional cost of their share in health insurance premiums. Pointing to other municipalities, its position is that Wrangell's public employees tend to be underpaid, something their benefits make more acceptable. In the package it put forward on June 8, the union suggested a $2.50 hourly wage increase across the wage table to compensate for the additional costs.
Following the Assembly's rejection of that offer, on June 9 the city's bargaining team submitted a package that included a $0.75 across-the-board wage increase, an amount it argues would cover the added cost of insurance for its employees. In a table prepared by its finance department, the city calculated that over the next three years of a new CBA IBEW-represented workers' share of insurance would amount to around $175,000. This rough projection comes with a number of assumptions, but it projects a $0.75 raise would cover this, at $189,394 over the same period.
The union's bargaining unit rejected this offer as inadequate the day it was presented, standing by its June 8 offer as its last and best. Affected employees voted on June 16 to approve a strike, awaiting the Borough Assembly's response before doing so. That came on June 20 in a special meeting, at which point the body unanimously approved implementation of its June 9 proposal, to take effect July 1.
Following that decision, IBEW filed an unfair labor practices complaint with the Alaska Labor Relation Agency on June 21, prior to the start of its strike the next day. A completed complaint packet was accepted by the agency on June 23.
The filing makes seven assertions, among which that the city bargained in bad faith, that its last offer on June 9 was "regressive and designed to foreclose future negotiations," and that it had withdrawn agreed-to provisions and engaged in dilatory tactics.
"Our hearing officer is working that case right now," explained Nicole Thibodeau, ALRA's hearing examiner and administrator. The hearing officer had initially found the filing insufficient, so a final packet was received on June 23.
The borough has until July 17 to file a response, typically an explanation or counterargument to the filed complaint. Receiving this, the hearing officer then will determine whether an alleged unfair labor practice was evident, and would work with both parties to resolve the issue.
If the issue remains unresolved, Thibodeau explained the matter could go to a panel of her and three Labor Board members selected by its chair. Their decision would be legally binding on the involved parties, though that could always be appealed to a superior court.
The strike itself began on June 22, with 24 city workers taking up signs and stationing themselves outside City Hall, the harbor, public works offices and the landfill. The employees involved belong to a number of departments, including power, water, garage, waste disposal, public works and harbors.
A press release from the IBEW Local accompanied the action: "The decision to go out on a ULP strike is not an easy one," it explained. The release made the following assertions:
"The workers have been negotiating with the Borough for more than three years for a fair deal. Unfortunately, the Borough has bargained in bad faith. Management made it clear that the most important thing to them was having employees pay a portion of their health care premiums. Despite numerous concessions on the part of the workers, including contributing to their own health care, the Borough Wrangell has ignored the fundamental issue of a modest increase in wages that simply keep up with the cost of living.
"Front line workers have not had a cost of yesliving increase since 2011 while the former Borough manager enjoyed a 47-percent increase in salary over the past four years; (Wrangell Public) School District employees recently received a one- to 23-percent increase in pay; and private sector wages in Wrangell have increased over 12% between 2012 and 2015."
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