Union agrees to seven-year contract with company

Jace Radke

Thursday, June 8, 2000 | 11:26 a.m.

Union trash haulers avoided a summer garbage strike Wednesday, approving a seven-year contract with Republic Services of Southern Nevada.

The deal is the first time that the Teamsters Local 631 and the trash company, formerly known as Silver State Disposal Inc., have ever agreed on a labor contract longer than three years. The agreement comes just four days before the workers' current contract expires.

"I'm hoping it's a contract that the membership as a whole can be happy with," Teamsters International Trustee James Wilkerson Sr. said. "I'm just proud of the way the membership turned out to vote tonight. I'm tickled to death."

About 85 percent of the company's Local members -- 866 of the more than 1,000 union workers at Republic Services -- voted on the contract between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. Wednesday. The agreement passed 651 to 209, Wilkerson said. Six votes were defaced, he said.

Last month only 65 union workers voted for a contract offer from Republic Services and 429 rejected it, sending negotiators back to the bargaining table.

The rejected deal was for five years and offered an increase of about 20 percent in salary and the addition of new job classifications providing for more union jobs.

The new deal calls for a 29 percent increase in salary over seven years, additional job classifications and assurances that jobs will not be subcontracted out.

Subcontracting was a sticking point for the union. About 70 truck drivers lost their jobs at Republic Services when the company subcontracted the transportation of garbage from transfer stations to the Apex landfill.

Other concerns with the first contract offer included adequate compensation, sick days and safety measures.

"Republic Services has agreed to set aside some issues that we will be sitting down to talk about," Wilkerson said.

The company, which holds franchises for trash removal in Clark County, Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas, has also agreed to change residential trash pickup from two shifts a day to one.

Three workers will be assigned to each truck instead of two, allowing employees to work a single shift, company spokeswoman Dawn Christensen said.

Republic Services officials called the contract excellent for the community, its employees and the company, Christensen said.