No settlement in mining dispute

Monday, March 31, 2003 | 11:17 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

A two-day strike by union employees at Newmont Mining Corp.'s Carlin operations in Northern Nevada ended Friday with no settlement reached in a dispute over terms of a new collective bargaining agreement.

Frank Herrera, chief negotiator and treasurer of the Operating Engineers Local Union No. 3, said that more than 300 workers had been on the picket lines and, including those 300,"at least 600 workers have refused to cross the picket lines." Newmont operated with skeleton crews during the strike, he said.

Newmont's three-year union contract expired Sept. 30, and the company has been in negotiations with the union for about six months. Newmont had an offer on the table that expired Wednesday, and then it extended the expiration date to Wednesday, the union said.

The purpose of the two-day strike was "to give the company a message that the work force is tired of the unfair labor practices that they're committing," Herrera said.

Among those practices, he said, were Newmont's penalizing union workers for union activity and unilateral changes by the company to the union agreement, both before and after the expiration of the agreement.

Those changes include an increase in co-payments for health benefits and changes in bonuses, without consultation with the union, Herrera said.

Newmont spokesman Doug Hock responded that Newmont respects the right of people to belong to the union and participate in it. The co-payments weren't something negotiated in the contract and are changed annually, he said. The bonus language has been in the contract since 1990, and bonuses were affected by production falling below target last year, he said.

Denver-based Newmont, the world's largest gold producer, has about 1,500 employees at the Carlin operations, which include underground and surface mines. Of those 1,500 employees, 960 employees have union representation from Operating Engineers Local Union No. 3, and about half of the 960 are actually members of the union, said Hock.

Hock and Herrera agreed that a main sticking point for the contract is the union's desired seniority system for employee advancement.

The company wants a skills-based system for promoting workers that will give it more operating flexibility and also give the workers more opportunity, Hock said. Two-thirds of the 960 employees are already using the skills-based system, he said.

But Herrera said that through Newmont's proposed system, Newmont could demote workers if they don't meet certain company criteria, including the ability of some workers to handle as many as eight different pieces of equipment. He also cited safety as an issue of debate for the contract.