NV Energy, union pact doesn’t end flap over pensions

By Anthony Ramirez

Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2010 | 2 a.m.

For months, the union representing utility linemen and others at NV Energy has been savaging management for what it said was an attempt to gut pension benefits for future retirees. “Shame on NV Energy” is the slogan of the union campaign.

With little fanfare, however, the union has narrowly approved a new contract with NV Energy. It was accepted Aug. 16 by a 23-vote majority out of 457 cast, or a margin of 52 percent.

The three-year contract provides a 4 1/2 percent pay increase, with a one-time 2 percent bonus in the second year that isn’t figured into future pay scales. The contract didn’t deal with the pension issue, so the union intends to keep hammering management.

NV Energy announced the contract in a required filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The accord covers workers from the old Sierra Pacific Power Co., whose service area covers Reno and the northern part of the state. Sierra Pacific merged with Nevada Power Co. in 1999 and eventually became NV Energy.

Rob Stillwell, a spokesman for NV Energy, declined Monday to elaborate beyond the SEC filing. “As a matter of policy, we haven’t discussed these negotiations and we aren’t going to now,” he said.

NV Energy provides electricity to 2.4 million customers and has about 3,000 workers, only a fraction of whom are members of a union.

In the most recent quarter ended June 30, NV Energy reported that profit had doubled to $36.9 million, or 16 cents a share, from the same quarter in 2009. But much of the increased profits came from cost cutting and lower prices for fuel and purchased power.

Quarterly operating revenue dropped nearly 7 percent to $785.4 million from the year-earlier period.

Contract negotiations had begun in July 2009.

“It was a squeaker, even after 13 months,” said Eric Wolfe, a spokesman for the union, International Brotherhood Of Electrical Workers, Local 125, headquartered in Vacaville, Calif.

The union said the contract does not deal with its objection to management’s plan for pensions, and Wolfe said the union plans to continue its “Shame on NV Energy” campaign.

“They wanted to save a large amount of money at the expense of future retirees,” Wolfe said about management. Executives also want workers to pay for 100 percent of increases in future medical costs, a potentially enormous bill, he said.

Medical expenses are important to the union’s members, he said, because many of their jobs are physically taxing. Utility linemen, for example, often need knee replacements after years of climbing poles, he said.

“They’re pretty gnarled-up folks,” Wolfe said. “It’s physically demanding and dangerous work.”

“We’re not giving up the fight,” he said. “We’re regrouping. We will continue to press the company to quit assaulting our members’ pensions.”

The union has a Web campaign on Facebook, the social-media network, with nearly 6,200 people who are known on Facebook as fans. It also has a website (shameonnvenergy.com) that contains comments from union workers.

“I just recently retired from NV Energy (Sierra) after 40-plus years, so this is all new to me and I’ve definitely had my eyes opened,” writes a worker identified as James M. Hill.

“This is definitely not the company I hired onto back in 1968,” he added. “The company used to be like a family.”