The Recent Years: 1960-2000
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Freddie Frye guided Local 81 into the l960's. One of Local 81's most successful negotiations was in the fall of 1959 when it achieved several firsts in negotiations: a pension program at a 10 cents per hour contribution rate (effective October 1, 1960), sick leave (beginning on the 4th day), and a third week of vacation after 15 years. Wages rose to $112 per week and $95 per week for wrappers. They achieved this by agreeing to a 3-year contract. They religiously maintained their hours standards of no selling of meat prior to 9:00 A.M. or after 6:00 P.M. and no selling of meat on Sundays or Holidays.
The rise of the Retail Clerk Union and the increasing retail dominance of the chains (Albertson’s and QFC both appeared in the late 1950's and early 1960's) created special challenges for Local 81. Increasingly the chain stores introduced new technologies into the meat markets: cry-o-vac beef being the most evident with the introduction of cutting rooms in their warehouse operations. The rising strength of the retail clerk union also brought new pressures upon Local 81 to adjust their work agreements to the more liberal practices of the clerks union, especially with regard to working hours and part-time workers..
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The decade of the 1960's was marked by internal political tensions and strikes both in 1964 and 1967. The first evidence of this political change was the election of Mel Roundhill to replace Ed White in 1962 as Recording Secretary. The strike of 1964 led to a hotly contested election for chief executive officer between Freddie Frye and Conrad Johnson (the latter who had run many unsuccessful elections to become an elected officer of Local 81 during the 1950's and remained a principal promoter of the meat cutter apprenticeship program). In one of Local 81's closest elections, Conrad Johnson defeated Freddie Frye by a vote of 604 to 583. It would be Connie Johnson’s role to lead Local 81 into the era marked by the emergence of Allied Employers, Inc. and the dominance of the grocery chain stores.
As grocery stores expanded their hours, its became increasingly important for Local 81 to insure that the Union defend their 40-hour workweek. They achieved this by developing language to provide a 40-hour guaranteed workweek and company-wide seniority language. The 1964 contract contained these two critical provisions. The 1967 contract took a third step in developing journeyman-on-duty language. Local 81 also engaged in two critical arbitrations in this decade(named for the arbitrators in each case): Peck(1966) and Gillingham(1970). Both of these decisions strengthened the 40-hour guaranteed workweek for members and provided the foundation for its seniority language for the next four decades. Local 81, unlike the Retail Clerks, developed the foundation for full-time rather than part-time employment, company rather than store-wide seniority. It was assisted in these endeavors by its new legal counsel, Hugh Hafer and John Rinehart.
Under the leadership of Conrad Johnson, assisted by Mel Roundhill, Rutledge, and Sid Casey(a fourth business agent being added in 1970), Local 81 defended and strengthened its contract in these years. It maintained the prohibition on the selling of meat before 9:00 A.M. although it allowed the selling of meat until 9:00 P.M. No selling of meat was allowed on Sundays or Holidays. The Local achieved a fourth week of vacation in 1967 as well as funeral leave. The Local also introduced a non-discrimination clause in their contract. Journeymen meat cutter wages were $3.82/hour, $3.35/hour for journeyman female workers(not until 1971 did the contract refer to meat wrappers).
In the Olympia area, Local 81 allowed Sunday and Holiday work, but extracted an increased premium pay. In its 1971 contract, Local 81 allowed Sunday and Holiday work but at the rate of double-time. Pension contributions were 20 cents per hour. Sick leave was allowed on the 3rd day of illness. A crucial cost-of-living formula was also placed in the contract. In 1971, a birthday holiday was added to the contract. (In 1977, one’s anniversary date was added as a holiday.) By 1979, journeyman meat cutter wages stood at $9.29/hour and journeyman meat wrappers at $7.72 per hour. Pension contributions had risen to 60 cents per hour. Aided by cost-of-living clauses, wages had doubled between 1967 and 1979. In 1976, Connie Johnson retired as chief business agent, to be succeeded by the team of Sid Casey, Mel Roundhill, Mel Savage, and in 1978, Steve Anderson.
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The devastating inflation of the late 1970's produced a wave of reaction against organized labor in the United States. Local 81's history parallels this attack. The decade of the 1970's saw a see-saw struggle with Allied Employers and a pattern of short, but largely successful strikes. The Fighting 81st maintained strong contracts in both the retail and jobbing houses. There was however a steady erosion of membership in the packing houses, as the emergence of more rapid transportation and refrigeration brought increasing economic pressure as employers moved their production to right-to-work states. A measure of this was the merger of the proud Amalgamated with the Retail Clerks International Union in June, 1979, forming the United Food & Commercial Worker’s International Union. Interestingly Local 81 was the only Amalgamated local to vote against this merger.
The election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and the breaking of the air traffic controller strike set the stage for a further attack upon organized labor in the 1980's. Local 81 lost over 300 members early in the 1980's in a series of jobbing house de-certifications. In 1983, sensing divisions between the meat cutters and the retail clerks, the employer community settled with the Retail Clerks but launched an attack upon Local 81's contract. Local 81 struck Lucky’s stores. Other Allied members locked out Local 81 members and, for the first time, locked out Local 81 members in Kitsap County.
Local 81 members steadfastly maintained their lines. Under the threat of permanent replacement, Lucky members returned to work reluctantly while the picketing continued for a total of 71 days. When a settlement was reached and after much internal strife, our members went back to work, though the sting of
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the bitter strike lingered for many years. The cost-of-living escalation clause was lost. Sunday and holiday premiums were reduced to time and three quarters. Pension contributions were increased to ninety cents, but less than the retail clerk contribution increase. Specific language was added that allowed fine ground beef into the markets without restrictions. Local 81's medical plan was merged with the retail clerks.
With all the strike related expenditures, Local 81's assets were nearly depleted. In its 1984 elections, the Local reduced its full-time officers to three: Esther Baxter(President and the first meat wrapper to lead a UFCW Local), Tony Abeyta (Secretary-Treasurer), and Steve Anderson, (Recording Secretary). Serious talks commenced about merging Local 81 with Local 1105. The 1986 contract negotiation fortunately avoided another strike, but at a price of introducing a substandard service counter contract with a lower wage and benefit standard and also allowing further expansion of the employer’s ability to introduce prepackaged and priced products into the markets. For the first time in its history, the Local settled for lump sum bonuses rather than hard wage increases.
The 1988 election was another watershed election for Local 81 with the selection of Tony Abeyta as President, Mike Williams as Secretary-Treasurer, and Steve Anderson as Recorder.
Tony Abeyta, a Safeway meat cutter with little ties to the factions which
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fragmented the Local in 1983, ran on a platform of ending concessionary bargaining, opposing a merger with the clerks, and promoting internal unity within Local 81's office. One of his first tasks was to return Local 81 to a four staff office with the addition of an organizer/business agent, Steve Conway. He also set upon the task of building stronger relations with the retail clerks.
The stage was thus set for perhaps one of Local 81's most successful strikes since 1964: the grocery strike of 1989. The Employer community entered the negotiations with a desire to change the Sunday premiums. Local 81 and 1105 entered the bargaining with a common goal of ending the decade of concessionary bargaining. Local 81 and Local 1105 and other Puget Sound locals carefully coordinated their bargaining strategies. In May, Locals 81 and 1105 struck Food Giant, followed by a lockout in other King County Allied stores. This strike/lockout would last 81 days.
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When the smoke cleared, Sunday premiums remained intact, although Local 81 reduced its premium to time and a half in exchange for increasing pension contributions, hard money wages increases were obtained, and a full maintenance of health and welfare contributions. Most importantly, the public support for the striking and locked-out grocery workers sent a message to employers that the decade of the attack upon organized labor was over(a lesson repeated in the successful Aerospace Machinist strike that fall). This strike set the stage for a decade of labor peace in the grocery industry.
Local 81 emerged from this strike with strong reserves. Under the leadership of Abeyta, the Local invested its surpluses wisely, an investment strategy which eventually allowed the local to purchase its own office building in Auburn in 1996. In 1992, 1995, and 1998, Local 81 managed to achieve early settlements, the most significant improvements being made in both the pension and health & welfare programs. By 1998, Local 81 had achieved an early retirement program which allowed its membership to retire with full pensions at 55 years of age and thirty years of experience. Unlike many unions which saw a steady erosion of health and welfare coverage, Local 81 continued to achieve improvements, and in fact established a Retirees Health & Welfare Plan in 1998. Wages steadily increased so that by the end of the decade Local 81 had some of the highest wages on the Pacific Coast. This had been achieved with no take-aways in the contract and no expansion of the duties of the service counter workers(an expansion in California which had gutted their contracts). Abeyta crowned his administration by establishing a Retirees Club and also dispatching Business Agent Steve Conway to the State Legislature to assist the Local and the state labor movement with their many needs, the first member of Local 81 to serve in the Washington State Legislature. After a serious stroke, Abeyta retired in May, 1999, leading to our current leadership: Michael Williams(President), Steve Anderson(Secretary-Treasurer), Mel Hosman(Recording Secretary), and Steve Conway(Executive Assistant/Business Agent).
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The most worrisome development in the late 1990's was the continued inroads made by prepackaged, pre-priced meats and products. In 1998, Associated Grocers announced the setting up of a centralized meat cutting plant in Tukwila. After several years of protracted negotiations, and under the leadership of newly-elected president, Michael Williams, Local 81 merged with the packinghouse union representing these employees, UFCW Local 554. In addition to this crucial representation of the centralized workforce, Local 81 also took over responsibility for contracts at the Safeway and AG warehouses, Draper Valley Poultry, Lennons Casing Plant, Turner & Pease, and the newly-merged garment factories, Item House and C.C. Filson Company. In 1999, Local 81 also hired a full-time organizer to expand Local 81 in the quickly expanding discount grocery industry as well as the food processing and textile industries.
Local 81 thus enters its second 100 years with a membership of over 2000. Its finances remain on solid footing due to its wise investment strategies and the strength of the American economy.. It continues to face important challenges. The continual expansion of non-union discount grocers--most importantly, Walmart, K-Mart, and Warehouse Market-- threatens the family-wage standard of the grocery and meat cutting industry. The threat of further expansion of centralized meat cutting remains real, already causing a disruption of the Associated Grocer membership. Increasingly many chains are looking toward expanding their use of prepackaged products. Only the increasing public concern for service and food safety stand as barriers to its expansion. Today’s meat cutter and wrappers must be as skilled in service as production, a task made difficult by the continual cutbacks in market hours. Local 81 also has a need to assist its seafood members who represent a growing part of the membership, both in improving their contract as well as the professionalism of their trade. It must also, like the Local of yesteryear, expand its influence in the Puget Sound food processing industry, if only to protect the wage, benefit and hours standards of its membership and the threat of centralized meat cutting
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Local 81 enters the 21st century with as large a membership as it has had in the previous century, but a membership with greater geographic and work-related diversity. Local 81 members today have many claims on their time. We should remember the importance given this Local by its pioneers of the past, their dedication and sacrifice in building one of the strongest contracts in the country. Throughout its history, the Fighting 81st has always found the collective wisdom to elect leaders to guide them through hard times---Joe Hofmann in the 1910's and 1920's, Conrad Johnson in the 1960's, and Tony Abeyta in the 1980's. This collective wisdom has been the source of its strength and independence. We must never forget this legacy and work to give Local 81 the priority in our lifes that it so richly deserves