Union Rallies Outside Caterpillar
Wednesday's rally was organized after Caterpillar filed a pair of federal lawsuits, here and in Tennessee, seeking to overturn an arbitrator's ruling that could cost the company millions of dollars.
In his decision, Goldstein wrote that Caterpillar had violated a 1991 agreement to keep intact expiring contract conditions, including cost-of-living increases, for those workers in return for a guarantee from the union not to strike those plants. The union never struck the sites.
"It looks to me like they're just trying to drag things out. I think the arbitrator's ruling caught them by surprise," said Jim Clingan, president of UAW Local 974 in Morton. "We feel like we're on pretty solid legal ground."
A.J. Rassi, a human services vice president for Caterpillar, said Goldstein exceeded his authority with the decision.
"The plain language of the labor agreement in place at the time for the Morton and Memphis employees states that the last cost-of-living adjustments would be June 1991," Rassi said in a
tatement. Caterpillar should not be made responsible for cost-of-living raises that were supposed to end anyway, company officials said.
The UAW has asked U.S. District Judge Joe Billy McDade, in Peoria, to dismiss Caterpillar's lawsuit. The company has until Thursday to respond to the union's motion for dismissal.
The union estimates the back pay would have added another $3 per hour to the wages of affected workers over the last seven years.
Goldstein was hired by both the UAW and Caterpillar to settle disputes stemming from the six-year contract agreed to in March.
That contract ended a period of hostile relations between the union and the company that began in 1991.
