Steelworkers Ratify New Contracts with Appalachian Healthcare, Bridgestone

by James Parks, Apr 27, 2007

Members of the United Steelworkers (USW) ratified new contracts this week with a regional health care company and a major tire manufacturer.

In one settlement, striking workers at Appalachian Regional Healthcare, which operates nine hospitals and 11 clinics in West Virginia and Kentucky, began returning to their jobs April 26 after union members ratified a three-year contract. The agreement will boost wages by more than 8 percent over the contract’s term, control increases in employee health care costs and continue defined-benefit pensions.

Meanwhile, members of six USW locals ratified a three-year master contract with Bridgestone Firestone covering about 4,000 workers at six of the company’s plants. USW members at two other plants in Warren County, Tenn., and Bloomington, Ill., ratified separate contracts covering another 1,100 employees.

The Bridgestone Firestone contracts call for no pay cuts for current employees, job security protection for employees at a minimum of two plants and possibly a third and a promise by management to invest up to $100 million in the protected plants, according to a union summary of the agreements. 

The master contract covers workers at tire-making sites in Akron, Ohio; Des Moines, Iowa; LaVergne, Tenn.; and Oklahoma City, plus a Firestone tube plant in Russellville, Ark., and a Firestone air spring plant in Noblesville, Ind.

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