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The Brotherhood can cheer an important IBEW court victory won earlier this yeara favorable ruling that will boost the bargaining power of union members faced with fighting for a contract in a tough climate of electric utility restructuring.

IBEW Local 1002 of Tulsa, Oklahoma, with strong backup support from the International Office, Seventh District, and the National Labor Relations Board, took on Public Service Company of Oklahoma (PSO), now a subsidiary of utility giant American Electric Power (AEP). A hard-fought IBEW campaign carried out over a six-year period resulted in a definitive win for working families.

"Ultimately, justice for workers prevailed thanks to the IBEW teams long and determined battle on behalf of union members," said Seventh District International Vice President Jonathan B. Gardner.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, in a ruling issued February 5, 2003, upheld an earlier NLRB decision finding that Public Service Company bargained in bad faith with the union and violated the National Labor Relations Act. The Court of Appeals also enforced the NLRBs award of back pay for union employees.

"International Vice President Gardner and International Representative Duane Nordick gave invaluable assistance to the local in our struggle with the utilitybeginning with difficult contract talks that started in 1996, and throughout subsequent battles with the company," said Local 1002 Business Manager Kevin Blackburn.

For the appeals court case, the IBEW International Office intervened in support of the NLRB. "The Court of Appeals rejected all of the companys arguments and upheld the unions position in full," said IBEW General Counsel Laurence J. Cohen. "As a result of the courts decision, the company now will have to pay back pay to the approximately 600 unit employees," Cohen said. "In addition, the courts decision should dissuade other employers from insisting on such regressive proposals during contract negotiations."

International Vice President Gardner and International Representative Nordick became involved in Local 1002/PSO contract negotiations in mid-September 1996 just prior to contract termination. They assisted the local union in filing unfair labor practice charges against PSO after the company declared impasse and implemented most of its proposals. Gardner and Nordick subsequently represented the local in a three-week trial before an administrative law judge in Tulsa and before the NLRB in Washington, D.C.

"The IBEW will always fight to ensure that our members collective bargaining rights are honored," said IBEW International President Edwin D. Hill. "This victory carries immense significance for all our brothers and sisters, especially for those who work in the electric utility industry."

Since passage of the National Energy Policy Act of 1992, deregulation of the electric utility industry has triggered a wave of mergers and acquisitions followed by drastic cost-cutting measures including massive layoffs, cutbacks and reductions in industry reliability and service, said IBEW Utility Department Director James Dushaw. "The IBEW continues to oppose federal legislation on comprehensive electricity deregulation," Dushaw said. "We have concerns about safety and reliability of the system, effects of cutthroat competition on staffing levels and maintenance programs, costs to consumers, mega-mergers and market dominance of a few energy conglomerates, and the impact of deregulation on the environment."

Public Service Company:
AEP/CSW Merger

For nearly 50 years, IBEW Local 1002 has represented utility workers employed by Public Service Company of Oklahoma. The locals 600-member PSO bargaining unit includes production and maintenance employees in energy delivery, and power generation employees in operations and maintenance, Kevin Blackburn said.

At the time of the violations of the National Labor Relations Act, PSO was a subsidiary of Central and South West Corporation (CSW) of Dallas, Texas. In 1997, American Electric Power announced a merger with CSW, which was completed in June 2000. As a public utility, PSO provides electricity to customers in Oklahoma. American Electric Power, based in Columbus, Ohio, is one of the largest electric utilities in the United States, with an 11-state electricity transmission and distribution grid. AEP owns and operates generating capacity both in the United States and abroad.

Bad Faith Bargaining
in Violation of the Act

On July 1, 1996, IBEW Local 1002 began negotiations with PSO on a new collective bargaining agreement. The parties met regularly for almost six months without reaching an agreement.

"During negotiations the company rejected every union proposal," Blackburn said. "PSO wanted complete control and for the union to waive every right." The IBEW proposed "mutual gains" bargaining, but the company refused.

The company insisted "on provisions giving it unilateral control over virtually every term and condition of employment," Cohen said. "When Local 1002 would not agree to the proposals, the company declared impasse and made unilateral changes in many terms of employment, including reducing overtime pay and other financial benefits."

On September 30, 1996, PSO terminated the contract and stopped payroll deduction of union dues. On December 29, 1996, the company unilaterally and illegally implemented portions of its final contract offer.

The IBEW promptly took the companys outrageous violations to the National Labor Relations Board. In February 1997, Local 1002 filed three separate unfair labor practice charges against PSO with the NLRB. "When dealing with NLRB, you cant just claim unfair treatment," Vice President Gardner said. "Youve got to document violations of law and sell it to the Board." International Representative Nordick researched past NLRB cases and the IBEW reviewed notes from negotiations for supporting material, Vice President Gardner said. The case was handled by the NLRB in Overland Park, Kansas.

The General Counsel for the NLRB investigated the charges and issued a complaint against the company. A hearing was held and the administrative law judge ruled that the company violated the National Labor Relations Act. Gardner and Nordick represented the local at the three-week trial, held in March and April 1998 in Tulsa.

In 2002, five years after the IBEW filed charges, a three-member panel of the NLRB affirmed the ruling of the administrative law judge regarding the companys bad faith conduct and upheld the IBEW charges. Subsequently, Public Service Company appealed the ruling and petitioned for review of the NLRB order, which, among other things, required the company to bargain in good faith with Local 1002. The NLRB filed a cross application for enforcement of the order, and the IBEW intervened in the case in support of the Board.

In the interim, the IBEW and its members rallied to stage an all-out defense for the rights of the collective bargaining unitand the union did not waver in its campaign until a contract was reached.

IBEW Fights Back:
Activates Strategy for Success

The IBEW devised a multi-faceted and ultimately successful strategy to deal with Public Service Companys illegal, antiunion intransigence. The union set in motion an effective corporate campaign, sought community support, educated the membership on strategy, intervened in the merger process and dealt with hard bargaining, Vice President Gardner said.

IBEW members from Local 1002 and Dallas Local 69 picket the Texas home of a Central and South West Corporation (CSW) executive to protest corporate greed and its impact on the community at large.

On weekends, local union members picketed PSO supervisors and managers at their homes, on the golf course and at the shopping mall. Local 1002 members traveled on a chartered bus to picket a company executives home in Texas, where they were joined by Dallas Local 69.

To develop community support, IBEW reached out to Tulsa religious groups and the Tulsa central labor council. At union rallies, IBEW members "distributed flyers on corporate greed and got people to staple anti-corporate greed flyers to their electric bills," Blackburn said.

Local 1002 members, working without a contract, had no past experience in dealing with this kind of conflict with the company, Nordick said, because they had long enjoyed a good working relationship with PSO. The Seventh District helped institute an education program for the membership designed to boost union solidarity and motivation, provide strategic information and training, and open a channel for member communication. The union conducted one-on-one training and encouraged members to pay union dues by check.

"Our union communication network for members was quite good," Blackburn said. "We set up a phone tree to keep communications open and members informed."

Because a strike was not a viable option, the IBEW adopted a "no-strike alternative," and instructed bargaining unit members in the "work-to-rule" strategy, whereby employees follow every company rule at work.

"PSO tried to drive a wedge between workers and their union," Blackburn said, noting that the company used its in-house e-mail system to send anti-union messages to employees. "The company put out negative e-mails on a daily basis."

Merger Intervention
and a Contract Agreement

"The IBEW also filed an intervention in the merger process, attacking quality of service, golden parachutes for company executives and other issues," Vice President Gardner said.

During the period prior to official completion of the AEP/CSW merger, Gardner held fruitful one-on-one discussions with an AEP executive vice president, Bill Lhota. Those talks led to an agreement for resumption of PSO-IBEW negotiations, which resulted in a new contract for Local 1002 members.

In April 1999, IBEW Local 1002 ratified an 18-month agreement with PSO, Nordick said. "Members subsequently went another stretch without a contract after that agreement expired in September 2000." In July 2002, members ratified a new contract, which expires September 30, 2004.

"Local union members have stood strong in solidarity throughout the PSO ordeal," Vice President Gardner said, "and that unity helped bring about ultimate victory."

Even though Local 1002 reached an agreement with the company in 1999 after 78 bargaining sessions, the issue of managements action in the preceding three-year period remained in the courts.

In February 2003, the U.S. Court of Appeals "denied the companys petition for review and granted the NLRBs petition for enforcement of the Boards order," said Attorney Sue D. Gunter, who represented the IBEW at the oral argument before the court.

The court upheld the NLRBs findings that the companys contract proposals "would have given the [company] extraordinarily broad control over employee benefits and discipline and discharge" and that the companys "proposals taken as a whole required the union to cede substantially all of its representational function."

In its ruling, the court wrote: "In other words, the Companys rigid adherence throughout negotiations to a battery of contract proposals undermining the Unions ability to function as the employees bargaining representative demonstrated it could not seriously have expected meaningful collective bargaining."

Back Pay Ordered
For Years 1996-1999

The appeals court ruling requires the company to pay back pay to unit employees "to make them whole for the reductions in their pay and benefits from the time the unilateral changes were made in 1996 until agreement with Local 1002 was reached in 1999," Gunter said.

As this issue of the Journal went to press, Vice President Gardner reported "the case is now in the compliance stage." The NLRB "has assigned a compliance officer, and the local and the company are supplying documents in an attempt to settle."

Some 230,000 IBEW members work in the electric utility industry in the United States and Canada, and the Brotherhood represents approximately 85 percent of U.S. unionized utility workers. The U.S. Court of Appeals 2003 ruling reflects a hard-fought and critical IBEW team win for all union members.