Lockout wears on community, families
Dayton Business Journal - by Don Baker DBJ Staff Reporter
Jim Adams hangs his head and slumps forward in a folding metal chair as he collects his thoughts.
He then methodically tells the story of what his life has been like for the past year and a half.
The Ashland, Ohio, man spent nearly two decades as a roll grinder in AK Steel Corp.'s Mansfield mill. He's one of 620 members of the United Steelworkers of America who've been locked out of their jobs since their labor contract expired in September 1999.
The emotional and financial toll the lockout has taken on Adams is clear in the tears that cloud his eyes.
"They stole our lives, and we didn't deserve this," Adams says. "But they didn't just steal our lives; they stole our families' lives. The part that amazes me is they have no remorse about it."
Adams, like many of his fellow members of the USWA Local 169, spends most days rotating four-hour shifts on the picket line and helping deliver donated food to other workers and their families.
As he continues to talk about the past 19 months, his thoughts focus on his family and what the future holds for him and his wife of 27 years, a nurse at a school for developmentally disabled children in Ashland.
"I've worked in the mill for 18 years. I'm 48. If I start over now I'll never know retirement. I'll work until I die," Adams says. "They've stolen something from me that I can never get back."
The issues
AK Steel officials would not comment for this story, but have said publicly the workers were locked out when the old contract expired because they feared union members would vandalize the plant, and because of threats made against management.
The two sides have yet to talk seriously about the contract, and no meetings are planned. Meantime, salaried employees and replacement workers keep the mill running, and the company says production is equivalent to pre-lockout levels.
Tony Montana, an official with the USWA's international headquarters in Pittsburgh, said there have been informal talks, but no real progress. Several issues stood in the way of a deal, mandatory overtime the primary stumbling block.
"This whole situation is insane," said Dwight McCollom, a Springfield native and 13-year veteran of the plant. "Why are they doing this? We offered to work under the old contract but the company wouldn't do that, so it can't be a contract issue."
Both sides have launched media campaigns to wage their battle.
In flyers, on radio and on the Internet, the USWA has continued to attack AK Steel for everything from the lockout to alleged environmental violations. It also has sent letters to AK Steel's institutional investors claiming the company isn't acting in its shareholders' best interest.
AK Steel television ads -- which ran for a time last year -- featured video of a riot that broke out in front of the plant two weeks after the lockout began.
Community support
The union is trying to make sure none of its members go hungry, and has organized a food bank to help keep groceries in workers' cupboards. On one recent day, several dozen union members gathered in the union hall playing cards and chatting as other workers stacked donated boxes of muffins and donuts and loaves of fresh-baked bread on folding metal tables.
"If it weren't for the community support and the churches and the people around here that have helped out, a lot of these people would have went under," said Rev. Tony Henderson, who retired from the plant seven months before the lockout began and has a son in the union.
The USWA also is paying each member about $120 per week, and has made monthly payments on home mortgages, according to locked-out workers huddled around a small fire burning in a metal barrel. The money comes from the international union, which manages a large strike fund.
But workers on the picket line say what they really want is to cross the yellow line on the ground in front of the plant gate and go back to work.
"My job is to get my job back," Adams says. "It's really hard for me to let my wife be the main income provider. I've always been used to working and being the bread winner."
Families affected
"You read about things that happen to people like this and you can't understand what it's like until you're in it," said Don Metz Jr. "People have learned to live without. You learn to live with as little as possible."
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