Wednesday, February 23, 2005

Robin Buckson / Detroit News Team leader Jeanette George of Richmond fixes foam on the line of the Toyota plant in Georgetown, Kentucky. The UAW has tried for nearly two decades to organize the workers; it will hold another vote in April.

UAW softens tactics in union-wary South

It touts history of helping workers in hopes of winning over Kentucky Toyota plant.

By Brett Clanton / The Detroit News

New approach The UAW is exploring more creative recruiting strategies at Toyota, including: • Opening a resource center where workers can find union materials. • Crafting a strategy to generate positive media coverage. • Developing a unique plan for organizing foreign-owned auto plants. • Publishing a monthly newsletter. Source: Dec. meeting transcript Error processing SSI file Selling the UAW The United Auto Workers union is toning down its hard-sell approach in hopes of winning the right to represent a Kentucky Toyota plant’s 7,000 workers. The strategy includes a “resource center” where interested workers can pick up information about the union at their leisure, and a greater effort to publicize the union’s long history of helping workers. Do you think a softer sell will persuade workers to vote for UAW representation? Yes No Get results and comments Comment on this story Send this story to a friend Get Home Delivery

After failing for nearly two decades to organize workers at a key Toyota plant in Georgetown, Ky., the United Auto Workers is toning down its hard-sell approach and exploring ways to improve its image in the union-wary South.

The UAW's goal is to win the right to represent the factory's 7,000 workers by this spring.

This softer style calls for a "resource center" in central Kentucky where workers can pick up information about the union on their own time. UAW backers also have suggested using the media and advertising to outline the union's long history of helping workers and to counter criticism that the UAW is a dying protector of lazy workers.

Top national and local UAW officials and pro-union Toyota workers hatched these and other ideas in a strategy session late last year, according to minutes of the meeting obtained by The Detroit News.

The new effort marks a sharp contrast to past organizing efforts and could provide a template for future campaigns to win the right to represent workers at other nonunion automotive plants in the South, where the UAW has struggled to make inroads among workers whose pay and benefits packages rival those of union auto workers.

But anti-union workers at Toyota Motor Co.p.'s Georgetown assembly plant contend it's simply more of the same propaganda, and say the union should simply admit defeat and leave.

"I'm ready for this to go to a vote, so this whole thing can just die," said Marvin Robbins, a Toyota assembly shop worker who belongs to an anti-union group called Truth Finders.

The drive in Georgetown is part of a broad UAW effort to organize foreign-owned plants to offset a membership slide.

The union has seen its ranks fall from 1.5 million in 1979 to 624,000 in 2003 in the face of downsizing by Detroit automakers.

The union's recent success among auto parts suppliers shows the UAW is able to rebound from losses, said Harley Shaiken, a professor specializing in labor issues at the University of California in Berkeley. He believes it is only a matter of time before the UAW scores a victory at a foreign-owned auto assembly plant.

"As the work force ages," he said, "and with all the ups and downs in the industry, the message the union puts out could certainly find a receptive audience."

Many Toyota workers and industry observers had written off the organization drive following a decision last year by top UAW officials in Detroit to close a Georgetown office.

But the UAW has collected signed cards supporting the union from about 40 percent of Toyota's workers in Georgetown, where the Camry and Avalon sedans and Solara coupes are built, and hopes to win support from a majority of workers to force an official vote on union representation.

Pro-union advocates at Toyota were recently given a boost when UAW Local 862, which represents workers at two Ford Motor Co. plants in Louisville, Ky., offered to play a bigger role in union organizing efforts. Early this month, the Louisville chapter hosted a meeting for Toyota workers interested in the union.

"We're not going to push them into anything they don't want to do," said Herb Hibbs, vice president of Local 862, who estimated that 300 Toyota workers showed up at the meeting. "We just want to let them know we're there if they want to talk."

The immediate plan is to establish the resource center, staffed by full-time UAW organizers, in or near Georgetown where Toyota workers can get information about the union in a non-threatening environment, Hibbs said. In the past, the UAW has set up makeshift offices in hotel meeting rooms and relied on volunteers to distribute leaflets at the factory. The old approach prompted complaints by some workers who felt they were being harassed by the union.

Pro-union Toyota workers have also suggested that the UAW do more to communicate positive messages about the organization. At the December meeting, union supporters called for a strategy to counter antiunion critics with billboards and media outreach designed to generate positive articles in local newspapers.

"Sometimes you have to think outside the box in order to find a different approach to move people. People are moved by their own emotions," Bob King, the UAW's chief organizer, said at the meeting, according to the transcript. UAW International and regional officials declined interview requests for this report.

Pro-union advocates believe the union could help secure their jobs in an uncertain industry, where layoffs have been rampant in recent years. They want a Big Three-style pension to replace Toyota's employee-managed retirement accounts; better benefits and pay for temporary workers; and guarantees that jobs won't be shipped out to suppliers.

They are also upset by Toyota's move in January to raise copayments on some prescription drugs.

But union opponents say the UAW has not been able to stop layoffs by Detroit automakers and that Toyota workers already are among the highest-paid auto workers without the union's help.

"Consistently, the majority of our (employees) say they don't see the need for representation from a third party," said Rick Hesterberg, spokesman for the Georgetown Toyota plant.

Pro-union workers, though they have fallen short of winning support from a majority of workers, say they have made considerable progress at the Toyota plant. Four years ago, they had signed cards from just 11 percent of the employees compared with 38 percent to 40 percent today, according to the meeting minutes.

But the union has come close and lost before. In 2001, the UAW collected cards from 70 percent of workers at Nissan Motor Co.'s Smyrna, Tenn. plant, only to have workers still vote against representation in a secret ballot election.

You can reach Brett Clanton at (313) 222-2612 or bclanton@detnews.com.