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Negotiations in the 13-day strike against Verizon Communications reached a crucial juncture yesterday, with both sides more optimistic than they had been that a settlement could be reached. "I can say with certainty that the end of the strike is one day closer," Verizon spokesman Eric Rabe said yesterday. "I absolutely believe that we can reach an agreement with the CWA and the IBEW today." Rabe has been optimistic about ending the strike since 87,000 workers walked off the job. Aug. 6. In contrast, officials from the Communications Workers of America, which represents 72,000 workers, and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which represents 15,000 workers, have complained about the talks' slow pace and maintained that the company wasn't ad-dressing key issues of forced over-time, shifting work and job stress.

Workers at Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. rejected a unionization drive by a nearly 4-1 margin, defeating efforts by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers for the fourth time in 14 years. After two days of balloting run by the National Labor Relations Board that ended Friday, the final tally was 1,135-304 votes, rejecting the union. The lopsided outcome keeps the Baltimore utility as one of the few utilities in the country that is nonunion. "We are extremely pleased that once again BGE employees have chosen overwhelmingly to remain union-free," BGE spokesman Rob Gould said.

The labor union representing Potomac Electric Power Co. workers has filed charges against the Washington utility and Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. over what it claims are attempts to undermine the organization.As part of the charges, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1900 also has requested that the National Labor Relations Board block the transition process involved in the planned March 1997 merger between the two utilities.Among the IBEW charges filed are that Pepco has bargained in bad faith regarding future job eliminations and that BGE has "threatened, coerced and intimidated" employees and threatened to fire them.

In a surprising victory for union organizers, electricians from Eastern Europe who came to the United States under a visitors exchange program have voted unanimously to join the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The vote, which was formally tabulated in Baltimore yesterday, means the IBEW will have the right to negotiate a contract for the workers with USA-IT Inc. , the Greenbelt company that brought hundreds of workers to the United States from Romania, Bulgaria, Poland and other Eastern European countries.

Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. announced plans yesterday to appeal a local National Labor Relations Board decision regarding which of its employees will participate in a union vote scheduled next month.The appeal, to the agency's federal office in Washington, D.C., caps the longest hearing process in the Baltimore labor board's history. BGE and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers spent 65 days presenting testimony.BGE, scheduled to merge with Potomac Electric Power Co. in April, has been fighting the IBEW's organizing efforts in an attempt to maintain its 180-year status as a union-free utility.

For the Washington union local that wants to become the first to represent Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. workers in the utility's 182-year history, today marks its second -- and possibly last -- chance.The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1900 knows going in that balloting to decide whether 3,200 BGE employees will be represented by organized labor is sure to be a tough climb.BGE remains one of only four major utility companies nationwide where workers are not represented by collective bargaining.

In a blow to Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. and its parent, Constellation Energy Group Inc., the National Labor Relations Board ordered a new vote yesterday that could unionize 2,500 workers for the first time at the 182-year-old Baltimore power company. The vote will mark the third attempt by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers to organize Constellation workers, who overwhelmingly rejected its efforts the first time in December 1996. The union also lost a second election in 1998, but by a much narrower margin, 52 percent to 48 percent.

Bell Atlantic Corp. announced yesterday that it has reached a tentative contract agreement with two locals of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.A rival union leader denounced the pact as a "piece of trash."The five-year agreement reached late Sunday with IBEW Local 827 in New Jersey and Local 1944 in Pennsylvania strengthens the company's hand as it moves into negotiations next month with the Communications Workers of America. The talks are seen as crucial to the future of the company and its workers as they move into a new era of competition in telecommunications.

The National Labor Relations Board is preparing to charge Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. with violating federal labor laws in connection with a December 1996 union vote, and is expected to force the utility to hold a second union election, sources familiar with the investigation said yesterday.The NLRB's pending charges against BGE cap a more than yearlong investigation by the agency into more than two dozen alleged unfair labor practices, including that the company promised employees raises in exchange for rejecting unionization and fired workers who supported the organized labor efforts.

In a vote that could signal the fate of organized labor in the electric utility industry of the future, Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. workers overwhelmingly rejected a unionization drive by more than a 2-to-1 margin.The 1,864-to-790 tally, concluding a two-day election held by the National Labor Relations Board, ensures that BGE will retain the nonunion status that has endured at the nation's oldest utility for nearly two centuries."I consider this to be a major victory for our employees, our customers and for our future," BGE Chairman and Chief Executive Christian H. Poindexter said.

Workers at three divisions of Constellation Energy Group Inc. rejected a unionization drive by nearly 2-to-1, giving the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers its third defeat in four years. After two days of balloting run by the National Labor Relations Board, the final tally was 1,441 to 758 against the union. The voting strongly confirmed that the IBEW never gained a firm foothold with its appeals to what it believed were widespread employee concerns about improved pay, benefits and job security.

For the third time in five years, 2,400 employees of Constellation Energy Group Inc. will vote starting tomorrow on whether they will be represented by a union. Efforts to unionize the workers in 1996 and 1998 were rejected by employees. Officials at Constellation, the parent company of Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., which has been nonunion throughout its 184-year history, want employees to once again send a decisive message that they want to remain union free. But leaders of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers - the labor group that has attempted to organize BGE twice before - desperately want to make a breakthrough at the historically anti-union utility.

Negotiations in the 13-day strike against Verizon Communications continued past the unions' midnight deadline into the early hours today with both sides reporting progress on key issues. "We're really moving head," said Candice Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Communications Workers of America, one of the two unions involved. "We've got a lot of ground to cover, but we're making progress." Johnson made those remarks at 12:30 a.m. today by telephone from Washington, where the talks are being held.

Negotiations in the 13-day strike against Verizon Communications reached a crucial juncture yesterday, with both sides more optimistic than they had been that a settlement could be reached. "I can say with certainty that the end of the strike is one day closer," Verizon spokesman Eric Rabe said yesterday. "I absolutely believe that we can reach an agreement with the CWA and the IBEW today." Rabe has been optimistic about ending the strike since 87,000 workers walked off the job. Aug. 6. In contrast, officials from the Communications Workers of America, which represents 72,000 workers, and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which represents 15,000 workers, have complained about the talks' slow pace and maintained that the company wasn't ad-dressing key issues of forced over-time, shifting work and job stress.

For the Washington union local that wants to become the first to represent Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. workers in the utility's 182-year history, today marks its second -- and possibly last -- chance.The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1900 knows going in that balloting to decide whether 3,200 BGE employees will be represented by organized labor is sure to be a tough climb.BGE remains one of only four major utility companies nationwide where workers are not represented by collective bargaining.

BOSTON -- Bell Atlantic Corp., the largest U.S. company providing local phone service, and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers said yesterday that they have reached a tentative agreement on a two-year contract that will increase wages and pensions for more than 13,000 employees.Two similar companies, US West Communications and Southern New England Telecommunications Corp., continued to negotiate labor agreements with the other major union in the industry, the Communications Workers of America.

Negotiations in the 13-day strike against Verizon Communications continued past the unions' midnight deadline into the early hours today with both sides reporting progress on key issues. "We're really moving head," said Candice Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Communications Workers of America, one of the two unions involved. "We've got a lot of ground to cover, but we're making progress." Johnson made those remarks at 12:30 a.m. today by telephone from Washington, where the talks are being held.

Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. and the union that failed almost two years ago to organize its workers have agreed to hold a second election in mid-October.In exchange, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers will drop complaints with federal authorities contending that the utility violated national labor laws just before a representation vote in December 1996.The decision to drop the complaints comes just two months before the National Labor Relations Board was to hold hearings to determine if BGE coerced and intimidated employees and pledged raises if its workers rejected the IBEW.