Union

Union agrees to vote on labor contract Officials from the Baltimore County government and the union representing its civilian workers will allow the union's members to vote on a proposed labor contract that includes pay raises and a contentious change in retirement benefits. Negotiators for the county and the local chapter of the Federation of Public Employees missed last week's deadline for an agreement. But two County Council members asked representatives from both sides this week to allow the union's members to vote on a county proposal that union negotiators had rejected.

NEW YORK -- The league representing Broadway's theater owners and producers and the union representing its stagehands reached a settlement last night, bringing to an end a strike that had shut most of Broadway for 18 days, disrupted the plans of thousands of theatergoers and cost the city tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue. The settlement ended the second strike on Broadway in five years but the longest since the 25-day musicians' strike in 1975. A musicians' strike in 2003 lasted four days.

SILVER SPRING -- For JoAnn Johntony and Davida Russell, a college education always appeared out of reach. Finding the time and money for education, while balancing work and family, seemed impossible for the school custodian and bus driver for developmentally disabled children, respectively, from Ohio. But here they were at the National Labor College last weekend, beaming with pride and posing for pictures in their caps and gowns. With financial support from their union and the college's focus on working adults, each woman now has a bachelor's degree in labor studies.

Chrysler and the United Auto Workers union began contract talks yesterday, formally opening the U.S. auto industry's effort to reduce labor costs that now give an advantage to Asian rivals. UAW President Ron Gettelfinger and Chrysler Chief Executive Officer Thomas W. LaSorda shook hands to mark the start of bargaining in a ceremony at company headquarters in Auburn Hills, Mich. The talks are aimed at replacing a four-year contract expiring Sept. 14. General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. open negotiations Monday.

Baltimore's teachers union is calling for a vote of no confidence in schools CEO Andres Alonso and is picketing at selected schools over the issue of preparation time, the last major stumbling block to a new teachers' contract. Since the union has already asked members to "work to rule," meaning that they should not do anything more than is required under the old contract, these additional actions are obviously meant to ratchet up the pressure. But Mr. Alonso and the school board should stare down the union and stick to their demands.

Twenty-two major-league umpires are out of work today, left with only faint hope of getting their jobs back after the Major League Baseball Umpires Association reached a compromise with baseball owners last night that allows them to be replaced at least temporarily.The umpires union dropped an unfair labor practice charge against Major League Baseball and withdrew its request for an injunction that would have prevented management from accepting the resignations of the 22 umpires who gave notice in July in an ill-fated effort to force management to begin negotiations on a new labor contract.

IMAGINE a local teachers' union president who sees many positives in private schools, promotes charter schools, even runs seminars for teachers interested in starting a public charter.Just as radical, consider a union leader convinced that professionalism and rigorous teacher-to-teacher peer review need to replace protection by tenure and assignment by seniority. A leader who believes teachers unions should be more like craft guilds of professionals than simply defense attorneys for members in trouble.

Today in history: Nov. 16In 1776, British troops captured Fort Washington during the American Revolution.In 1864, Union Gen. William T. Sherman and his troops began their "March to the Sea" during the Civil War.In 1885, Canadian rebel Louis Riel was executed for high treason.In 1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state of the union.In 1933, the United States and the Soviet Union established diplomatic relations.In 1959, the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "The Sound of Music" opened on Broadway.

When Washington and Philadelphia faced the same multimillion-dollar budget deficit on Baltimore's horizon, officials looked to city workers.In Washington, the financial-control board imposed by Congress fired 18,000 city workers, or one in three. In Philadelphia, Mayor Ed Rendell fought for $300 million in health benefit concessions from workers and turned the city from the verge of bankruptcy to a $169 million surplus last year.In the waning months of his 12-year tenure, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke is proposing that Baltimore allow private companies to bid on some city services.

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.

James Grayson "Reds" Compton, a retired steamfitter and union official, died of prostate cancer Jan. 28 at his Upperco home. He was 81. Mr. Compton was born in Baltimore and raised on Miles Avenue in the city's Remington neighborhood. He attended city public schools. A lifelong sports fan, Mr. Compton was in his teens when he founded the Remington Boxing Club and the Remington Football League. Mr. Compton, who worked as a steamfitter for more than 45 years, was business agent of the Plumbers and Steamfitters Union Local 486 at the time of his retirement in 1995.

Henry "Jim" Koellein Jr., former state commissioner of labor and industry and a highly regarded labor activist, died Sunday of a massive heart attack at the University of Maryland Medical Center. He was 82. Mr. Koellein, who was called "Jim" all of his life, was born in Baltimore, the son of a German immigrant father, and raised near Patterson Park. He attended city public schools until enlisting in the Marine Corps in 1943. Landing with the 4th Marine Division during the invasion of Iwo Jima, Mr. Koellein was severely wound by a grenade.

WASHINGTON - First it was the heads of Detroit's Big Three automakers who offered public pledges to cut costs, shrink their vehicle lines, go green and slash their salaries in the quest for a desperately needed government bailout. Yesterday, it was the workers' turn to sacrifice before crucial congressional hearings begin this morning on the automakers' request for $34 billion in emergency loans. United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger said the union would allow General Motors, Ford and Chrysler to delay billions of dollars in payments to a retiree health-care trust and suspend a jobs bank that pays laid-off workers.

The NFL Players Association is about to find out what it's like to go into high-stakes negotiations without Gene Upshaw. Upshaw carried the union fight for 25 years as its strong-willed executive director, participating in collective bargaining negotiations as far back as 1977. His death, from pancreatic cancer Wednesday, went shock waves through the NFL and left a leadership void in the union. "The new guy will have to do what he can, but he can't be Gene Upshaw," said Stan White, a former Baltimore Colt and long-time union activist.

The Baltimore Teachers Union election Wednesday features two longtime rivals who have taken each other to court before - and aren't afraid to do so again. Sharon Y. Blake, who is running for president of the union's teacher unit, defeated incumbent Marietta English by two votes when the women first squared off in 2000. Blake served as president until 2002, when English won the position back, and Blake's supporters sued to contest the validity of the election process. Now Blake is trying to unseat English again.

About three dozen picketers, including actors from The Wire, took to a Baltimore street corner yesterday morning to voice their support for the Writers Guild of America's seven-week-old strike against movie and television producers. "Their fight is our fight," said actor Delaney Williams, a member of the Screen Actors Guild who plays Sgt. Jay Landsman on HBO's The Wire. The picketers, massed at the corner of Pratt and Light streets, handed out leaflets to the occasional pedestrian and waved signs at passing motorists.

NEW YORK -- The league representing Broadway's theater owners and producers and the union representing its stagehands reached a settlement last night, bringing to an end a strike that had shut most of Broadway for 18 days, disrupted the plans of thousands of theatergoers and cost the city tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue. The settlement ended the second strike on Broadway in five years but the longest since the 25-day musicians' strike in 1975. A musicians' strike in 2003 lasted four days.

Baltimore teachers and paraprofessionals overwhelmingly approved a two-year contract yesterday that will give them a 4.5 percent pay raise this year and a 4 percent increase next year but will not resolve proposed changes affecting planning time, an issue that will stay in mediation. The vote at Polytechnic Institute had been held up for months as the school board and union remained at an impasse over the use of planning time and a health care issue involving emergency room visits. Last week, both sides agreed to a vote without those disputed issues on the table.

Baltimore's teachers union is calling for a vote of no confidence in schools CEO Andres Alonso and is picketing at selected schools over the issue of preparation time, the last major stumbling block to a new teachers' contract. Since the union has already asked members to "work to rule," meaning that they should not do anything more than is required under the old contract, these additional actions are obviously meant to ratchet up the pressure. But Mr. Alonso and the school board should stare down the union and stick to their demands.

They are intense. They both like to know even the smallest details. They also are sometimes hard to read. And they have both reached the peak of their careers just as their organizations are struggling to reverse deep, long-term losses. That is why the United Auto Workers union strike against General Motors Corp. is not only the clash of two giants of the American auto industry but of two men, UAW President Ron Gettelfinger and G. Richard Wagoner Jr., GM's chief executive and chairman.