Nearly a year and a half after losing their jobs, former employees of Globe Metallurgical are still waiting for what they've got coming.
The Highland Avenue manufacturer of silicon metal shut down "temporarily" a few weeks before Christmas in 2001, and reopened amid much hype from local politicians eager to glom credit in 2002. The plant finally closed its doors for good in September 2003, a few months after Globe won a new round of concessions from Local 9436 of the United Steelworkers of America, which represented about 50 hourly employees.
The permanent layoffs came with just three days notice -- or 57 fewer than mandated by federal labor law. The company also froze the workers' 401(k) plans and resisted paying them for unused vacation time or settling on a severance package required by their contract.
When employees demanded their vacation pay and the return of their 401(k) funds, they were told they'd first have to sign a release that amounted to "quitting" jobs they hadn't had for months, a move which would have required them to give up their right to any severance package.
Further complicating matters, the company switched attorneys several times while entwined in bankruptcy proceedings.
"Every time it seemed like we were getting close, they'd change lawyers on us," said Doug Brocious, who worked at the plant for 20 years and served as a member of the union's negotiating committee. "We were having trouble even finding out who to talk to."
Finally, New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer got involved last fall. Under pressure from his office, Globe finally began the process of paying off vacation time and returning 401(k) money to workers in recent weeks.
Before doing so, though, the company did maintain the holiday spirit displayed with the timing of the 2001 layoffs.
"They said they were going to give up the back pay in December," said Lou Salciccioli, a 19-year Globe veteran and union leader. "They gave us the runaround again, and we didn't get anything until the end of January -- after the holidays."
Like Brocious and Salciccioli, most of the workers at Globe had been hired under previous ownership. There were 108 hourly employees when the company took over in 1995, a number it slashed by more than half through attrition before finally locking the gates.
While the ex-employees are pleased to see some movement from Globe, about $675,000 remains at stake -- $400,000 for the labor-law violation, a figure dictated by the legislation itself based on the number of workers and shortness of the shutdown notice, $150,000 in remaining unpaid vacation time and a severance package that totals $125,000, or less than a month's pay per employee.
Union officials said the proposed package is particularly reasonable, given the $348,372 salary still drawn by Globe owner Arden Sims, who also stands to get a 10 percent commission on the sale of the company's other properties, which include plants in Beverly, Ohio, and Selma, Ala., even as bankruptcy proceedings drag on.
They also point to a string of concessions made by the union in an effort to keep Globe's furnaces in Niagara Falls lit. The union backed Globe's opposition to foreign dumping of low-cost metals and helped push for IDA loans, low-cost power and other government subsidies.
"We did anything that would make the company money," said Bill Brown, a 19-year Globe employee. "Our first priority was to keep the factory open and keep people working."
In return, Globe ignored maintenance needs at the factory, the former workers said, while steadily squeezing them for more concessions.
Still, the local even agreed to reopen their contract in April 2003, after the bankruptcy filing and a year before it was set to expire.
"They told us they needed $300,000 in concessions," Salciccioli said. "We came up with a plan to save $321,000, where everybody contributed an extra $50 a week toward their health insurance. They had a teleconference with (Sims), who said it would keep the plant open."
For barely five more months, that is.
When the final shutdown came, Globe officials left it to union leaders to tell the workers, who had operated the plant largely without corporate supervision after the company bought the facility in 1995.
"The corporate liaison said, 'Fellows, they're not my men, they're yours,'" Salciccioli said.
To make matters worse, the company issued layoff letters that made the move sound temporary, making it difficult for many to find other employment.
"At one place, I was told why I wasn't getting a job," Brown said. "I was told, 'You're just going to go back there when they open again.'"
Most of the former Globe workers have found other jobs. Some landed at Ferro Electronic Material on Hyde Park, only to be laid off again after less than a year. The former union leaders carry on the fight at their own expense, since no dues are collected from the ex-employees. With Globe's bankruptcy proceedings moving slowly through federal court, they're hoping for an assist from Rep. Louise Slaughter or one of New York's two senators, Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer.
Meanwhile, Globe's furnaces sit dormant, the decaying plant yet another stark reminder of the exodus of industry from Niagara Falls. Like so many other companies, Globe took the government money and ran, spurning a competitor's offer to purchase the plant and keep it open, instead leaving a mess that the politicians who so eagerly showered it with grants and subsidies do their best to ignore.
"They end up owing the IDA money, they take advantage of the community," said G. Daniel Dunlap, subdistrict director for the USWA's Western New York branch. "I can't believe they've been able to get away with it."
Ken Dillon, former Local 9436 president, was even blunter.
"It seems like anytime a plant closes up here, they do the same thing," Dillon said. "They screw over the workers. It's the same pattern with every one of these companies, and nobody holds them responsible."
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | March 1 2005 |