Woodland Pulp Workers (USW 27) Ratify New Contract with Wage Increases & Paid Leave Improvements

About 75 percent of members of  United Steelworkers Local 27 voted last week to ratify a new three-contract with Woodland Pulp in Baileyville.

“I think we negotiated a pretty solid contract,” said Mike Higgins. “It’s got decent raises and improvements to our earned paid leave policy. All in all, I think we made out pretty well."

During the last round of negotiations in 2022, Local 27 members voted to authorize a strike to demand wage adjustments that reflected the increased cost of living. But the company was able to hold their retroactive pay hostage, having pushed negotiations several months beyond the expiration of their contract.

“That's what companies do if you go past expiration,” said Higgins. “The longer that you go, past expiration, the less that they want to pay back pay.”

In the end, there was not enough support for a strike and the workers settled for what turned out to be a relatively fair contract, said USW labor rep Mike Higgins.

This time the union’s negotiation committee asked the company to begin negotiating in June with the contract set to expire in August. The union and the company each brought very short lists of priorities to the table and two sides met every day for bargaining during the first week in June. By the end of the week they had a tentative agreement.

The new contract includes:

• Wage increases of over 10 percent over three years (3 percent in year one, 3 percent in year two and 3 percent in year three);
• A one-time $1,100 signing bonus;
• A raise in the allowance for boots and safety eyewear; and
• Improvements to earned paid leave policy

According to Higgins, after the last round of negotiations Local 27 did not end up in a good spot with the state’s earned paid leave law. The agreement required workers to use their earned paid leave as their vacation time because EPL runs concurrent with vacation.

“So if a person was taking a vacation to go skiing, snowmobiling, ice fishing or going to Mexico in the wintertime, that’s their earned paid leave,” said Higgins. “And the law allows the company to do that.”

This time around, the committee negotiated an agreement to allow workers to choose which vacation to take their earned paid leave out of. So if they want to use a day in the winter, they will still have a few days left to use throughout the year and the EPL isn’t gone after the first vacation.

“That was a pretty good improvement because those guys up there don't have single day vacations,” said Higgins. “It gives our members some choice of how they want to use that week. They made it decide not to use that week at all.”