Union Plus #GivingTuesday

Source: Union Plus

 

#GivingTuesday — Kick Off the Season of Giving!

 

Thanksgiving, Cyber Monday…#GivingTuesday! Kick off the holiday season by taking a break from traditional holiday shopping to give the gift of kindness.

#GivingTuesday is the Tuesday following Thanksgiving — this year it’s December 3rd.

It’s a day to take a pause from holiday gift-giving to think about ways that you can give back to people in our communities — by way of a charitable donation or even in small ways like offering a kind word or a hot meal.

 

 

Here are some quick and easy ideas of how you can participate in #GivingTuesday.

But don’t limit yourself to this list — be creative and have your friends and family join in the fun! 

 

  • Donate to a charitable organization

Whether it’s a charitable organization or a local pet shelter — support the vulnerable in our communities that need your help.

 

  • Buy or prepare a meal for someone in need

This can be as easy as buying a meal for someone or as personal as preparing a meal.

 

  • Stop by your local fire or police department and say thanks.

They’re helping people in your community, everyday. A thank you can make their day.

 

  • Write a letter to our troops overseas.

They’re all separated from their families during the holidays — show them that they’re appreciated and thank them for their service.

Wilberg Mine Disaster Remembered at 35th Year Memorial Services

Source: ETV News

At the monument on the junction of Highway 29 and the haul road, National Miners’ Union Presidents and officials paid tribute to the 26 men and one woman who lost their lives in the worst coal mine fire disaster in Utah history on Dec. 19, 1984.

Mike Dalpiaz, International Vice President of the United Mine Workers of American district #22, welcomed the crowd of family members, fellow workers and 26 union officials from the western states. He introduced Levi Allen, International Secretary Treasurer of the United Mine Workers of America, and Jaceson Maughan, chairman of the Utah Industrial Commission, as speakers for the memorial.

Dalpiaz also explained that there would be two ceremonies included in the program: the lantern and evergreen. During the lantern ceremony, Union officials, family members or fellow workers carried a lantern to the front of the monument bearing the name of the lost miners one at time while Dalpiaz read the name of the miner and the representative carrying the lantern.

As Allen began speaking, he asked everyone to take two deep breaths, explaining that he believed that nothing binds us like our breath. He explained that we all breath the same air and that we should never waste a single breath in forgetting these 27 courageous miners. Allen continued, stating that the disaster did not need to happen and we need to make sure that it never happens again. He asked everyone to live every day to remember these 27 miners. “They are our heroes and we should never forget them,” he pleaded. He then requested that the audience all sing the first verse of “Amazing Grace” in remembrance of the miners.

As Maughan was introduced, it as remarked that he works with the state legislature to demand worker rights for all. Maughan recalled the time of year that this disaster happened and that it changed the lives of 27 families. He reminded all of the sacrifice made by many to try to rescue the miners and the crippling sorrow that overcame the community as the outcome was announced. Maughan said that he will work to enhance coal mine safety so that it never happens again. He expressed his abiding love for everyone that goes inside the mines and takes his responsibility very serious.

Following the addresses of the speakers, Dalpiaz read the ceremonial words of the sacred evergreen ceremony used at occasions such as this. Everyone present placed an evergreen bough at the center of the monument between the lanterns. This ceremony was followed by a prayer. As memorial guests, left they were given a gift to be placed in their homes so that they would never forget the 27 miners who lost their lives in the Wilberg Mine Disaster.

Written by: Julie Johansen

Help for coal miners: Flame the ember of hope for miners’ pension rescue

Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

November 25, 2019

 

Right is right. A promise is a promise.

For generations, coal has powered our lives. It has heated our homes, fueled the conduction of electricity that lit our lamps, ignited the Industrial Revolution. And it was coaxed from the earth by miners who risked their lives and sacrificed their health in the effort that didn’t just blacken their faces and their hands, but also their lungs.

We are indebted and they are owed at the very least the pensions they were promised.

For the first time in years, there is an ember of hope that the United Mine Workers of America retirement plan will be rescued from the collapse projected to happen in 2022.

Miners have been pleading with federal lawmakers for years to shore up union pensions in the wake of industry bankruptcies and layoffs. They’ve had the bipartisan support of West Virginia Sens. Joe Manchin and Shelley Moore Capito, a Democrat and a Republican, respectively. Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey has been with them, shoulder to shoulder, as a co-sponsor. But they’ve gotten nowhere.

Finally, earlier this month, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky, has gotten behind the American Miners Act, which would transfer excess funds from abandoned mine reclamation to the nearly broke retirement plan.

Congress must follow his lead.

Right is right. A promise is a promise. And the promise of a pension was made not only by the industry, but by our country. President Harry Truman pledged decades ago that the federal government would not allow the UMWA pensions to fall. President Donald Trump made a promise, too. In the 2016 election, he said he would spark the restoration of coal jobs by rolling back environmental regulations. But, demand for coal has continued its downward slide as power plants use less expensive and cleaner-burning natural gas — natural gas that is abundant in Western Pennsylvania.

The logical answer is to rescue the retirement fund before it goes broke. The number of coal jobs may not be climbing, but the pensions that prevent pensioners from falling into poverty can and must be preserved. In 2017, just 10,000 workers were paying into the pension fund that supports 120,000 miners receiving pension checks. The pension fund simply cannot stand on its own without federal support.

Using excess funds from the federal Abandoned Mine Reclamation Fund makes sense. The money was collected from coal companies for mine restoration projects. Using some of it to restore the pensions of those who worked the mines is necessary. The legislation must pass both congressional chambers by year’s end.

 

Brooke County Commissioners back preservation of UMWA pensions

Source: WTOV9

 

 

Commissioners in Brooke County are showing their support for the protection and preservation of pension and healthcare for UMWA plan beneficiaries.

At Tuesday morning’s commissioners meeting, a resolution was passed to show support and say that they want the federal government to act to protect the pensions of these retirees.

It’s a nation-wide issue threatening the pension of miners. U.S. Senator Joe Manchin joined Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senator Shelly Moore-Capito recently in introducing a bill to protect the pensions of 92,000 retired miners and their families across the industry.

“The pension benefits for miners throughout the country are now being threatened because of bankruptcy and things like that, and we wanted to throw our support behind those retirees,” Commissioner AJ Thomas said.

The signed resolution will now be sent to Manchin’s office in hopes of making an impact in Washington.

51st anniversary of Farmington Mine Disaster ceremony brings together community

Source: 12 WBOY

Farmington, W.Va. – On Sunday friends, family, union workers, and others gathered for the 51st commemoration of the Farmington Mine Disaster that killed 78 miners.

Around 5:30 a.m on November 20, 1968, there was an explosion and fire in the Consolidation Coal Company’s No.9 mine. Of the 78 miners who died that day, 19 remain entombed in the mine. They are all memorialized at a site in Marion Co., where their names engraved in stone.

Cecil Roberts, the president of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), was in attendance and spoke with vigor about the sadness of the tragedy that changed the lives of the families for the worse. He described the site of the monument as a holy place for him and said in all his years of attending the commemoration the crowd size had seemed to increase and not diminished with the passing of time.

“This is such a wonderful tribute to those miners who died,” Roberts said. “Those widows who woke up–as I said, to bed as a wife woke up as widows not only that they woke up as the head of the household. And then 12, 14-year-old boys being told ‘you’re the man of the house now.’ People having to figure out ‘how do we pay the bills, how do we eat, how do we get through this?”

Roberts said he has a lot of admiration and respect for the families because they did not give up. Instead, they persevered for themselves and also for other coal miners by becoming activists for mine safety. He said the disaster and pressure from families changed the rules and regulations for the coal industry.

A year later, in the wake of the tragedy, Congress passed the nation’s first comprehensive mine safety and health legislation called the Mine Safety and Health Act of 1969.

Levi Allen, who serves as the UMWA international secretary-treasurer, said it’s always been important for him to be a part of the ceremony and that he’s been taking part for almost ten years. He spoke at the ceremony and said the tragedy was UMWA’s history, heritage and where they come from.

“I worked 8 years in an underground coal mine,” Allen said. “I left that mine alive every day because of the effort and the sacrifices these workers made.”

He said the tragedy changed everything. Miner’s contracts changed, allowing them to have more of a say and decide who is best to represent them in the union. And that, in turn, allowed the union to step up their responsibilities in terms of protecting miners.

“Before 1968, before Farmington, you didn’t have any enforcement rights and essentially under the Bureau of Mines, if something was looked at you could make recommendations, you could say this is how something should be done but you didn’t really have enforcement you didn’t have fines that were levied you didn’t have mandatory fines, you didn’t have things that got shut down and production wasn’t really impacted the same way, so after these miners died you got true enforcement,” Allen said.

That sentiment was shared by Roberts and both men said there was no need for the tragedy to happen before the laws were changed. Roberts, whose father was a coal miner and hails from generations of coal miners, said miners had fought for decades to no avail. That is until disaster struck in Farmington in 1968.

Roberts said the bigger tragedy was that lawmakers and company owners failed mine workers for more than one hundred years before the disaster. He said they did so by denying the existence of black lung disease, by not listening to the concerns of workers and ignoring the tens of thousands of lives that were lost to being blown up, burned up and covered in coal mines since the inception of mining.

From his perspective, Allen said it was just the unfortunate nature of the country.

“Every movement in the United States of America comes on the back of the people– it didn’t need to happen,” Allen said. “It’s just sometimes people need tragedy or need heartache or hardship before they want to wake up.”

Written by:

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Source: Union Plus

 

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Bill addresses pensions, health care for miners, retirees

Source: WHSV

November 6, 2019

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is co-sponsoring a bill with West Virginia’s two U.S. senators and others aimed at preserving the pensions of about 92,000 retired coal miners, as well as the health-care benefits of another 13,000 working miners.

Democrat Joe Manchin and Republican Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia announced the bill Wednesday.

 

 

McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, said in the statement that he raised the issue of protecting miner pensions and health benefits with President Donald Trump this week, and is “committed to continuing to work with him and my colleagues” toward a solution.

The bill would transfer surplus money from the Abandoned Mine Land fund to prevent the insolvency of a 1974 miners’ pension plan. It also would add coal company bankruptcies from 2018 and 2019 to health-care legislation that passed in 2017.

Manchin said on a conference call that McConnell’s support “helps us get a guaranteed vote, I would think. He knew it was time to do it. I think he understands the longer we wait, the more it costs and makes it harder to do.”

In the past, Manchin and the United Mine Workers of America have been critical of McConnell for blocking votes to secure the pensions and health benefits.

 

 

“With this one bill, the United States Senate has taken a giant, bipartisan step forward in keeping America’s promise to our coal miners and their families,” UMW President Cecil Roberts said in a statement. “I am especially thankful for Leader McConnell’s support of this legislation. His voice on behalf of retired miners is critical, and I want to thank him on behalf of every retired miner in America.”

Manchin said Ohio-based Murray Energy’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing last week accelerated the urgency of getting the bill passed and signed before the end of the year.

“We need to get this done as soon as possible to prevent anyone from losing their pensions or their health care,” Manchin said.

Murray Energy joined a growing list of struggling mining companies as utilities switch from coal to cheaper and less-polluting renewable energy or natural gas. Murray Energy, which has operations in seven U.S. states, was the fourth largest U.S. coal producer in 2018, accounting for 6% of total production, according to the Energy Information Administration.

In the western United States, three of the Powder River Basin’s nine producers — Colorado’s Westmoreland Coal, Wyoming’s Cloud Peak Energy and West Virginia-based Blackjewel — have filed for bankruptcy protection over the past year. St. Louis-based Peabody Energy Corp. emerged from bankruptcy protection in 2017 and both St. Louis-based Arch Coal and Bristol, Virginia-based Alpha emerged in 2016.

Written by: John Raby

‘Nervous and scared.’ Coal workers fear for pensions after Murray Energy bankruptcy

Source: CNN 

November 1, 2019 

 

New York (CNN Business) – Tom Kacsmar worked underground at a coal mine for nearly four decades. The promise of a decent pension and healthcare for life kept him at this dangerous job. Now, Kacsmar fears those benefits will get washed away by the bankruptcy of Murray Energy, America’s largest private coal mining company.

“I was a proud, hard-working coal miner my entire life. With the stroke of a pen, they’re going to cut my healthcare,” the 76-year-old retiree told CNN Business.

Kacsmar never worked a day for Murray Energy, the mining giant founded by coal king Robert Murray. But like countless other retirees, the fate of his benefits is inextricably linked to the company, which is seeking to “dramatically” slash its liabilities, including $8 billion of pension and retiree healthcare obligations.

Murray built his empire by gobbling up smaller miners, including the Ohio company Kacsmar used to work for.
“I was led to believe that if I did my job, I would have a pension and healthcare for the rest of my life,” Kacsmar said. “There is something wrong with the laws in this country that put the employees last in line to receive anything.”

 

Murray Energy is the last major funder of industry pension plan

 

Like many of its bankrupt rivals, Murray Energy is widely expected to make the case that those benefits need to get dialed back for the company to survive.

That would have far-reaching consequences because Murray Energy is the last major company contributing to the United Mine Workers of America’s pension plan. That plan provides pension benefits to about 87,000 retired miners and surviving spouses, who collect an average monthly pension of about $600.

George Shultz retired a decade ago from Consul Energy, a company later acquired by Murray Energy.
Now the 69-year-old worries his pension will get gutted, potentially costing him his home.

Current and former Murray Energy employees told CNN Business they are bracing for cuts.

“I’m really worried. I know they are going to wipe away my pension,” said Ryan Cottrell, a father of two who works at a West Virginia coal mine owned by Murray Energy. “This bankruptcy is clearly to strip pensions and retirees’ benefits.”

George Shultz bought a house with his wife when he retired in 2009 from Consul Energy, one of the companies acquired by Murray.

“If I lose that pension, I’m going to lose that house,” said Shultz, whose wife recently passed away.

 

Coal is getting crushed

 

The bankruptcy of Murray Energy puts an exclamation point on the stunning downfall of America’s coal industry. Despite President Donald Trump’s promise to revive coal country, the shift towardnatural gas and renewable energy has only accelerated.

US power plants are expected to consume less coal next year than at any point since Jimmy Carter was in the White House, according to projections by the federal government.

“Although Murray has been able to outlast many of its competitors, mounting debt and legacy liability expenses have become too heavy of a burden to sustain under current industry conditions,” Robert Moore, the company’s incoming CEO, argued in court documents. “The company has exhausted all options and liquidity.”

Murray Energy declined to comment on what will happen to worker pensions, but legal experts say retirees and workers have reason to worry.

Murray Energy “will seek to eliminate or reject the collective bargaining agreement as well as any obligations to fund retirement medical benefits,” said Gregory Plotko, an attorney at Richards Kibbe & Orbe who represented the union and other creditors in the Patriot Coal bankruptcy.

Coal miners can’t rely on the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the federal agency created in the 1970s to protect worker retirement plans.That’s because the PBGC is not required to cover 100% of multiemployer pension plans like the coal industry’s. And in any case, the agency doesn’t have the funding to do so. The PBGC projects that its program will run out of cash by the end of 2025.

Lawmakers in Congress have been debating for years how to reform this safety net before it becomes insolvent.

 

‘Nervous and scared’

 

Bankruptcy courts have in the past allowed coal companies to shed those expenses — a point that Murray Energy didn’t shy away from noting in its court filings.

“Competitors have used bankruptcy to reduce debt and lower their cost structures by eliminating cash interest obligations and pension and benefit obligations, leaving them better positioned to compete for volume and pricing in the current market,” Murray Energy said in court documents.

The company emphasized that it doesn’t take this process lightly.

“Murray’s employees are its lifeblood and Murray has a longstanding history and valued partnership with their unions,” the company said.

Ryan Cottrell, a West Virginia coal miner who works at Murray Energy, with his wife Kendra, son Hunter and daughter Harper.

However, Murray Energy’s lawyers said the company is “simply not able to repay” its liabilities, including its “outsized” pension and retiree healthcare obligations. The mining giant argued it must slash its liabilities to attract the capital needed to fund future operations.

Current and former coal miners expressed frustration at the situation, especially because they took less pay during previous contract negotiations in order to protect their pensions.

“People are nervous and scared. They don’t know what to do,” said Gary Campbell, who works at a West Virginia coal mine owned by Murray Energy. “Why is there no help for us? Why is everyone piling on the coal industry? It seems like we take it on the chin, again and again.”

 

Pressure on lawmakers for solution

 

Sheila Slocum Hollis, a partner and energy specialist in the law firm Duane Morris, warned that the impact of these coal bankruptcies can be “extremely devastating” on local communities. Property values plunge, even as the strain on resources rises.

“The country owes these people a lot for the sacrifices they’ve made and the risks they’ve taken,” Hollis said. “If the company isn’t there because of the bankruptcy, somebody needs to step up to help the people left high and dry.”

In this case, even coal miners who never worked for companies related to Murray Energy could be affected. After a wave of bankruptcies over the past decade, Murray Energy is the last man standing funding the union pension plan, which is known as the 1974 Pension Plan. Murray Energy helps fund pensions for people who worked for other bankrupt coal companies but still rely on that industry pension plan.

The company estimates it funds a “staggering” 97% of the plan’s total contributions, totaling $15 million in 2018 alone.

“If Murray stops contributing, the pension plan will be unable to pay out benefits to all of its members,” said Plotko, the lawyer.

Murray Energy said in court documents that if it withdraws from the plan, it would be on the hook for $6.4 billion — an amount the company almost certainly can’t afford.

Senator Sherrod Brown, the Ohio Democrat, said in a statement that the Murray Energy bankruptcy “intensifies the urgent need for a comprehensive solution to the imminent pension crisis.”

Brown pledged to work with lawmakers to find a bipartisan solution to “get the job done for these workers who have worked so hard for this country.”

 

‘Poor management’

 

The rise of Murray Energy was made possible by the misfortunes of its rivals. The company made a string of purchases of struggling companies, including Consul Energy, Foresight Energy, Armstrong Energy and assets in Colombia.

“Throughout the downturn, Murray has capitalized on opportunities to make value-accretive asset acquisitions,” the company said in its bankruptcy documents.

Those deals, Murray argues, boosted earnings and gave the company additional assets to pledge to creditors to refinance debt.

Murray Energy coal mine worker Ryan Cottrell.

However, doubling down on the coal industry also further exposed the company to the same challenges facing all miners. And it added stress to Murray’s balance sheet, which the company admits is saddled with “mounting debt” and hefty interest payments.

Some workers argue that empire-building strategy backfired.

“Honestly, he got too big for his britches,” said Cottrell, one of the West Virginia miners. “We ended up in bankruptcy because of poor management.”

Murray Energy ‘exhausted’ alternatives, joins coal peers in bankruptcy filing

Source: S&P Global Market Intelligence

October 30, 2019

Despite its efforts to avoid what its founder once called the “bankruptcy sewer,” Murray Energy Corp.’s parent Murray Energy Holdings Co. followed the path blazed by many of its peers with an Oct. 29 petition for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization.

The largest privately-held coal producer in the U.S. recorded $542.3 million in EBITDA in 2018 but faces more than $8 billion in potential and actual legacy liabilities alongside $2.7 billion in outstanding funded debt obligations costing the company $298 million in debt expenses annually. In a bid to keep the company operating, Murray Energy filed a voluntary petition for bankruptcy in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Ohio.

Former Murray Energy President and CEO Robert Murray, who is being replaced at the company by Foresight Energy LP President and CEO Robert Moore as part of the reorganization, frequently cited the added stress placed on the coal market by the number of companies filing for bankruptcy and discharging their financial obligations. Of the top five coal producers in the U.S. by volume in 2018, only Alliance Resource Partners LP has not been forced to file bankruptcy in recent years.

“There simply are no creative management solutions, operational improvements, or strategic or financial options remaining, even for Murray; the company has exhausted all options and liquidity,” Moore wrote in a bankruptcy declaration.

Foresight is an affiliate of Murray Energy but was not part of the bankruptcy filing.

Moore pointed to the closure of 93 GW of coal-fired power generation in the U.S, the rise of inexpensive natural gas and the growth of wind and solar energy, an overall decline in electricity demand, recent utility companies’ bankruptcy filings and changes in legislative priorities as significant factors deteriorating the market for thermal coal.

“What we’ve seen over the last decades since thermal coal has peaked is significant erosion in demand,” said Benjamin Nelson, senior credit officer and lead coal analyst at Moody’s. “We think that continues out into the next decade with about half of what’s left disappearing over that horizon.”

Meanwhile, along with the rest of the industry, Murray is struggling with deteriorating export markets that Nelson said are showing no signs of turning around soon.

Expanding in coal

In 2014, Murray vowed to be the “last man standing” in coal. In a 2016 interview with S&P Global Market Intelligence, he laid out a plan to keep the “best coal company in the world” out of bankruptcy, but only a few months later reported the company was again on the brink when one of its customers filed for bankruptcy.

Murray Energy grew its thermal coal footprint considerably in recent years — becoming the third-largest producer of U.S. coal along the way —by making large acquisitions of mines from coal companies such as Consol Energy Inc., Armstrong Energy Inc. and Foresight Energy. The company also recently ventured into the metallurgical coal space, taking on assets from Mission Coal Company LLCs bankruptcy reorganization.

The company succeeded for some time, even “outrunning” the industry downturn, Moore wrote. However, the debt and obligations accumulated by the company became too much.

“It’s primarily because of the quality of their assets and they’re low-cost that kept them profitable for a long time,” S&P Global Ratings analyst Vania Dimova said. “What was working against them is this huge, big debt load of almost $5 billion.”

However, Moore wrote that the acquisitions boosted earnings and gave the company additional assets to pledge to creditors in exchange for extending debt maturities. The company continued to purchase thermal coal mines based on “Mr. Murray’s belief that the energy industry would come to appreciate the potential value of high heat bituminous coal.”

“Murray maintains its belief that longer-term demand for coal is underpinned in the United States by a practical requirement that approximately 25% of the power supplied to the electrical grid come from coal power generation to ensure reliable electricity during cold snaps and heatwaves, when other parts of the grid will be less reliable or overly expensive,” Moore wrote.

Coal accounted for about 23.4% of U.S. power generation in August and about 27.3% of generation year-to-date through August, according to a recent S&P Global Market Intelligence analysis.

Murray will finance its operations through the reorganization with cash on hand and access to a new $350 million debtor in possession financing facility. Under its restructuring support agreement, a group of Murray Energy lenders is forming a new entity to serve as a stalking horse bidder to acquire the company assets.

Murray Energy needs the cash infusion to pay vendors who have seen the company delay payments and stretch payment terms in recent months, according to a bankruptcy court declaration from Robert Campagna, a managing director with Alvarez & Marsal North America LLC.

Worker impact

Ohio-based Murray Energy employs nearly 5,500 people across the U.S., including approximately 2,400 active union employees. United Mine Workers of America International President Cecil Roberts issued a statement on the bankruptcy Oct. 29 saying the reorganization comes as no surprise and suggesting that Murray Energy would likely try to throw out its collective bargaining agreement with the union and discharge its obligations to retirees, their dependents and widows as part of the reorganization.

“Now comes the part where workers and their families pay the price for corporate decision-making and governmental actions,” Roberts said. “We have seen this sad act too many times before.”

News of the bankruptcy prompted Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., to tweet about legislation that would prioritize workers in bankruptcy reorganizations “because companies like Murray Energy are using the bankruptcy laws to shirk their pension obligations.” Moore wrote in the bankruptcy declaration that while the company’s “employees are its lifeblood,” the myriad of obligations to its employees combined with the cost of servicing its debt has substantially reduced liquidity.

S&P Global Ratings and S&P Global Market Intelligence are owned by S&P Global Inc.

 

Stephanie Tsao contributed to this article.

This article was published by S&P Global Market Intelligence and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.

Written by: Taylor Kuykendall