News Archive - Page 49 of 61 - United Mine Workers of America

Unions Show Their Force In Pennsylvania District Won By Trump

Source: The Huffington Post

WAYNESBURG, Pa. ― Over 200 coal miners, family members and local activists crowded into a hall at the Greene County fairgrounds Sunday afternoon in Pennsylvania’s rural southwest corner.

The attendees, many of them retirees in their 60s and 70s clad in the United Mine Workers of America’s signature camouflage-patterned regalia, were there for one last get-out-the-vote rally for Democrat Conor Lamb.

But the raucous atmosphere at the rally felt more like a church revival service than a political gathering. And while everyone present was there to support Lamb, the main event was Cecil Roberts, the charismatic preacher and president of the UMWA labor union.

After ascending the stage to chants of “U-M-W-A,” Roberts delivered a nearly 30-minute sermon in which he managed to portray a vote for Lamb in Tuesday’s special election as a sacred and patriotic act in keeping with the godly social justice tradition of Moses, Gandhi, UMWA founder John Lewis, Martin Luther King Jr. and the recently victorious West Virginia teachers’ strike.

“We’re God-fearing folks down here in these coal fields,” Roberts roared in his West Virginia twang. “I believe in God and so do you and we don’t apologize to anybody for that.”

“The bible tells us some day we’re all gonna be judged by how we treat the least of these, and the labor movement and the Democratic Party are about treating the least with respect and lifting them up,” he continued, to loud applause and affirmative shouts of “that’s right” from attendees.

To hear Roberts tell it, the struggles of organized labor reflect a deep spiritual and patriotic fervor ― a fervor that Lamb shares.

“It just excites me when people run up to me with a camera and say, well, ‘Tell me what kind of person Conor is.’ We don’t know each other personally, but let me tell ya, I know what he’s about,” he intoned in his breathy preacher’s cadence.

“Let me try to explains [sic] to ya what kind of folks we are and what kind of Democrat Conor is. He’s a God-fearing, union-supporting, gun-owning, job-protecting, pension-defending, Social Security-believing, health care-greeting and sending-drug-dealers-to-jail Democrat!” he bellowed in conclusion as the audience rose to their feet and broke out in chants of “CON-OR, CON-OR.”

Elements of the rally ― the religiosity, the pro-gun rhetoric and the romantic attachment to coal country ― would surely make more socially liberal Democrats squirm.

But for better or worse, Roberts’ speech was the rhetorical capstone of a campaign that has sought to bring rank-and-file union members who voted for Donald Trump or past Republican congressional candidates back into the Democratic fold.

And in union-heavy congressional districts like Pennsylvania’s 18th, if not in the country at large, organized labor remains a powerful tool in Democrats’ toolkit.

Suburban women played a key role in Democrats’ electoral sweep in Virginia in November. And black women got credit for helping put Democrat Doug Jones over the top in his surprise win in the Alabama Senate race in December.

Now it’s labor unions’ turn to bask in the spotlight: If Lamb wins Tuesday, he will owe much of his success to them.

Lamb has acknowledged as much, telling the audience at the UMWA rally that organized labor has “been the heart and soul of this campaign.”

A Lamb victory would not merely give organized labor an avowed policy champion, however. It would elevate the political capital of unions across the country by reminding both major political parties of their power to sway close contests ― particularly in the swing-voting industrial states along the Great Lakes.

“What this race shows already, regardless of the outcome, is that labor is still very relevant and still has a lot of clout and the ability to organize and affect elections,” said Mike Mikus, a Democratic political consultant based in western Pennsylvania.

Organized labor has experienced a steady decline in the country in the past few decades, devastated by the hollowing out of manufacturing and employers’ increasingly aggressive union avoidance tactics. Just 10.7 percent of American workers belong to unions, down from 20.1 percent in 1983.

But in Pennsylvania’s 18th, with its high concentration of steelworkers, coal miners, carpenters and civil servants, about 23 percent of voters remain unionized.

Thanks to more conservative views on hot-button issues like guns, abortion and immigration, rank-and-file union members have increasingly lent their support to Republicans, often against the advice of their leaders.

President Trump, with his talk of reviving American manufacturing and coal mining, proved especially effective at picking off union members in this region. The UMWA, fretful about the effect of the Obama administration’s environmental regulations on the coal industry and Clinton’s promise to continue them, declined to endorse a presidential candidate in 2016.

Nationwide, Hillary Clinton received 10 percent fewer votes from union members than Barack Obama in 2012, according to an internal survey by the AFL-CIO, a national umbrella federation of labor unions.

But in a Saturday conversation at the smoke-filled Cuddy Sports Club in Cuddy Hill, Zeszutek said he would vote for Lamb. A representative of his union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 5, called him to say that Saccone supported right-to-work laws. That is a dealbreaker for Zeszutek, who believes that preventing unions from compelling dues payment from workers they represent is tantamount to theft.

“If they start taking money out of my pocket, what are they going to do for the rest of this country?” Zeszutek said.

Of course, labor unions’ efforts on Lamb’s behalf have not been without their hiccups. Lamb rankled some union officials during a February debate in which he disavowed the $15 minimum wage, which has become a leading progressive cause thanks to the organizing work of the Service Employees International Union.

Lamb’s remarks prompted rare public griping from some labor officials, which Republican groups have tried to capitalize on in campaign literature.

(For his part, Saccone said he opposes an increase in the minimum wage, which is $7.25 in Pennsylvania, and argued that the floor on pay should be “market-driven.”)

Darrin Kelly, a union firefighter who is now president of the Allegheny County Labor Council, said that organized labor was at least guaranteed an audience with Lamb when it disagrees with him.

“The best thing about what we have with Conor Lamb is that we know he’ll listen,” Kelly said. “That’s all we really want when we help someone get elected ― is to make sure that our voices get heard.”

Written by: Daniel Marans

Our Promise to Miners Must be Kept

Source: The Register Herald

Among the many issues in the news, the one that is missing serious attention is passage of the American Miners Pension Act. This act pertains to securing promised benefits to nearly 87,000 coal miner retirees, widows and future retirees in the negotiated United Mine Workers of America 1974 Pension Plan. Passage of this Act has major repercussions on the West Virginia economy.

The situation is clear. In 1946, President Truman signed the historic Lewis-Krug Agreement negotiated by UMWA President John L. Lewis and U. S. Department of Labor Secretary Julius Krug. This industry-wide agreement obligated the federal government to life-time health and pension benefits for the nation’s miners through the initially called UMW Welfare and Retirement Fund. In the deal, workers sacrificed wage increases for the promise of life-time health-care and pension benefits. These promises were obligations and responsibilities agreed to by corporate America and top political leadership in the absence of national programs, such as those in Canada and Europe, that were legislatively obtained through the political process. The plan was set up with royalties paid per ton of coal backed by a federal guarantee.

In 1974, the Employment Retirement Income and Security Act caused the above-mentioned fund to split into two separate funds, with the 1974 Pension Plan providing pension benefits to eligible miners who worked on or after January 1, 1976. As a result of extremely depressed coal markets, coal company bankruptcies, layoffs, consolidation and other factors there has been a dramatic decrease in the level of employer contributions to the 1974 Plan. In the last two years alone contributions have dropped by more than $100 million, leaving less than $25 million per year still coming in to the Plan.

As noted, there are many factors that are contributing to the problem. One is the failure of the federal government to honor its commitment to coal miners who made America a great nation. Another is declining coal production. A third is the use of bankruptcies to take away worker’s lawful benefits. It is ironic that this country does not recognize that human resource obligations negotiated by companies and government are a legal debt equal to if in fact not superior to the debt owed to commercial vendors. Abraham Lincoln made the point clear when he said, “labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could not have existed had not labor first existed. Labor is superior to capital and deserves the much higher consideration.”

Indeed, there is an issue of moral values. Corporations that over the years gained wage concessions and promised health/pension benefits for life, now have unscrupulous leaders. Benefits that promised economic security were agreed to by all parties. Workers, accepting the promise in good faith, paid for the promise over and over again. But when the promises had to be honored, the promise-makers danced and laughed. They milked assets and ran. They hid behind bankruptcy laws and non-union shields. Furthermore, they preached in favor of moral values while they practiced deceit. They claimed to be in favor of family integrity while they practiced policies that disrupted and destroyed family stability. The decision to break commitments, promises and guarantees to workers and their families is morally despicable.

The described contradictions cause deep division and consternation. We cannot boast of being free politically when we permit workers to be economically enslaved, disregarded, disrespected and relegated to the human scrap heap. Bankruptcy laws must become humane and government commitments are treaties that must be honored. Judges must be made accountable. Economic terrorism must be stopped. And fairness, good working relations, and honesty must return as the top priority to the value system of those who lead America.

Coal miners are owed the American Miners Pension Act. It represents a promise for today and tomorrow made yesterday that must be kept.

Written by: John P. David Guest Columnist

UMWA president delivers fiery endorsement for Lamb in 18th District race

Source: Observer-Reporter

WAYNESBURG – The president of the United Mine Workers of America delivered a fiery endorsement Sunday in Greene County of Conor Lamb in the race for the Pennsylvania U.S. House’s 18th District, saying the Democrat will work to protect Social Security, Medicare and coal miner pensions.

Cecil Roberts, speaking like a fire and brimstone minister, urged a standing-room-only crowd in a Greene County Fairgrounds exhibition barn to ask their friends, relatives and neighbors to vote for Lamb, 33, of Mt. Lebanon as a way “to fight back for middle-class America.”

“Treat this as a movement,” Roberts said at an event that attracted national and international media covering a closely watched race that is seen as a test of President Trump’s support in Southwestern Pennsylvania.

A day earlier, the president made his second trip to the Pittsburgh area to lend his support to Lamb’s challenger, state Rep. Rick Saccone, 58, during a private rally in an airplane hangar in Moon Township. Trump also campaigned for Saccone, R-Elizabeth, in January while touring H. & K. Equipment in Coraopolis.

State Rep. Pam Snyder hosted the event for Lamb as the hours count down before Tuesday’s special election to fill a seat in the House that became available in October when former U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy of Upper St. Clair resigned amid a scandal.

“He’s proud to say he supports the unions,” said Snyder as she introduced Lamb, drawing a standing ovation and chants of “Conor, Conor, Conor.”

Earlier, Central Greene kindergarten teacher Missy Brant said the Southwestern Pennsylvania State Education Association has also endorsed Lamb because he is considered to be a supporter of increasing funds for public education.

Brant said Saccone has a voting history in Harrisburg of voting to lower state funding for education.

“This is the last thing we need is another rubber stamp for the wealthy few,” she said.

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald also appeared on the podium to support Lamb, a U.S. Marine veteran and former U.S. prosecutor.

“You have a fighter here who respects that in Conor Lamb,” Fitzgerald said, referring to the protection of coal miner’s pensions.

Lamb took his turn at the podium and he paraphrased Franklin D. Roosevelt when that president spoke in October 1936 at Madison Square Garden about Americans having the sense that Washington, D.C., had turned its back on their struggles.

“Americans need to know that the government walks on their side of the street,” Lamb said.

He said the country made a promise to coal miners to guarantee their pensions from bankrupt corporations. He also said he does not support cuts to Social Security or Medicare.

“I do not believe as (House Speaker) Paul Ryan does that these are entitlements,” Lamb said. “We will secure your rights to these benefits that you have worked hard for all of your lives.”

Roberts then delivered a rousing speech after noting that everyone in the room has some connection to the veterans who built this country.

“We’re the most patriotic people on Earth here in the coalfields,” Roberts said. “We’ve proven that we are patriotic.”

He said the UMW doesn’t need to lobby in Washington, D.C., when “working people stand up and fight back.”

“(Lamb) believes in us folks in the coalfields. When workers are united, they will never be defeated,” Roberts said.

“We need one of our own in the United States Congress,” he said before reminding the audience that Republican Political Action Committees have spent heavily on Saccone’s campaign.

“You can’t let out-of-state millionaires outwork coal miners, outwork steelworkers and outwork schoolteachers.”

After the rally ended, retired coal miner Lou Brova of Scenery Hill, Washington County, said he came to Waynesburg to see Roberts speak and pledged to vote Tuesday for Lamb.

“He’s a young man,” said Brova, 81. “He’s a veteran, and I think he’s an honest person.”

Written by: Scott Beveridge

Cecil Roberts: I support WV teachers because I support WV kids

Source: Charleston Gazette Mail

The bold actions by West Virginia’s teachers, school support personnel and other state employees to stand up for our state and our schoolchildren over these last two weeks are an inspiration.

To see these normally reserved, compassionate professionals take a proud position to improve their pay, for better security of their benefits and a better long-term education for West Virginia’s children sends a refreshing message of strength and hope to me and millions of others — not just within our state but across America.

I know our teachers would much rather be in the classroom with their students than out on the picket line or rallying in front of the Capitol. It is better to solve workplace issues at a bargaining table, with both sides reaching a mutually beneficial agreement. Unfortunately, our teachers do not have that opportunity. They instead are forced to react to the whims of a state Legislature that is more interested in ideological purity than it is in doing what’s best for the people — and especially the children — of West Virginia working families.

I am heartened by the actions of these brave teachers and workers because I know that those who will gain the most from a successful ending to this action will be West Virginia’s students. They will reap the benefits of an educational system equipped with long-term professional teachers who don’t have to worry about living paycheck to paycheck and can instead focus on helping our students become the best they can be.

This problem is largely one of the West Virginia Legislature’s own making. Over the past several years, the Legislature has taken vote after vote that have impacted workers’ wages and the resulting taxes they pay.

For example, passing legislation restricting prevailing wages for construction workers hasn’t created any more jobs, but it has resulted in smaller paychecks for those workers and lower income and sales tax revenue collected from those workers. Passing Right to Work (For Less) legislation hasn’t brought any new businesses to West Virginia, but it has reduced the ability of workers to collectively win better pay and benefits, which would help fill state coffers.

Far too many of our legislators cannot see that because they are blinded by an ideology that puts the demands of out-of-state billionaires and corporate elitists ahead of the needs of West Virginia working families. Perhaps the courage of our teachers and others who have so boldly stepped forward will take the blinders off these legislators and bring some sense to them.

But I’m not holding my breath. The bumbling maneuvers by the West Virginia Senate leadership last week only serve to further highlight the majority’s disinterest in actual governance. The continued outrageous insults about teachers and allied workers from individual senators show them to be little more than schoolyard bullies who someone has finally stood up to.

While our legislative leaders continue to do the bidding of their corporate masters, our teachers’ pay still ranks 47th in the nation. Even the 5 percent increase that was approved by the House last week won’t change that ranking much. The laws passed in the last two legislative sessions attacking workers’ rights will cut workers’ paychecks and slash their benefits. These regressive policies only serve to hurt West Virginia working families, not help them.

Despite that, I am indeed inspired by our teachers and the others who have gathered at the state Capitol, walked the picket lines and stood united, fighting to make things better for our children and grandchildren. They have seen what is happening to our state, and decided to stand up and do something about it.

The UMWA is proud to join with them for the sake of a brighter future for all West Virginians. That’s worth fighting for today, tomorrow and forever. #55strong!

Rescue Imperiled Pension Programs

Source: Wheeling Intelligencer

Imagine everyone who lives in Wheeling suddenly being told their incomes are being cut off. Imagine them being old enough that they had few prospects of replacing that loss.

Now you have some idea of the disaster facing families throughout our state and in other coal mining regions.

Slightly more than 27,000 people live in Wheeling, according to the Census Bureau. That happens to be the number of retired West Virginians who rely on pensions from their former employers in the mining industry.

They and about 60,000 people in other states are facing imminent disaster because the United Mine Workers union pension fund is on the brink of bankruptcy. Without intervention from some source, it will be only a matter of time until the program has to stop sending checks to retirees.

Unfortunately, the situation is much more complex than merely an issue of whether to assist retired miners. Several other union pension funds also are nearing insolvency. Helping the miners while doing nothing for those other retirees would be both wrong and politically difficult.

Fortunately, there is bipartisan agreement in Congress that something needs to be done. To that end, a Joint Select Committee on the Solvency of Multi-Employer Pension Plans has been established to craft a federal government approach to the problem.

Among the panel’s 16 members are Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.; Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio; and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.

Committee members face a daunting task. An idea of its magnitude can be gained by considering that the U.S. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., which normally steps in to rescue insolvent retirement systems, could be wrecked itself if called upon to help with funding for the imperiled programs. Hundreds of thousands of retirees ranging from teamsters to ironworkers are involved.

A formula for helping them simply must be found and adopted. Too many people, including the 27,000 retired miners in West Virginia, will have no hope if the committee does not find a way out for them.

1.5 Million Retirees Await Congressional Fix for a Pension Time Bomb

Source: The New York Times

WASHINGTON — The sprawling agreement to boost government spendingreached by Republicans and Democrats this month quietly included a step toward defusing what could be a financial time bomb for 1.5 million retirees and hundreds of companies in the industrial Midwest and the South.

The deal creates a select congressional committee to craft what could effectively be a federal rescue of as many as 200 so-called “multiemployer” pension plans — in which employers and labor unions band together to provide retirement benefits to employees.

Many of these plans are hurtling toward insolvency in the coming decade, with benefits owed to retirees projected to swamp what the plans can afford to pay. The 16-member, bipartisan committee will have to come up with a solution and legislation by the end of November, which the full Senate would need to vote on by the end of the year.

Select congressional committees have long struggled to produce results, like one during the Barack Obama administration meant to reduce the growth of the national debt. This committee’s work will be complicated by disagreements over whether companies, retirees or taxpayers should bear the brunt of the cost for shoring up pension plans that would otherwise run out of money.

“A solution that works is going to be challenging for all parties, and that’s going to make it hard to get political buy-in,” said Aliya Wong, the executive director of retirement policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has pushed Congress to solve the multiemployer pension problem. “The biggest issue is, where do you get the money from? Every source seems to be tapped out.”

Pension plans across the nation are facing shortfalls, with both corporate plans and those for public employees like teachers and firefighters owing more to retirees than the investment funds can possibly pay. But the looming collapse of the multiemployer pension system is significant given the sheer number of people affected and the potential for a devastating economic ripple effect: retirees losing the pension checks that keep them afloat and a potential wave of bankruptcies among the companies that once employed those workers.

The situation has been brewing since the 2008 financial crisis, as investments plummeted, leaving many plans in the red. The slow economic recovery and recent stock market rally have not been sufficient to reinvigorate the plans, which are jointly funded by labor unions and employers whose workers participate in them.

According to Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research, the nation’s 1,400 multiemployer plans are facing a $553 billion “hole” of unfunded liabilities, meaning they don’t have sufficient assets to cover what they owe workers. About a fourth of these plans are in the so-called “red zone,” where insolvency is more imminent, potentially within the next 10 to 20 years. Most of the participants in these plans work in the transportation, services and manufacturing industries. Their employers, many of which have been trying to withdraw from the plans, include companies like United Parcel Service and Kroger.

U.P.S. said in 2016 that it could be responsible for nearly $4 billion in benefits payments if the Central States Pension Fund, the largest multiemployer plan facing insolvency, slashes benefits to retirees or becomes insolvent. In the past year, U.P.S., which participates in more than two dozen pension plans, has been working with lawmakers on Capitol Hill to help develop pension legislation. It has also offered its own proposals.

“We want the system stabilized and fixed in the long term because we’re in so many plans and we have a lot of employees in the plans,” said Chris Langan, vice president of finance at U.P.S. “It’s something that is not wise to wait on.”

Now, Congress must decide whether to rescue these funds with low-cost loans, force them to cut benefit payments or let the funds go bankrupt and wipe out retirees’ entire pensions.

Ms. Wong and other advocates of congressional action say they are optimistic that the committee can achieve rare bipartisan success. Members of Congress across the aisle, they say, are coming to grips with the cost of doing nothing.

“This committee forces Congress to get serious,” said Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, a longtime champion of unions who represents many retirees covered by the pension plans, and who fought for the committee’s creation in the spending bill. “It forces us to come together and work out differences.”

The strain on the multiemployer pension system carries another risk — the potential annihilation of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the government agency that insures pension plans. The P.B.G.C. said in its latest annual report that its multiemployer program is likely to run out of money by the end of fiscal year 2025 because of the “rapid decline” in the P.B.G.C.’s financial position. In 2017, the agency paid $141 million in financial assistance to 72 multiemployer pension plans and that number is expected to rise as more plans collapse.

If the multiemployer pension plans go broke, the federal safety net created to protect retirees will not have enough money to make good on the promised benefits, leaving workers with little to no retirement benefits.

“It’s an urgent problem that needs to be fixed,” said Alicia H. Munnell, a management professor at Boston College and the director of its Center for Retirement Research. “Unfortunately there’s an ideological divide — do you bail these people out or not?”

“No one wants to see old, poor people penniless in retirement,” she said.

Mike Walden, a retired Teamster and the president of the National United Committee to Protect Pensions, has led fellow retirees to Washington for several years to pressure members of Congress to fix the problem. Retirees, already squeezed by living on a fixed income, are frustrated at the prospect of seeing their benefits reduced or eliminated if Congress does not act, he said. “I don’t think they understand, when they take money away from us, how much they’re going to hurt the economy.”

Mr. Walden called the creation of the committee a “meaningful step” to soothe nervous retirees. “It’s been way too long — just talk, talk, talk, talk,” he said.

To succeed, the committee must navigate Washington’s aversion to anything that resembles a bailout, particularly as the government is running large deficits that are projected to grow $7 trillion over the next decade — and when many Republicans see unions as political enemies.

And Congress has already tried to help these plans, with little success. In 2014, the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act was enacted to help funds develop rescue plans, including by reducing benefits to retirees. In 2015, Central States submitted such a plan to the Treasury Department, but it was rejected the following year on the grounds that the proposed benefit reductions were unlikely to help the fund avoid insolvency.

Mr. Brown and Representative Richard E. Neal of Massachusetts, a Democrat, have pushed an effort that would attempt to stabilize plans with 30-year loans from the Treasury Department, as long as plan managers could demonstrate the money would put them on a path to solvency — and not invest it in risky assets. Fiscal hawks, like the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, warn that the bill could leave taxpayers responsible for as much as $100 billion if the loans are not repaid. Backers of the bill say taxpayers should not end up paying a dime.

“This is beyond party affiliation, this really cuts to the root of what retirement is going to look like,” said Mr. Neal, who will be a member of the special committee and has been working to recruit more House Republicans to support his proposal.

Mr. Neal has six Republican co-sponsors on his bill and said that several others have expressed support. A handful of Republican senators have also been engaged on the issue, including Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, who said this month that she was pleased the spending bill “recognizes the urgent need to help tens of thousands of retired coal miners.”

The Trump administration has been largely quiet on the situation, but when asked about it at a congressional hearing last week, Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, noted that it was a “significant” issue and promised to offer technical assistance to support any solution that lawmakers find.

As congressional negotiators homed in on a spending deal early this year, Mr. Brown pushed Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader, to attach his pension language to the larger budget agreement. The bill establishes a process to ensure that if the commission produces a bill supported by a majority of its Democratic and Republican members, the Senate will vote on that bill before a new Congress convenes next year.

If concern over retirees is not enough to get lawmakers to act, those who represent pension funds hope that concern about the broader economy will. Michael D. Scott, executive director for the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans, projects that if all of the pension plans that are in “critical” and “critical and declining” condition go broke, the federal government would face a half trillion dollars in lost tax revenue over the next decade because of the taxes that the active funds currently pay.

“I think ultimately the government is going to look at how much tax revenue it is going to lose without a solution,” Mr. Scott said.

Robocall from President Roberts – February 15, 2018

President Cecil Roberts gives an update on the United Mine Workers’s continued fight to preserve the pensions of retired and active miner’s.

Miners Lobby for Action on Pensions

Source: E&E News

The United Mine Workers of America returned to Capitol Hill this week as Congress mulls who will decide the fate of their pensions.

Party leaders in both chambers have yet to select the special joint committee tasked with shoring up pensions for roughly 1.5 million union workers, including 107,000 former UMWA miners (E&E Daily, Feb. 8).

Born out of the recent budget compromise, the panel — 16 members split evenly between House and Senate, Republican and Democrat — avoided another government shutdown fight over the issue.

The committee is instructed to come up with legislation by the last week of November. If at least five Democrats and five Republicans approve, the bill will be guaranteed an expedited floor vote without amendments.

After nearly a decade of camouflage-clad campaigning, the UMWA sees a crack of light at the end of the tunnel.

Democrats are solidly behind the push, and many Republicans have backed at least a UMWA fix, but selection of panel members will be vital as conservative groups have criticized pension action.

“The key is to get people on there that want to settle it,” UMWA retiree Eddie Embry said yesterday. “Not somebody that wants to muddy the water and drag it out from now until November and then disband the committee.”

Embry has made a dozen road trips — traveling about 17,000 miles — from western Kentucky to Capitol Hill in little over a year.

This time, UMWA members delivered letters from retirees unable to make the journey.

Dick Lucas, a UMWA retiree from West Virginia, noted pension money is important not only to people but rural areas where retirees represent a major portion of the population and keep many businesses afloat.

The pension funds aren’t expected to go belly up until at least 2021, but the recent tumult in the coal industry has heightened fears.

“We’re one bankruptcy away from being completely broke because we’ve had so many companies go into bankruptcy,” shedding their pension obligations, Embry said.

Written by: Dylan Brown

Speaker Bates reaffirms support for Navajo families at ‘Yes to NGS’ rally

Source: The Navajo-Hopi Observer

PHOENIX — Hundreds of Kayenta Mine and Navajo Generating Station workers marched on the Arizona State Capitol Feb. 6 to announce the formation of ‘Yes to NGS,’ a coalition that advocates for solutions to ensure the continuation of NGS operations beyond 2019.

The workers were joined by members of the Navajo Nation Council, United Mine Workers of America, state senators and reprepresentatives.

Navajo Nation Council Speaker LoRenzo Bates (Nenahnezad, Newcomb, San Juan, Tiis Tsoh Sikaad, Tse’Daa’Kaan, Upper Fruitland) and Navajo Nation Council Delegate Seth Damon (Bááháálí, Chichiltah, Manuelito, Tsé Lichíí’, Rock Springs, Tsayatoh) were on hand at the rally.

“It’s heartening to see so many Navajo and tribal families here to bring a powerful message to Arizona and Washington leaders. Today, we say ‘Yes to NGS!’” Bates said. “With the creation of this coalition, we are taking another step in this challenging journey to keep Navajo families together by keeping NGS and Kayenta Mine in operation beyond 2019.”

In 2017, Bates sponsored legislation that finalized an agreement between the Nation and NGS owners to continue NGS operations and protected the jobs of hundreds of Navajo workers through the end of 2019.

Myron Richardson and Dwight Lomaintewa, who are employed at Kayenta Mine and whose families rely on the operations of both the mine and the power plant to provide for their households, joined speaker Bates.

Each of them shared the importance of keeping NGS in operation and explained that NGS and Kayenta Mine have allowed their families to remain on their traditional homelands with their extended families rather than having to away from the Navajo Nation and Hopi Tribal lands to find employment.

Lomaintewa also noted that the potential closure of NGS would impact the Hopi Tribe tremendously because coal production at Kayenta Mine provides approximately 85-percent of the tribe’s annual revenue.

“Too often we equate the Navajo Generating Station with only dollars and cents,” Bates said. “The real story is about the traditional working family and the work they do to benefit tribal people and families across Arizona.”

Damon, who chairs the Council’s Budget and Finance Committee that is tasked with developing the Nation’s comprehensive budget each year, said he and his colleagues are doing everything possible to advocate for NGS and Kayenta Mine workers to keep their jobs at home and to provide financial stability for the Navajo Nation.

President of the United Mine Workers of America Cecil Roberts also spoke to the workers and urged the federal government to work with the tribes to continue NGS.

“The Navajo Generating Station was developed on tribal lands by tribal workers who mine the coal and create the power that moves water to benefit families and businesses across Arizona,” Roberts said. “The path forward is for the federal government to maintain its ownership position and continue leading the transition to new owners.”

The nonprofit ‘Yes to NGS’ coalition will be tasked with informing communities, engaging stakeholders and advocating for solutions that would allow NGS operations to continue beyond 2019. According to the coalition, the founding members represent well over 100,000 U.S. businesses and organizations.

More information about ‘Yes to NGS’ coalition is available by visiting Yes to NGS.org.

Written by: Katherine Locke

Workers To Rally In Phoenix To Support Navajo Generating Station

Source: kjzz.org

Workers from the Navajo Generating Station and the Kayenta Mine in northeast Arizona will be in Phoenix on Tuesday. They’re calling for action to save the NGS power plant, which is slated to close at the end of next year.

The utility companies that co-own the Navajo Generating Station say they can get power elsewhere more cheaply.

The scheduled shutdown affects hundreds of workers at the station and the Kayenta Mine, which supplies it with coal.

Many of the workers at the plant and the mine are member

s of the Navajo and Hopi nations. The NGS also pays royalties to the tribes.

The United Mine Workers union is urging station owners to sell the plant rather than shut it down.

“We believe there are at least four potential buyers for this power station,” said Cecil Roberts, the union’s president. “Why would you close it, creating all this pain and suffering for many, many others, when somebody wants to give you money for it?”

The mine’s owner, Peabody, has hired a financial firm to work on securing a buyer for the NGS. No buyer has yet come forward publicly.

SRP and other private owners say a sale is possible, but the longer it takes for a buyer to secure a solid deal, the harder a sale becomes.

By Bret Jaspers