New Flyer plant is a ‘green jobs’ – and union – success story (& card check win)

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.workdayminnesota.org/index.php?news_6_3974

By Barb Kucera, Workday editor
17 March 2009
ST. CLOUD - Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to the New Flyer Bus Co. on Thursday will showcase how the U.S. economy can be revitalized with new, “green” technologies. But it also can be an opportunity to highlight another of the Obama administration’s priorities – the Employee Free Choice Act.
Biden will convene the second meeting of the “Middle Class Task Force” at 11:30 a.m. Thursday at New Flyer – one of those rare companies that is doing well in today’s dismal economy. In 2008, the company hired more than 90 people at its St. Cloud plant and has operated around the clock to fulfill a two-year, $4.1 billion backlog of orders.

New Flyer manufactures buses for some of the largest transit agencies and cities in the United States and Canada and is a leader in the production of hybrid and low-emission vehicles. Biden and the task force – which consists of Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis and a number of other Cabinet members and federal officials – will tout the company as an example of the kind of investment being promoted in the new federal stimulus bill and the Obama administration’s proposed budget.

Most of the 650 workers at the St. Cloud plant are represented by Communications Workers of America Local 7304. They chose union representation through majority sign-up – the method that would become an option for all workers if Congress passes the Employee Free Choice Act.

When New Flyer opened the St. Cloud facility in 1999, it already had a unionized operation in Crookston, Minn., and another in Winnipeg, Manitoba. CWA Local 7304 represented the workers in Crookston, while the Canadian Auto Workers had a contract covering workers in Winnipeg.

At the request of workers, the management of the St. Cloud plant agreed to forego the lengthy and often contentious National Labor Relations Board election process and instead agreed to recognize the union if a majority of workers signed cards.

FULL story at link.

[madrchsod]

1. the crookston plant is hiring assemblers...

and so are the other plants