NEWS RELEASE PRESS RELEASE
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
For immediate release: December 17, 1997
CONTACT: Joe Drexler, OCAW Special Projects Director
303-987-5329
Eric Scherzer, International Rep. - 973-509-9545
OIL WORKERS' CAMPAIGN AGAINST
CROWN CENTRAL PETROLEUM SOARS
Baltimore City Council and National Black Caucus of
State Legislators Endorse Actions Against Crown
Lakewood, CO - The Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers
International Union (OCAW) has achieved new milestones in
its campaign to obtain justice for 252 oil refinery
workers who were forcibly removed from their jobs 22
months ago in Pasadena, Texas and for other victims of
Crown Central Petroleum.
On Monday, the Baltimore City Council, in a
strongly-worded resolution, criticized Crown, whose gas
stations are largely located in the Baltimore area, for
its actions against OCAW members and a still-emerging
pattern of racism, sexism, and environmental crimes
allegedly being committed by Crown. This followed on the
heels of another resolution passed on December 13th by
the National Black Caucus of State Legislators which also
condemned Crown for its unsavory practices against
workers, people of color, women, and the environment. The
Black Caucus resolution endorsed a boycott of Crown
gasoline, while the City Council in Baltimore voted to
support the AFL-CIO campaign against Crown, which is
primarily focused on the gasoline boycott.
"These resolutions mark a whole new phase of our campaign
against Crown and make an effective boycott of Crown
gasoline in its major market areas much more likely,"
said Robert Wages, OCAW President. "We believe the public
will respond as more victims of Crown's practices step
forward and as various constituent groups and community/
religious leaders take actions."
In addition to being condemned for its almost two-year
lockout of union members, Crown has been sued for
violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and faces
a $50 million lawsuit in state court being brought by
residents who claim health and property value damages
from Crown's Pasadena refinery. The alleged civil rights
violations, including the distribution of racist
handbills, exceed those charged against Texaco, which was
forced to settle a class action lawsuit for $170 million.
OCAW and the Texans United Education Fund, a
community-based environmental group, issued a report
three weeks ago which documented a three-fold increase in
the pollution of surrounding neighborhoods from its
Pasadena refinery since the lockout began. Both OCAW and
Texans United charged that the forced replacement of
experienced workers by unskilled contract workers and
significant reductions in the work force at the Crown
refinery are major reasons for the pollution increase.
"The public outcry against Crown builds daily, and
eventually it's going to affect its profits," said Wages.
"We intend to get the message out that everyone who knows
the difference between right and wrong should refuse to
buy Crown gasoline."
==================================================================
NEWS RELEASE PRESS RELEASE
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
For immediate release: November 13, 1997
CONTACT: Robert Wages, (303)987-2229,
OCAW International President
OCAW Seeks Dialogue With Bidders
for the US Enrichment Corporation
LAKEWOOD, Colo. -- The Oil, Chemical and Atomic
Workers International Union has declared an interest in
opening a dialogue with all prospective bidders for the
privatization of the US Enrichment Corporation (USEC).
The union represents over 2,000 hourly workers at the two
uranium enrichment plants USEC operates in Portsmouth,
Ohio, and Paducah, Kentucky.
"Since the USEC Privatization Act states that the
Secretary of Treasury should not approve a transfer of
USEC's stock unless bidders maintain operations of the
two gaseous diffusion plants, OCAW has a direct interest
in ensuring that all bidders continue production and
maintain employment at the plants after privatization is
completed," said OCAW President Robert Wages.
"Since the U.S - Russia Highly Enriched Uranium
Agreement calls for an increase of shipments to 5.7
million SWU per year in 1999 -- each plant produces
approximately 6.0 million SWU/year -- this will have the
potential to cut back production and employment at the
two gaseous diffusion plants in the foreseeable future,"
Wages noted. "We are interested in understanding the
approach that the Treasury Department will require and
the approaches that various bidders will commit in order
to meet the objective of maintaining production at both
plants."
"While OCAW has supported Pleiades' bid because of
its active solicitation and interest in meeting the
concerns of our members, it should be made clear that
this support is not exclusive, and OCAW and its local
unions are willing to serve in an advisory capacity --
either formal or informal -- to all parties with an
interest in privatization," Wages added. "We look forward
to working with any other bidder who will also try to
address the concerns of the workers at Portsmouth and
Paducah."
"OCAW has communicated with the Pleiades Group that
OCAW does not intend to be a party, nor a direct owner,
in the bid for USEC. While discussions were held with
Pleiades about offering OCAW a seat on its Board of
Directors, OCAW has no intention or desire to hold such
a seat," Wages said.
==================================================================
PRESS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE November 10, 1997
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
CONTACT: Lynne Baker, (303)987-2229, Communications Director
OCAW and Oil Industry Agree to Extend
National Oil Bargaining Program Three Years
LAKEWOOD, Colo. - The Oil, Chemical and Atomic
Workers International Union National Oil Bargaining
Policy Committee has approved a proposal from Shell Oil
Company to extend the collective bargaining agreements
affected by the National Oil Bargaining Program through
January 31, 2002.
The contract extension offer is subject to
membership ratification within 15 days from the date of
the formal offer being presented at the local union
bargaining tables.
Part of the proposal includes an agreement on
successorship that will apply to refineries and chemical
plants historically a part of National Oil Bargaining.
Policy Committee members view this extension as a
breakthrough agreement because of the successorship
language and wage increases.
Under the successorship agreement, if a company
sells an entire plant to a third party or enters into a
joint venture or merger agreement covering an entire
facility, the company would include in any sale, merger
or joint venture agreement the requirement that the
successor company recognize the union as the exclusive
representative of the bargaining unit and adopt the
collective bargaining agreement and all existing
memoranda of agreement.
With this extended National Oil Bargaining contract,
OCAW-represented oil and chemical workers receive wage
increases amounting to $3.00 per hour over the four-year
term of the agreement. Effective February 1, 1998 the
current 3 percent hourly wage increase will rise to 3.5
percent each year through 2001.
The talks between OCAW and Shell Oil were held in a
manner consistent with the historical approach to
bargaining in the oil industry. Representatives of the
rank and file on the National Oil Bargaining Committee
were apprised last August at the International union's
convention of the proposed talks, and the negotiations
began after the Committee's approval.
Both the OCAW and the oil industry agree that
extending the contract and including the successor clause
will offer stability in an industry rife with buyouts,
mergers and joint ventures.
==================================================================
PRESS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE 10/24/97
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
CONTACT: Richard Miller, (202) 637-0400
OCAW Labels OSHA/EPA Lodi Explosion Report "Tainted"
LAKEWOOD, Colo. -- Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers
International Union president Robert E. Wages labeled the
OSHA/EPA report on the April 21, 1995 chemical explosion
at Napp Technologies Inc.'s Lodi, N.J., plant as
"tainted" and "fraudulent."
"It has taken OSHA and the EPA 32 months to complete its
investigation of the Lodi disaster," Wages said. "The
agencies gave the report to Napp to review and scrub
prior to publication."
Two union members and three supervisors died in the Lodi
disaster. At the time of the explosion, the five men were
acting under the orders of higher management to unload
nearly 10,000 pounds of explosive material. Management
also ordered workers not to notify the Lodi Fire
Department about the emergency circumstances in the
plant.
According to Wages, the OCAW team reviewing the report
found the following:
* There was no peer review of the report in spite of the
Clinton Administration's assurances to Congress that the
reports would be peer-reviewed as a proxy for a degree
of independence.
* OSHA failed to mention that the plant manager had lied
about his qualifications and reportedly had a previous
criminal record.
* OSHA's analysis missed the true root cause --
management system failure. OSHA talks about inadequate
operating procedures and process hazard analyzes, but the
underlying cause was management who were inept and
unqualified. In fact, the OSHA/EPA report didn't use a
formal root cause analysis methodology, so it
would be difficult to discern how they arrived at their
conclusions and recommendations.
"The Napp report only underscores the fact that OSHA is
being forced to do what it is not competent to do instead
of doing what it should do, which is enforcement," Wages
said.
"This report should galvanize the Clinton administration
to approve funding for the Chemical Safety and Hazard
Investigation Board (CSHIB)," he said. "Such a Board
would provide timely and accurate analysis of the root
causes of chemical accidents."
Congress created the Chemical Safety and Hazard
Investigation Board under the Clean Air Act of 1990, and
modeled it after the National Transportation Safety
Board. The Administration appointed members to the Board
and Congress confirmed them, but the Administration
delegated the Board's responsibilities -- but not its
authority -- to OSHA and EPA and refused to fund the
Board.
"President Clinton now has the opportunity to get the
Board running by approving the VA-HUD appropriations bill
with its $4 million earmarked for the Board," Wages said.
He said that OCAW concurs with the recommendations that
UNITE (Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile
Employees) has made to OSHA calling for a withdrawal of
the final report; a release of the initial draft report;
and a re-issue of the report, after addressing the
involvement of Napp's managers and the loopholes in
OSHA's emergency response standard.
==================================================================
PRESS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE 9/15/97
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
CONTACT: Rod Rogers, (303)987-2229 or Paula Littles,
(713)473-3381
Energy Workers Union Condemns Discrimination
at Crown Central Petroleum Corp.
LAKEWOOD, Colo. -- Robert E. Wages,
president of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers
International Union (OCAW), strongly condemned Crown
Central Petroleum Corp.'s discriminatory promotion
policies which have prohibited African-American and
female employees from advancing within the company.
In a statement released today, Wages
said, "The reprehensible and thoroughly disgusting
situation at Crown Central Petroleum confirms our
conviction that racism and sexism are alive and well in
work places around the United States. Even after the
despicable behavior of Texaco executives was revealed to
the public, we find even worse discrimination at another
oil company."
Eight management and union employees at
Crown's Pasadena, and Tyler, Texas refineries have filed
a race and gender class action lawsuit against the
company. The suit alleges that Crown created a hostile
working environment by allowing racist and sexist
materials to be circulated and posted throughout the
refinery.
Wages' statement in support of the
plaintiffs continued:
"Crown and other companies in the energy
and chemical industries that OCAW deals with every day
routinely exhibit the most callous disregard toward all
their employees, including minority and female workers --
locking out workers and putting at risk their health and
safety, and that of their communities, through downsizing
and contracting out work to inexperienced and ill-trained
temporary workers -- all driven by the relentless pursuit
of short-term profits. So we aren't exactly shocked to
hear about companies, like Crown, harboring racist and
sexist attitudes."
Wages said, "As a union, we will not
stand silent in the face of outrageous practices by Crown
and others who use racist practices to divide and harass
workers. We supported the workers at Texaco in their
fight to win a record $176 million settlement, and we
will support similar efforts until all discriminatory
practices are erased from the industry."
He added, "Crown's behavior in denying
the claims of the plaintiffs in the Federal Court
lawsuit, Burrell vs. Crown, is similar to that of
Texaco's managers who denied the legitimate claims of
their workers for more than three years until the
recording of top managers at Texaco surfaced and revealed
to the public their plot to deny legitimate claims. After
the recording was exposed in the media, and a national
boycott of Texaco was threatened by civil rights leaders,
Texaco reached a hasty settlement with the plaintiffs in
that case.
"Since the Texaco case," said Cyrus Mehri,
a Washington, D.C.-based attorney who represents
workers in both the Texaco and Crown cases, "we have
examined literally dozens of potential cases, and we
found Crown to have the most abhorrent and hostile work
place for women and African-Americans." According to
Mehri, the workers at Crown had to work beside a variety
of offensive leaflets which were posted on company
bulletin boards, including handbills ridiculing Jesse
Jackson, and sexually explicit cartoons.
Wages concluded his statement saying,
"OCAW will continue to fight against racism, sexism and
all forms of bigotry wherever they exist, and will
continue to fight for job and economic security for all
workers."
==================================================================
PRESS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
For immediate release: July 10, 1997
CONTACT: Joe Drexler, (303) 987-2229
President of Oil Workers' Union Tells Unocal 'Outside'
Board Members to Take Stand Against Burma's Dictatorship
Unocal Board Members from Amgen, Mattel, Northwestern
Univ. and University of Michigan to Start Feeling Pressure
In letters written to four non-management or outside
board members of Unocal Corp., Robert Wages, president of
the 90,000-member Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers
International Union (OCAW), calls on them to "take a
public stand against Unocal's presence in Burma and to
work with other outside board members to bring about a
change in Unocal's policy." He added in the letters that
"anything short of Unocal pulling out of Burma should
prompt you to resign from Unocal's board."
According to OCAW Special Projects Director Joe
Drexler, "The letters were Mitten to specific Unocal
board members who are particularly vulnerable to being
associated with slave and forced child labor, heroin
trafficking, brutal political suppression, murder and
rape of the civilian population, and other crimes in
Burma."
In a letter to Kevin W. Sharer, president of Amgen
Inc., based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., Wages said that
Sharer, as president of a company "engaged primarily in
the development and sales of products to sustain life,"
should ensure that Unocal's activities are carried out in
a manner that recognizes "the sanctity of human life" and
that Amgen's image will be damaged by being linked
through Unocal to drug money-laundering and the illegal
sale of drugs.
Wages also wrote John Amerman, chairman of Mattel
Inc., headquartered along with Unocal in El Segundo,
Calif., to remind him that as a major producer of
children's toys he should make sure that Unocal's
policies will not harm children.
Wages' letter to Donald Jacobs, dean of J.L. Kellogg
Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University,
cites Jacobs' role as an educator and notes his "special
responsibility to ensure that Unocal's activities are
carried out ethically and to set an example to your
students." The letter further states that Jacobs'
association with Unocal will "taint your professional
reputation and that of the Kellogg Graduate School of
Management." A similar letter was written to Marina
Whitman, Professor of Business Administration and Public
Policy at the University of Michigan.
Wages in his letters also reminded the Unocal board
members that "the precedent set at Nuremberg means that
corporate officers can be held responsible for crimes
against humanity." He refers in the letter to Burma as
"the concentration camp known as Myanmar," the name given
to Burma by the military dictatorship.
"We fully expect that these directors and their
companies and institutions will become targets of the
campaign to force Unocal out of Burma until democracy is
restored," said Drexler. "We are giving them a chance to
speak out independently of Unocal management and against
the company's involvement in Burma."
Wages has been one of the most outspoken critics of
oil company and multinational corporate support for
Burma's military dictatorship and led the charge among
U.S. labor leaders in calling on the Clinton
Administration to impose economic sanctions on Burma. He
has repeatedly criticized oil companies for downsizing
U.S. operations and selling assets to raise capital for
investments in countries governed by ruthless
dictatorships. The downsizings and sales of assets to
so-called low-cost oil refiners, according to Wages, has
not only cost U.S. workers good-paying jobs but has also
severely compromised worker and community safety.
Unocal and French-owned Total SA are partners in the
Yadana pipeline project, which is the single largest
source of outside investment in Burma today. According to
the U.S. State Department, Burma's military dictatorship
derives its major revenue from the sale and production of
heroin, much of which ends up on U.S. streets.
==================================================================
PRESS RELEASE NEWS RELEASE/ ALERT
OIL, CHEMICAL & ATOMIC WORKERS INTL. UNION, AFL-CIO
Contact: RODNEY ROGERS Publicity Director 303-987-2229
Home:303-329-8652 FAX:303-987-1967
Shell Chemical Explosion in Deer Park, Texas Refinery
Workers Call on Congress to Fund Chemical Safety Board
U.S. House Members Join in the Call to Fund the Board
Lakewood, CO--Robert E. Wages, President of the
Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers International Union (OCAW)
today issued the following statement on the June 22, 1997
explosion and fire at the Shell Chemical plant in Deer
Park, Texas.
An explosion and resulting fire in the olefins unit
at the Shell Chemical plant located along the Houston
Ship Channel caused major damage to the production unit,
rocked the homes of nearby neighbors and shattered
windows at businesses near the refinery. The blast was
felt for miles away. Fortunately, no one was killed,
although one worker was sent to the hospital. Plant
workers heard the vapor cloud release and took immediate
action by running for their lives. They had between 20
seconds and one minute, depending on who you ask, to
find shelter to escape the fire ball. Several workers
found shelter in the control room, which is reportedly
designed to withstand the shock.
Obviously, this explosion had the potential to take
lives and maim workers. Its force was tremendous. The
question is whether and how the government ought to
respond. Although OSHA and EPA are investigating, and
perhaps they will find violations of rules or
regulation, we doubt anything they can accomplish will
reduce the chance of another comparable explosion at
Shell or anywhere else.
The Shell explosion follows closely on the heels of
a Tosco refinery explosion earlier this year and further
underscores the need for the CSHIB.
The solution is for Congress to fund the Chemical
Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSHIB) which was
mandated by the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990.
The CSHIB is an expert, independent, non-regulatory
body charged with responsibility to investigate the root
cause of chemical accidents and explosions, and make
recommendations to government and industry on ways to
prevent them in the future. Modeled after the respected
National Transportation Board, its findings cannot be
used in litigation or by enforcement personnel. CSHIB
was terminated by the Clinton Administration in 1995.
Led by Congressman George Miller (D-CA), Jon Fox
(R-PA), Bob Wise D-WV) and Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY),
members of the House of Representatives are now seeking
to appropriate the funds for FY 98 so that the CSHIB may
be constituted and begin its work. Markups of the various
bills begins this week.
It's time for the Clinton Administration to get
out of the way and let Congress begin the job of
protecting workers and communities from these
catastrophes.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Important - Alert - Important
Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union
July 22, 1997
Preliminary observations made during the investigation of
the Shell Deer Park refinery explosion indicate that a
certain type of check valve might fail under certain
conditions.
The suspect valve is a 36" CLOW TRI CENTRIC air assisted
check valve with an external two piece valve stem. This
valve contains a single dowel pin that holds the two
piece valve stem together. In the Shell explosion, it is
suspected that the failure of this dowel pin may have led
to a "stem blow out" resulting in a release to the
atmosphere. The valve stem has a diameter of 3.75" (see
attached diagram).
