Published: May 09, 2008 09:14 pm         

Our Readers Speak - Saturday, May 10, 2008

Prevailing wage jobs are negotiated, fair



I just read an article “Being Open for Business Vs. Open for Favors” by Father Thomas S. Acker. Mr. Acker does not understand everything about prevailing wage jobs and organized labor.

First, Jesus was a carpenter, and I am sure he would have been on the side of organized labor. Who in the world would want to be an exploited worker, or suppress a worker’s wages? That is how unions got started, to protect workers’ rights, and stand up for the weak and defenseless.

Second, our prevailing wages are negotiated and fair. Nonunion companies use our rates to negotiate their wages. The only difference is a substandard wage and benefits for their employees, while the companies reap the benefits.

Mr. Acker, it is my opinion you are a wolf in sheep’s clothing for the working men and women of this state (union and nonunion). When I go to work for a contractor, I already know what the pay scale and benefits are. I want to make the contractor money in return for a fair day’s pay. Union labor is most of all about fairness between employers and employees.

Third, I am a union ironworker and the wage rates you addressed for electricians and ironworkers were based on annual income. Most of the heavy highway jobs I have been on last only two or three months. I was lucky enough to work on the federal building in Beckley. I was employed by three different contractors for a total of 15 months. When the building was done, so was my pay. That little bit of time that the union craftsmen spent to provide that building will support the wages and benefits of every worker in that building for many years to come.



Teddy J. Dixon

Glen Daniel



Strip mine jobs are temporary, destructive



Mr. Hudson’s letter published in this paper on March 16 was pure old rotten bologna.

As a disabled underground miner, I am outraged that Hudson stated that we “real” miners butchered the land. Has he no eyes to see what he has done to God’s mountains and creation? Or does he think that we can’t see the destruction for the rotten bologna?

Open up your eyes and stop spreading poison and misinformation. The real enemy is the out-of-state coal companies that are raping the land and the people. In fact, these coal companies have stolen even the spines of some workers and residents. You all should get your spine back and stop blasting and poisoning your own neighbors.

It is reasonable to call someone an enemy if they blast and poison people. It isn’t the environmental groups that are poisoning and blasting us; it is the coal companies and their puppets and shills. In the late 1800s, a hated robber baron named Jay Gould once said that he “could pay one half the working class to kill the other half of the working class.” With letters like Hudson’s I can see why Gould thought that he could buy people’s souls.

Strip mine jobs are temporary, destructive jobs. They destroy one mountain, stream and community and then move to the next to destroy, blasting and poisoning their neighbors as they go. Soon you will run out of mountains with coal and your legacy will be that of total destruction.



Chuck Nelson

Glen Daniel