Published: May 08, 2008 11:42 pm         

NLRB wants to force Massey to hire union workers at Spartan Mining

The National Labor Relations Board began making its case Thursday that coal operator Massey Energy Co. should be required to rehire 85 union workers at a West Virginia mine.

The NLRB wants an injunction that also would require Richmond, Va.-based Massey to recognize and negotiate with the United Mine Workers union at the eastern Kanawha County mine operated by subsidiary Spartan Mining.

The NLRB contends miners who lost jobs when Massey bought the mine from Horizon in 2004 will suffer additional harm without an injunction enforcing an administrative law judge’s decision that the company violated federal labor law by refusing to rehire union workers.

Massey contends former employees weren’t hired because better replacements were found. It also says it didn’t have to bargain with the UMW because the subsidiary that acquired the mine wasn’t a legal successor to Horizon.

NLRB lawyer Jonathan D. Duffey called the 85 employees “casualties” of Massey’s war against the UMW. Remedies such as rehiring and requiring bargaining “are going to be rendered meaningless by the passage of time,” Duffey told U.S. District Judge Robert Goodwin during the hearing, which is scheduled to resume Friday morning.

Spartan lawyer Forrest Roles countered that most of the harm to the former employees already has occurred, leaving Goodwin no reason to issue an injunction before the NLRB reaches a final decision.

Roles also argued an injunction would harm current employees by cutting their wages, pension benefits and 401(k) retirement matches.

William “Bolts” Willis, president of the UMW local representing workers at the mine, testified that many employees have since retired, taken other jobs, moved out of state and even died. He also testified that more than 200 workers who lost their jobs in 2004 would have returned at the time. Today, he says more than 60 are willing to go back.

Massey, the nation’s fourth-largest coal producer by revenue, largely rid itself of the union in the 1980s. Today, about 110, or 2 percent, of the company’s 5,400 workers are represented by the UMW. All work at one smaller surface mine or six prep plants that handle 28 percent of Massey’s coal.