ST. LOUIS --- The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local No. 1 and the St. Louis Chapter, National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) approved a new three-year contract with changes to heighten productivity, enhance competitiveness and strengthen industry entrepreneurship. The agreement affects the 3,700 construction members of IBEW Local No. 1 employed by 100 contractors represented by NECA. It covers all St. Louis area union electrical construction and 26 Missouri counties, stretching from the northern border of Lincoln County south to the Arkansas border. The contract was approved one week prior to its June 1 expiration.

“We began our negotiations with a mutual commitment to work together to maximize productivity for the owners who buy our services,” said Stephen P. Schoemehl, business manager of IBEW Local No. 1. “With change comes challenge, but we recognized opportunities to expand our market penetration and bring quality construction to more buyers by revising and amending some of our long-standing practices.”

Douglas R. Martin, executive vice president of the St. Louis Chapter, NECA, added, “Our joint efforts to remain competitive while protecting our workforce’s standard of living made these our toughest negotiations in years. We succeeded by finding ways to boost productivity, expand competitiveness and enhance the value we bring to our customers.”

Wage & Benefit Details
The contract limits wage and benefit increases to an average of 3.1 percent annually. “Our compensation package is competitive, comparing favorably with construction industry settlements for other crafts in the St. Louis area and with NECA-IBEW contracts throughout the Midwest,” Martin said. Many Midwest construction industry settlements within the last year have averaged 4 to 4.5 percent annually, fueled by escalating health insurance costs, pension funding concerns and skyrocketing fuel costs.

Advancing Minority Contractors and Entrepreneurs
The new contract offers supervisory mentor provisions to advance development of qualified jobsite supervisors among disadvantaged, minority and women-owned electrical contractors (DBE firms). The new terms were developed in collaboration with NECA-IBEW minority-owned contractors and community officials leading construction contracting compliance efforts aimed at strengthening diversity. In a move aimed at expanding the number of new union minority and service contractors, the contract allows formation of one-person firms. New working contractors are granted a nine-month incubation period before they incur the obligation of paying full wage and benefit costs for time spent in the office instead of the jobsite.

New Terms Enhance Competitiveness
IBEW and NECA made more than a dozen other significant contract changes to enhance the productivity and cost effectiveness of union electricians, with special provisions aimed at recapturing market share in the public sector and on multi-tenant residential projects, including hotels and dormitories.

• Competitive Prevailing Wage terms for public projects.
• Expanded Residential Wireman Apprenticeship – from 6,000 hours to 8,000 hours.
• Expanded Residential Scope of Work so work on structures built for residents can be built at 90 percent of the journeyman electrician rate, including hotels, dormitories, nursing homes and condos.
• Greater Workforce Development and Training to recruit and train apprentices and use new workers to reduce crew costs.
• Lower Healthcare Costs, lowering health and welfare premium rates by 20 percent for entry level workers for the first 2,000 hours of work.
• More Flexible Work Day and Week, allowing early starting time of 6 a.m. and work weeks of four 10-hour days, Monday through Thursday, when all crafts are similarly scheduled.
• Unrestricted Purchasing of Materials, removing prior restrictions on the purchase of preassembled and custom materials.
• Material Delivery rule change so construction electricians are no longer disrupted from work to pick up deliveries at the curb.
• Lower Fringe Benefits, reducing benefit costs on work earning double-time wages (weekends and work days exceeding 12 hours) to match those paid for work earning one-and-a-half times the straight time rate.

Safety Incentive Brings OSHA 30-Hour Certification to Full Workforce by 2008
The area’s union electrical industry affirmed its safety commitment, beginning in 2006, by funding incentives to ensure accelerated completion of OSHA 30-hour certification by its entire workforce. OSHA 30-Hour certification is the gold standard for safety training.

Local electrical and communication members of IBEW have already exceeded construction industry expectations for safety training, with more than 2,700 – or 73 percent – achieving OSHA 10-hour certification. OSHA 30-hour classes are filled through late September 2007. The OSHA 10- and 30-hour classes will continue to be offered throughout 2007 and 2008 as part of the Electrical Industry Training Center’s extensive continuing education program. About 2,200 of the 2,700 IBEW members receiving the initial OSHA 10-hour certification have also completed the OSHA 30-hour class. In addition to saving lives, research by the Associated General Contractors of America shows that contractors with OSHA-trained and -certified workers have achieved up to a 66 percent drop in lost-time injuries.

Rather than waiting years to achieve voluntary training goals, NECA and IBEW Local No. 1 accelerated training by funding payments of $500 to every IBEW electrician earning OSHA 30 certification, for a total industry investment of about $1.5 million. Dennis Gralike, director of the St. Louis Electrical Industry Training Center, said the union electrical construction industry for Eastern Missouri is on track to achieve 100 percent OSHA 30 certification by spring 2008.

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