The Inter-Mountain photo by Haley Gordon From left, Kathy Mahoney, Scott Russ and George Studer, employees of AHF Products in Beverly, confer at the West Virginia Wood Technology Center in Elkins Friday. Each is a 20-year veteran at the plant and are part of the negotiations committee taking part in the negotiating process between AHF and Teamsters Local 175.

The Inter-Mountain photo by Haley Gordon
From left, Kathy Mahoney, Scott Russ and George Studer, employees of AHF Products in Beverly, confer at the West Virginia Wood Technology Center in Elkins Friday. Each is a 20-year veteran at the plant and are part of the negotiations committee taking part in the negotiating process between AHF and Teamsters Local 175.

ELKINS — Teamsters Local 175, the union group representing approximately 500 employees of the AHF Products hardwood plant in Beverly, is urging employees to vote against the upcoming contract renewal on Sunday.

Teamsters officials also announced they will be filing unfair labor practice charges against AHF with the National Labor Relations Board, said Ken Hall, president of the local chapter and general secretary-treasurer for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

AHF, a subsidiary of American Industrial Partners, has a current contract with employees that expires today. In an attempt to negotiate a new three-year contract, the Teamsters and the negotiations committee, which includes several Beverly plant employees, said they met resistance when trying to meet with AHF representatives earlier this year.

“(The employees) have more knowledge of what’s going on at that plant so they are much better equipped to tell us what they need,” Hall said about the committee. “They drive the process. They decide ultimately what we close and what we don’t. Our job is to listen to their ideas and put them into forms and proposals and give advice on what we see.”

As of Friday, AHF had proposed various changes to the previous employee contract.

“In (an AHF) meeting, they gave them the highlight,s like wage increase and a lump sum bonus, but they didn’t tell them the truth about some other proposals they have on the table,” said Hall.

The lump sum AHF proposed in the new contract is in the amount of $1,100 for each employee, but the contract also includes other stipulations, such as a 92% increase in health insurance costs over the next three years, and an elimination of pension benefits,.

“They told the employees in today’s meetings that there would be a small increase in contributions (to health insurance) to employees. The fact is, based on their own proposals that we have here, they have proposed up to a 44% increase in one year,” Hall said. “They have admitted, across the table, that the company had no increases in 2019. In fact, they had a small decrease in how much they paid.”

AHF was contacted by The Inter-Mountain for this story, but did not return phone calls as of presstime.

Hall also said the Teamsters have offered to provide insurance and medical care to AHF employees at no additional cost to the current plan.

“If we are the provider of their insurance, we intend to open a clinic in Elkins that would be there to service our members, both at AHF and our existing UPS members. (…) If somebody’s got an acute illness, (the clinic would) work them in that day,” he explained.

Hall said AHF’s behavior during the negotiating process has been “disgusting” and shows “disrespect” to the employees.

“In doing this for more than 33 years, I have never seen a company behave like this,” Hall said.

In a press release, he stated that the company has disrespected the committee elected by the membership by “dealing directly with the employees, spreading half truths and threatening to replace all employees.”

“It has been apparent from the very beginning this company never intended to reach an agreement. It’s disgusting to see the disrespect this company has shown its own employees during this process. In my 33 years of negotiating contracts, for a company to meet directly with employees before negotiations have finished is unprecedented,” he said in the release.

On Friday afternoon, Hall told The Inter-Mountain, “Despite the fact that we were scheduled to have a full day of negotiations today, the company came in and gave us a final offer. They didn’t give it to us in any kind of final offer form but essentially said, ‘We’re not moving any farther than where we’re at,’ which would be consistent with what they told employees when they met directly with them at the plant this morning.”

“As a result of that, we will be recommending to our members that they reject the contract and in addition we will today file unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board for, among other things, their presenting a final offer to the membership directly before submitting it to the authorized negotiating committee,” Hall said. “We expect our members to overwhelmingly reject this offer on Sunday.”

The final vote will take place at 1 p.m. Sunday at Elkins High School and is closed to the public.

American Industrial Partners purchased the hardwood flooring business from Armstrong Flooring in November 2018.

Federal, state and local officials attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony in November at the AHF Products plant, formerly known as Armstrong Flooring, to honor the new 85,000-square foot expansion of the Beverly facility. The expansion is expected to add up to 50 new jobs to the plant.