By HEATHER BAUGHMAN
baughman@crescent-news.com
A four-year contract between General Motors and United Auto Workers at the Defiance GM Powertrain plant has been ratified, paving the way for new work opportunities locally.
On Tuesday morning, the vote was tallied for the new contract and 63 percent of the UAW membership who voted supported the agreement, which provides security to plant workers over the next four years.
While the national contract, which was approved last September, dealt with wages, benefits and retirement, the local contract assures workers "security to get work in-house and job security," said Defiance UAW shop committee chairman Grant Muncy.
Negotiations for the contract went on for months as questions from the membership were answered by International UAW officials in Detroit.
"We spent a lot of hours negotiating," UAW Local 211 president Dwight Chatham said Tuesday afternoon, just hours after the membership vote was counted and announcements were made in-house.
"Both sides laid things on the table" during negotiations, Chatham said, with well over half of the membership voting in favor of the final contract.
Chatham and Muncy said this is a competitive operating agreement that has positioned the plant for new work and secured the future for workers and the plant.
"There were some exciting new opportunities identified during negotiations," said Muncy, "that we hope to announce in the near future."