Forced into financial hardship by a 16-month-long lockout that halved their ranks, American Crystal Sugar workers plan to vote next week on a labor contract that's changed little from management's initial offering.
Many workers are eager for a steady paycheck as winter approaches, ending the seasonal factory or farming jobs they've relied on since the lockout started Aug. 1, 2011, said Gayln Olson, a sugar boiler and union leader. Workers plan to vote Dec. 1.
"People are giving up," said Jeannie Madsen, who worked in the Moorhead company's lab and is engaged to Olson. "People are losing everything. People just want their jobs back."
When workers first rejected the contract last year they numbered roughly 1,300, but about half have retired or quit as two dozen meetings between the union and American Crystal Sugar representatives went nowhere. The union has three times rejected the contract because of health care cuts and changes to the role seniority would play in promotions, among other concerns.
The decision to vote a fourth time came as pressure mounted within the ranks and after a Nov. 15 meeting between both sides. Olson said workers are struggling between fighting for their rights and meeting their families' basic needs.
"There are a lot of people who didn't want to vote" next week, Olson said. "It's a toss-up situation. I don't know how the vote's going to go, to be honest with you."
The last vote was in June, when 63 percent of the membership rejected the contract. At least 90 percent of workers rejected it in two votes in 2011.
The company is the nation's largest beet sugar producer and operates five plants in the Red River Valley, two in North Dakota and three in Minnesota. About 90 percent of its production weight is sold to industrial users, including confectioners, bakeries and breakfast cereal manufacturers.
