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Second Straight Win at New Mexico Utility

May 6, 2008

The IBEW has racked up another organizing win at Public Service New Mexico. In late April, meter readers and collectors voted 74 to 8 for IBEW representation in the fourth National Labor Relations Board election since 1999. The unit joins 260 gas workers who voted for a voice on the job with the IBEW a few weeks earlier.

“The meter readers and collectors actually kicked off both recent campaigns,” says Lead Organizer Craig Parkman.  They were forced into a later vote after the company, which has been sold to Continental Energy, contested their inclusion the first election because they perform functions in both gas and electric departments.

“I was one of the guys who tried, but failed to get a union in here back in 2001,” says Bert Perea, a collector, who has spent 10 years collecting past-due bills, or turning off power to customers on 21 routes in the Albuquerque area.  Perea’s father-in-law is a journeyman electrician in the meter department who joined an IBEW bargaining unit, Albuquerque Local 611, years ago. “I knew the union was for us, because I never heard him complain about his job,” he says.

Parkman is expecting uncertainties over job security to push more workers to seek representation.  Continental first said that all workers would be retained after the sale, which is still pending before state utility commissioners. A subsequent e-mail from their new employer has them worried about the strength of that pledge.

The company opposed the union campaign by making exaggerated claims about union dues and holding frequent captive audience meetings.  “Looking at the overwhelming vote, they obviously didn’t do enough to discourage us,” says Perea.