From: Curtis Price <cansv-AT-igc.apc.org>
Date:          Sat, 9 Aug 1997 11:34:12 +0000
Subject: AUT: (Fwd) Tanned, rowdy and ready, strikers run the picket line


------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
Date:          Fri, 8 Aug 1997 02:19:32 -0700
From:          NewsHound <NewsHound-AT-hound.com>

Reply-to:      NewsHound-AT-hound.com
Subject:       Tanned, rowdy and ready, strikers run the picket line



NewsHound article from "STRIKES" hound, score "77."



Tanned, rowdy and ready, strikers run the picket lineBY JON MARCUS
Associated Press Writer


SOMERVILLE, Mass. (AP) -- At most United Parcel Service plants,
>>striking<< >>workers<< walk a picket line. Outside this one, they run.

Strikers display a rowdy level of enthusiasm that's led to more arrests
than at any other UPS plant since the Teamsters walked out Monday.
Defiantly smoking cigars and loudly mocking managers inside, they say they
are part of a resurgence in a union movement deeply rooted in this
blue-collar city.

``This is it. We're ground zero,'' said Bill Carrabino, a 28-year veteran
UPS driver. ``We have solidarity here like no other building.''

Since Monday, 23 pickets have been arrested in Somerville for trying to
block delivery trucks from leaving the building.

The same union local represents UPS >>workers<< in Chelmsford, Norwood and
Watertown, where more than a dozen other >>workers<< were arrested. More
arrests could come as the >>strike<< continues; bargainers met for more
than 10 hours Thursday in Washington without any apparent concessions on
either side.

Hours after the familiar brown trucks leave, the strikers in Somerville
play catch with a tattered tennis ball as they circle to the beat of rock
'n' roll music blaring from the speakers of a Teamsters tractor-trailer.

``We don't care about anyone else,'' said Carrabino, who was arrested
Monday. ``This is our building. We have union spirit.''

About 150 Teamsters drivers, sorters and pre-loaders work in the
comparatively small facility, and say they're tighter than at most larger
UPS plants.

``They're worried about their families, they're worried about their
children. The cause is right. The energy is there,'' said John Flueckiger,
a 24-year driver who was arrested Tuesday.

When a sedan with UPS administrators inside tries to leave the gated
parking lot, police and strikers set down their cold drinks and face off
smartly, taking their places in two lines like well-drilled military units.

The picketers hurl insults at the people in the car while other managers
watch furtively from second-story windows.

Flueckiger said it isn't really anger in their voices; It's frustration
born of union setbacks that began with the firing of >>striking<< air
traffic controllers by President Reagan in the 1980s.

``When the rest of the unions didn't come to the aid of the air traffic
controllers, that was a sad day,'' he said.

Somerville has a legacy both of rebellion and of industry. The UPS plant is
near the site of a Revolutionary War fort. Beginning in the mid-19th
century, the city was a center of brickmaking and later home to a Ford
Motor Co. production plant.

Much of the strikers' daily diet of doughnuts, pizza and coffee has been
donated by small business owners, civic groups and other unions sympathetic
to them. Even the loud music from the Teamsters truck is often drowned out
when passing trucks sound their air horns in support.

The growing duration of the tedious >>strike<< is evident only in the
picketers' hoarse voices and their sunburns, and in the piles of discarded
cups and newspapers. Their resolve, they said, continues unabated.

``I thought this would be easier than work,'' said picket Jim Neary as he
took a break in the shade. ``I've never been so sore.''



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