Workers at Georgia school bus maker Blue Bird approve their first union contract
FORT VALLEY, Ga. — A year after voting to unionize, workers at a Georgia school bus manufacturer have approved their first contract.
The United Steelworkers union and Blue Bird Corp. said union members at Blue Bird’s assembly plants and warehouse in Fort Valley voted to sign a three-year contract between the company and the union.
The union said the contract will give all 1,500 covered employees a pay increase of at least 12%, with some of the lowest-paid workers receiving a raise of more than 40%. The union says the company will contribute to a pension plan for employees, share profits and improve health and safety.
The negotiations have been closely watched by President Joe Biden’s administration, in part because Blue Bird has received $40 million in federal aid to build electric school buses.
Biden released a statement Thursday saying acting Labor Secretary Julie Su had helped bring negotiations to a successful agreement. Contract negotiations after an initial union vote are often difficult.
“Congratulations to the members of the United Steelworkers and to Blue Bird for once again proving that meeting our clean energy goals is an opportunity to create good-paying union jobs for American workers,” Biden said.
Blue Bird is one of three major school bus manufacturers in the United States, along with Thomas Built Buses, a subsidiary of Daimler Truck AG, and IC Bus, a part of Navistar International.
Blue Bird had urged employees to reject unionization last year, but CEO Phil Horlock said in a statement Friday that the contract discussions were “highly collaborative” and that the company “looks forward to a strong partnership with our USW team members.” The company said higher wages, benefits and career development opportunities will help Blue Bird attract employees.
“We have reached an agreement that will deliver positive results for all parties involved and will continue to drive our One Team high performance culture,” said Horlock. “We are confident that the agreement will further strengthen Blue Bird’s position as an employer of choice in the region.”
Blue Bird is a publicly traded company based in Macon. With a total of about 2,000 employees, it has long been the largest private employer in Peach County.
The vote for the USW was a remarkable victory for organized labor in the traditionally unfriendly Deep South.
“Federal investments like this must come with a seat at the table for workers,” Dan Flippo, director of United Steelworkers District 9, said in a statement. “Our union has a long history in the South of fighting for better wages and working conditions in a variety of industries, but for too long corporations and their political proxies have tried to characterize the South as a place where they could walk away from unions. cutbacks and pay employees less.”
The share of workers nationally who are unionized has been declining for decades, falling to 10% last year, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. And private sector workers are much less likely to belong to a union, with only 6% paying dues.
Organized labor makes up an even smaller share of Georgian workers, with only 4.4% of workers belonging to a union. The state’s business leaders have long been hostile to unions. Republican Governor Brian Kemp pushed through a law this year that would ban companies from using state incentives to recognize unions without formal secret ballot elections.