Tension is rising at telephone-equipment company Avaya’s two metro Denver offices as about 700 union workers in Colorado prepare for a potential national strike when their contract expires May 27.
A dozen workers walked an informational picket line Thursday morning at the company’s Highlands Ranch campus off C-470 and Lucent Boulevard.
At the Westminster campus, employees held signs saying “It’s all about jobs” during their work breaks Thursday, said Dave Minshall, a Communications Workers of America Local 7777 union spokesman.
Union workers want a job-security clause in their new contract because they believe the company wants to send their jobs overseas. Avaya spokesman Scott Horne said Thursday, “There is no plan to do that.”
Avaya has about 2,800 CWA union employees working at Avaya offices around the country, with the highest number in Colorado, said Suzie Miller, CWA Local 7777 president in Englewood.
Avaya laid off about 80 workers in Denver in February and March.
“The company is pushing us to go out on strike. We don’t want to,” said Brook Harned, a call- center technician at the Highlands Ranch office whose husband is also an Avaya employee. “I’m afraid of it.”
Workers will find out today if an earlier vote for a strike authorization was approved, Minshall said. Such a vote is often used as a negotiating tactic, he said.
“I voted to strike. I’m very much supportive of protecting my job and benefits and the way of life I’ve grown accustomed to,” said John McKinney, a systems-support specialist from Littleton who works at the Highlands Ranch office.
“They’re outsourcing all our jobs overseas,” said Dawn Barraco, a union organizer who said she has worked for Avaya and its predecessors, Lucent Technologies and AT&T, for more than 25 years.
“If provoked, we will strike,” said Barraco. “The strategy is to get a contract.”
Miller said contract negotiations going on in Washington, D.C., “have pretty much fallen apart” on the job-security issue.
CWA union workers at other companies such as Denver- based telecommunication company Qwest have job-security clauses in their contracts, Miller said.
Avaya’s Horne declined to say how negotiations are going.
“We’re at the table and having negotiations, and we plan to conclude and reach an agreement,” Horne said.
About 300 International Brotherhood of Electric Workers around the country – but none in Denver – also are negotiating a new contract for May 27.
Avaya has a total of about 2,500 workers in Colorado, including nonunion research-and- development workers, software engineers and managers, Horne said. Union workers do technical support and install and repair equipment.
Staff writer Beth Potter can be reached at 303-820-1503 or bpotter@denverpost.com.
