Strike Looms At Local Grocery Stores

Thousands of Southern California grocery workers have voted to reject a health care proposal from major supermarket chains and authorize their union leaders to call a strike, the Associated Press reports.

“More than 90 percent of voters from the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 770, which has about 62,000 members, rejected the proposal from Vons, Ralphs and Albertsons stores,” according to the Associated Press.

If a deal is not reached within 72 hours, union officials are expected to call a strike.

More talks are scheduled Monday.

A four-month strike and lockout that began in 2003 cost Ralphs and other grocery chains an estimated $2 billion, the Associated Press reports.

Messages left by the Associated Press for grocery store representatives were not immediately returned, but Ralphs Grocery Co. spokeswoman Kendra Doyel previously told the news organization that her chain is committed to staying at the table to negotiate, and the grocers' proposal was affordable and good for employees and their families.

Union members have been working without a contract since March.

Both sides announced last month that they had reached a tentative agreement on the employers' contributions to pension benefits, but health care costs have been a major sticking point, the Associated Press reports.

Ralphs currently pays more than 90 percent of employee health coverage costs, Doyel told the Associated Press. Workers hired before 2004 pay nothing for health insurance while those hired later pay either $7 a week for single coverage or $15 a week for family coverage, she said.

The companies' proposal would raise that to $9 a week for singles and $23 a week for families. That is much lower than the average cost of health care insurance in California, she said.

Lake Elsinore and Wildomar each have an location, and a store is also located in Lake Elsinore.