A tentative contract agreement was reached last night (Wednesday) to avert a potential United Steelworkers strike at one of the Quad Cities’ largest employers. John Riches, spokesman for aluminum maker Alcoa, says the contract covers nine-thousand workers at 15 Alcoa plants, including 16-hundred workers at the Riverdale plant, just outside Davenport.
Riches says the local unions in Riverdale and at the 14 other locations will be scheduling informational meetings and ratification votes over the next week. Details of the new four-year contract have not been released to the public. The tentative deal was reached after a meeting that began around 10:15 Wednesday night and Riches says the previous contract would have expired at midnight.
Riches says everyone worked hard and came right down to the wire and came within an hour and a half of the deadline and finally got an agreement. Another Alcoa spokesman says the proposed contract has a competitive wage and benefits package, a new health care plan and a new pay-for-performance program. The last strike at the Davenport Works was in 1986.