“Now that we’re on strike the company will throw everything it has at us, but we’re standing up no matter how long it takes,” said Bob Campbell, president of CWA Local 3176 in Ocala, Florida.

“This is the first Florida strike against Sprint ever,” Jamie Bryant, a picket line captain here told the Militant. “The major issues are company demands for Sunday pay at straight time, reduced health-care benefits, and removing the cap we have to pay on insurance. As it is some of the insurance choices don’t have hospital service where a lot of us live.” The company also wants to contract out work, cut disability benefits, and weaken seniority rights.

“The engineers’ hands are tied because they [the company] won’t spend the money on upkeep” for local service, added Bryant. “They don’t have a maintenance program, but it’s needed desperately to support the increased technology on the older copper cables.”

“Now that Sprint has merged with Nextel, it’s planning to spin off local phone service and walk away from rural America,” explained a union flyer pickets handed out to drivers in cars passing by. “But not before it tries to squeeze millions more in contract concessions from its employees.” The total customer base for Sprint is 7.5 million, mostly in rural areas.

The company has 2.1 million Florida landline customers, with a service area that includes portions of Osceola, Orange, and Seminole counties. A CWA news release points out that local service is the most profitable segment of the entire company and that it siphoned off $8.7 billion in earnings from 1998 to 2003, using the money to invest in expansion of its wireless and data networks. Sprint Nextel is the country’s third-largest wireless company.

The Sprint bargaining unit here covers about 500 workers, and 55 percent are in the union, pickets reported. “About 20 have joined the union since the strike started, and only a few have gone back to work,” said Bryant. There was little hiring for a decade until last year, when the company hired about 100 new workers, so the majority of the workforce has 10-20 years seniority, he added. Few of the newly hired have joined the union. New employees receive about $10 an hour compared to $20-plus earned by higher-seniority workers, and fewer benefits.  
 
 
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