Senior U.S. District Judge Stephen M. McNamee issued a decision last week to enforce an arbitrator’s award that ASARCO must pay a negotiated quarterly bonus based on the price of copper to the hundreds of employees hired after June 30, 2011. The company had denied the benefit and with this ruling the company will be forced to pay the bonuses.
The award is estimated to be worth more than $10 million. The unions represent 2000 workers at five ASARCO locations in Arizona and Texas won the arbitration in December 2014.
The Region 28, National Labor Relations Board issued a fourth consolidated complaint against the company for unfair labor practices. Those complaints include unlawfully implementing portions of it’s “last, best and final” contract proposal.
At press time there were no comments from the company on the expected pay outs of the bonuses or other complaints made against ASARCO to the NLRB.