Class & Collective Action Lawsuit Filed
Allegheny Technologies, Inc., & Strom Engineering Corporation
Kehoe Law Firm, P.C. and co-counsel have filed a class and collective action lawsuit against Allegheny Technologies, Inc. (“ATI”) and Strom Engineering Corporation (“STROM”) on behalf of replacement workers who worked for these companies between August 2015 and March 2016.
The complaint claims that Strom and ATI violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) by not paying its employees for their time spent being transported to and across picket lines in front of ATI facilities.
To review a copy of the ATI and Strom Complaint, filed on July 10, 2017, please click here: Filed Complaint ATI and Strom 7.10.17
Lockout Of Approximately 2,200 Employees
ATI, a publicly-traded corporation, manufactures and supplies specialty metals-including steel and other types of materials-for its customers worldwide. On August 15, 2015, ATI instituted a lockout of approximately 2,200 employees, all of whom are covered by various collective bargaining agreements (“CBAs”) with the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, AFL-CIO, CLC (“USW”).
ATI & USW Contract Dispute & Strom’s Temporary Workforce
The lockout occurred due to a contract dispute between ATI and USW. In response to the lockout, the USW mobilized its members to protest ATI’s decision. These protests included picket lines and rallying at plant gates.
Regarding the lockout, ATI contracted with Strom, a privately-held corporation that provides strike and replacement labor for unionized employers throughout the United States, to provide a non-unionized temporary workforce to work at the ATI plants.
ATI and Strom scheduled these replacement workers to work 84 hour workweeks, 12 hours per day, 7 days per week. The replacement workers were required to travel to ATI facilities in vans that were owned, leased, or rented by Strom and driven by the replacement workers. The time spent driving or traveling to and across picket lines to enter the ATI facilities was unpaid.
Plaintiffs allege that the required travel is compensable work time, because it was an integral and indispensable part of their principal work activities.
Replacement Workers
Replacement workers are individuals hired to fill the roles of company employees who are unable to work due to a strike or lockout. They are sent from workplace to workplace by strike replacement companies such as Strom.
Replacement workers are often limited in their ability to organize and advocate for their rights because of the temporary and transient nature of replacement work.
Instead, without job security, the ability to organize, or access to labor protections that are traditionally associated with permanent positions, replacement workers are placed at the mercy of strike staffing agencies and companies whose priorities center on ensuring continuity of their own operations, frequently at the expense of the work conditions and basic rights of the replacement workers.
In addition, replacement workers, who are typically hired from outside the community where a lockout or strike occurs and who need hourly work to support themselves and their families, are often pitted against the union employees they are replacing.
If you are a replacement worker who was employed by Strom and ATI between August 2015 and March 2016 and did not receive payment for your travel time in Strom-operated vans, please contact Kehoe Law Firm, P.C., Michael Yarnoff, Esq., (215) 792-6676, Ext. 804, [email protected], or send an e-mail to [email protected], to discuss your circumstances, including whether you are eligible to join the lawsuit.
Replacement Worker Lawsuit News
Two news stories regarding the lawsuit can be accessed at:
https://www.bna.com/pay-crossing-picket-n73014461561/
The Kehoe Law Firm, P.C. is a multidisciplinary, plaintiff–side law firm dedicated to protecting investors and consumers from corporate fraud, negligence, and other wrongdoing. Driven by a strong and principled sense of social responsibility and obtaining justice for the aggrieved, Kehoe Law Firm, P.C. represents plaintiffs seeking to recover investment losses resulting from securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, corporate wrongdoing or malfeasance, those harmed by anticompetitive practices, and consumers victimized by fraud, negligence, false claims, deception, data breaches or whose rights to minimum wage and overtime compensation under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and state wage and hour laws have been violated.