HOPE SEEN IN KROGER SETTLEMENT 1 STRIKE OVER FOR RALPHS' PARENT.

Byline: Nicholas Grudin Staff Writer

A grocery store strike between Ralphs' parent company, Kroger Co., and 3,300 union employees in West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky was tentatively settled Tuesday, casting tempered optimism onto Southern California's lingering labor dispute.

The similarities between the two situations offer reason to hope: Both strikes involve Kroger stores and United Food and Commercial Workers employees, both disputes center on health care plans, both began in early October, and both have been mediated by federal officials.

``Sometimes things that look completely irreconcilable seem to be able to be resolved,'' said Daniel Mitchell, a professor of management and policy studies at UCLA. ``There are ways to come to some solution here.''

The West Virginia strike started Oct. 13 after UFCW employees and Kroger locked horns during contract negotiations. The employees struck 44 stores in the tri-state region, forcing the chain to temporarily close them all. Neither the union nor Kroger would release details of the agreement.

The Southern California dispute started Oct. 11, and has pitted 70,000 UFCW employees against Kroger's Ralphs, Safeway Inc.'s Vons and the Albertson's chain, a total of 859 stores from San Diego to Santa Barbara. Sunday, federally mediated negotiations broke down and no new talks are scheduled.

``I hope this means that the supermarkets are coming to their senses, but you're dealing with two different animals,'' said UFCW Local 770 President Rick Icaza.

Although the two strikes are similar, the differences may be more notable, according to Kent Wong, director of the UCLA Center for Labor Research and Education.

``The West Virginia resolution says there is potential for this dispute to be resolved, but the circumstances are different here,'' Wong said.

According to Wong, a revenue-sharing pact between Ralphs, Vons and Albertson's and the massive constituency of the Southern California union adds an entirely new dynamic. The Southern California dispute will have a national impact, Wong said.

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer is investigating the legality of the companies' pact.

``This is not a situation where each of these supermarkets are negotiating independent of each other. The breakdown in the talks the other day reflects that there is no immediate end in sight.''

Of the three companies in the Southern California dispute, labor leaders have singled out Kroger's Ralphs as the least culpable in the strike, citing Safeway chief executive Steve Burd as the ringleader. Last month, the UFCW removed picket lines from the region's 300 Ralphs stores to focus the pressure on the other two chains.

Details of the West Virginia agreement will not be released until after a member vote in Charleston on Thursday morning, and offi Cincinnati-based Kroger would only say that an agreement has been reached. The dispute over health care benefits has been resolved, according to reports.

``Through the offices of federal mediation, the parties have reached an understanding concerning the issues surrounding the work stoppage,'' according to a Kroger statement.

Also Tuesday, Kroger announced that its third quarter earnings were down 57 percent from last year as a result of the strikes in Southern California and West Virginia. The losses are in line with Albertson's recently reported 50 percent plunge in third-quarter profits.

A 25-day strike in St. Louis was settled Oct. 31 with the help of a federal mediator, but none of the same companies were involved.

Nicholas Grudin, [phone]

nicholas.grudin(at)dailynews.com