LOCKHEED PROPOSAL REJECTED\Union to strike if bargaining halts.

Byline: Jim Skeen Daily News Staff Writer

Members of a union representing 1,270 Lockheed Martin "Skunk Works" employees rejected a proposed contract and authorized a strike that will begin Tuesday unless negotiations resume, union officials said Thursday.

The contract was rejected when 67 percent of the membership of International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local 727P in Palmdale voted against the pact, then authorized the strike with a 68 percent vote.

"They felt they should have had a general wage increase," said Gary Holt, area director for the union. "They haven't had one for nine years."

The voting turnout was described as the largest in 20 years, with 91 percent of the union membership going to the polls. The union requires at least a two-thirds vote to authorize a strike.

Lockheed Martin issued a statement saying the corporation was "surprised and disappointed" at the strike vote. The corporation said it had "fully met union demands."

"The company is baffled by the decision of union members at these locations not to endorse an agreement that reflects their own demands," the Lockheed Martin statement said. "The company is weighing the options it has at its disposal and will elaborate on future actions at the appropriate time."

In Marietta, Ga., where the union represents 8,000 workers, more than 90 percent of union members voted for a strike. Workers in Sunnydale voted 53 percent in favor of a strike, but that fell short of the two-thirds requirement.

"The general mood has been 'enough is enough,' " said Pete Gnerlich, a flight line electrician and an employee of the company for 25 years. "The take-aways have to stop."

Paul Best, an aircraft inspector who started working for Lockheed in the 1970s with the L-1011 passenger jet program, said he and his co-workers had grown tired of no raises while managers increased their own salaries and benefit packages.

"About nine years ago they started with the bonus offers instead of raises," Best said. "We're the guys on the bottom slicing the apples for them to have their pie and we didn't get anything."

In at least one park of Lockheed Martin's Palmdale operation, workers staged at lunch-time demonstration, walking around the work site chanting "strike," a worker said.

Al Kurki, president of the Antelope Valley Board of Trade, said he is concerned a strike could hurt efforts to win support for legislation to help California's aerospace industry. An Antelope Valley delegation was in Sacramento on Tuesday and Wednesday to lobby for legislative support.

"We're trying to get legislation we need to make California competitive for aerospace jobs. A strike is the last, negative public relations thing we need," Kurki said. "The timing couldn't be worse."

"The economy needs those payroll dollars," said Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford, a former Lockheed employee. "I don't think it'll register as crippling, but there will be some effect."

The proposed contract called for a $2,000 lump sum bonus to each worker this year followed by 3 percent lump sum bonuses in 1997 and 1998. It includes a $600 cost of living supplement for each of the three years.

Reasons cited for rejecting the contract also included proposals to cut the number of paid holidays from 37 over three years, as in the previous contract, to 35 holidays over three years.

Workers also cited what they felt were inadequate cost of living increases, pension provisions, and changes in health care benefits.

"We're willing to meet with them anytime," Holt said of Lockheed officials. "The ball is in their court."

The union represents about one-third of the employees at the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works in Palmdale. The company is known for building airplanes in secret, such as the Blackbird spy planes during the 1960s and the F-117A stealth fighters during the 1980s.

With more than $40 billion in backlogged orders and $23 billion in annual sales, Lockheed Martin is the world's largest aerospace and defense corporation.