North Olympic Peninsula workers at Safeway, Albertsons and QFC groceries approved a contract during voting last week.
The 635 workers’ contracts with Allied Employers expired Dec. 5, said Tom Geiger, communications director for the United Food and Commercial Workers 21, which represents grocery workers at those major stores in Clallam and Jefferson counties.
The workers Wednesday voted on contracts — which had separate terms for grocery workers and for meat and seafood handlers — that had been negotiated by union workers in King, Snohomish, Kitsap and North Mason counties after union workers at those stores, as well as Fred Meyers, approved their contract the week before.
The contracts in Clallam and Jefferson counties were approved by 98 percent of those voting, Geiger said.
In November, 94 percent of some 25,000 workers in King, Snohomish, Kitsap and North Mason counties rejected a contract proposal because of cuts in pay, health benefits and pensions and gave the union the approval to declare a strike if new negotiations were unsuccessful.
But a tentative agreement reached Nov. 20 resolved those issues.
The contract for Peninsula workers is “a distinct contract, although it’s the same content by and large,” Geiger said.
If the issues hadn’t been resolved by early December, then it could have been recommended that Peninsula workers consider a strike vote, Geiger had said.
Three unions were bargaining together: UFCW 21, UFCW 81 and Teamsters 38.
