The sugar beet harvest is in full swing, truckloads of beets are streaming into Crystal Sugar plants to be processed, and 1,300 union workers are sitting on the sidelines, watching their jobs and chances of getting them back dwindle away.
The workers have been locked out since July 31 by Crystal Sugar company management, who say they are doing just fine with replacement workers. Management says the union should sign the contract it has been offered, or get lost.
With each passing day, it seems that locked-out workers – many of who have devoted 20 to 30 years of their lives to the company – are fighting a losing cause. Management has no interest in so much as having a meeting with union reps. The company is happy to move on without them, or take them back if the union signs what the company says is its "only and final offer."
Today as Day 70 of the lockout nears, the only thing that passes for negotiation are a few letters to the editor in local newspapers, where management and union workers are sniping and taking pot shots at each other.
Many people here in Kittson County have long worked at Crystal Sugar’s plant in Drayton, N.D., about 40 miles west of Karlstad. Workers on the Minnesota side are a bit luckier than their North Dakota counterparts because locked out Minnesota folks can collect unemployment; North Dakotans can’t.
So what’s the buzz on the streets of Kittson County about the lock-out? Not much. One Karlstad resident has a sign posted outside his house declaring his status as a “Locked out union worker” in bright red letters. As for the farmers growing the beets – they have no interest in talking to reporters about the issue. Most say, “We just want to get our beets out of the ground.”
One might think that blue collar factory workers and farmers would be natural allies, but that’s not the case this time around. Some farmers have told the various media -- anonymously -- that they tend to favor company management. The farmers just want to harvest their beets and get paid for them.
Union members have been putting up some token resistance with some lackluster picket lines, waving a few signs outside the factory, and venting frustration when the media occasionally pays attention to them. Beyond that it’s pretty much business as usual in the sugar business, and the 1,300 workers who have lost their jobs may never get them back again. Some have already moved on to new jobs as mortgages and car payments loom.
For Crystal Sugar management, replacing union workers was a snap. The contracted with Minnetonka-based Strom Engineering, which shoveled over all the workers Crystal needed. For management and the sugar industry, the business of grinding beets into sugar never skipped ... a beat.
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