Photo: Plant Scherer is the largest megawatt producer in the U.S. and thanks to the M.O.R.E. Work Investment Fund, Boilermakers are back working there after three decades.
Thanks to the M.O.R.E. Work Investment Fund, Boilermakers out of Local 26 (Savannah, Georgia) have regained work they lost over 30 years ago. Boilermakers signed a three-year contract with two Southern Company facilities, Plant Scherer and Plant Yates, for maintenance work.
In a significant shift, non-union contractor Zachry lost its contract, and Day & Zimmermann secured a maintenance contract for both Yates and Scherer. And Southern Company usually bids out new builds or outage work to union contractors, which means even more work.
“We utilized the M.O.R.E. funding to get these contracts in order to be competitive enough to get that work,” said Mike Autry, International Rep and Recruiting and Training Coordinator for the Southeast. “If it’s been more than five years, we have additional M.O.R.E. Fund agreements to utilize to get into a plant,” Autry said. “We can use the M.O.R.E. Work Fund to lower the hourly bidding rate to be more competitive with non-union bids.”
Local 26 BA/ST Johnathon Bates said the last major maintenance work Boilermakers performed at Scherer was in 1994. While some work was done at Yates in 2013-2014 during its conversion from coal to gas, there had been no significant presence at Scherer for decades.
“The M.O.R.E. Fund was the biggest factor in getting this work,” Bates said. “It allowed us to lower wages to be competitive with non-union rates.”
For maintenance, Scherer will maintain a crew of 20-25 Boilermakers year-round. However, during outages, workforce numbers could swell to as many as 300. At Yates, currently, five Boilermakers are performing maintenance.
“This is the first project we’ve received through the M.O.R.E. Fund,” Bates said. “Since Plant Vogtle finished in 2022, we lost three-fourths of our man-hours. Scherer will double our man-hours. It’s a lifesaver for us.”
Bates said the process for accessing M.O.R.E. Work Fund resources was straightforward. “The request goes through Boilermaker leadership,” he explained. “Once we outlined how helpful it would be for our local and district, it passed without issue.”
At Yates, there’s currently an outage on the existing units, followed by another in May and a third in the fall. Looking ahead, Bates noted three new gas-fired units are going to be built at Yates, all outside of the M.O.R.E. Fund agreements, and Boilermakers will gain man-hours from that new construction. Outages will occur twice a year on the new gas-fired units, with larger outages every nine or 10 years requiring approximately 60 Boilermakers for at least a month.
Plant Scherer is currently undergoing an outage, with 65 members on site. Another outage in the fall will employ over 200 workers.
Beyond securing a contract, the Boilermakers have also recruited new members from these plants. Since Zachry withdrew from Scherer, 14 workers joined the Boilermakers. The union has gained four new members from Yates. Additional recruiting, also funded through the M.O.R.E. Fund, is currently underway to bring more Boilermakers to both jobs.
“M.O.R.E. has given us the opportunity to secure this work,” Bates said. “Our Boilermaker leadership and Day & Zimmermann have been instrumental in this. They’ve been phenomenal.”