Members gather before going to leaflet.

As a result, the Teamsters are taking a stand in current contract negotiations. On Monday, members voted overwhelmingly in favor of authorizing their leadership to call a strike. And each night this week, members are volunteering to hand out leaflets to would-be customers at Cenex gas stations in the metro area, raising awareness of their contract campaign.

“We feel CHS is not bargaining in good faith,” Tom Lange, a union steward in the CHS shop, said as workers gathered outside the Inver Grove Heights facility Wednesday, before heading out to leaflet in Prescott, Wis. “We’re trying to be together and tell the company they need to step up to the table.”

Among the issues bogging down negotiations, Lange said, are wages and contract language that allows the company to hire temporary workers.

A final mediation session is scheduled for Friday.

“CHS is coming off multiple years of record profits,” Lange said. “We feel that they’re not sharing that with their employees who are helping them achieve those profits.”

Article and photo by Michael Moore, editor of The Union Advocate.