IBEW Local 3 Workers on Strike at WESCO & WESCO Liberty

Sixty IBEW Local 3 members at WESCO Liberty Electrical & Elevator Supply in Woodside, Queens and WESCO in Hauppauge, Long Island went out on strike Monday after WESCO failed to offer a fair contract to members. The multinational company boasts of record-setting business over the last several quarters, with a record $21.4 billion in sales in 2022, an 18% year-over-year increase from 2021, and another record $1.4 billion in operating profit.

Despite the union's best efforts to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement with WESCO as it has historically done for decades, no agreement was reached due to WESCO's position of underfunding members' pension and medical plan, impacting not only the WESCO employees and their families, but the other participants in the plan plus their families and retirees. Additionally, WESCO proposed cutting the union employees' pay by changing how overtime is calculated, ultimately reducing overtime hours and lowering the workers' pay.

"The Union is fully committed to these courageous sisters and brothers who are standing up to their employer by demanding they continue to work under the collective bargaining process & reach a fair deal that appropriately funds the pension and medical plan with no cuts to overtime pay," said Local 3, IBEW Business Manager Christopher Erikson.
The union has put up picket lines at both WESCO locations and plans to hold the lines for twelve hours each day for as long as it is necessary. Read more about the strike here and follow the union on social media here for updates. You can also support the union by contacting WESCO and demanding that the company come back to the bargaining table, fully fund the pension and medical plan, and overturn the proposed overtime pay cuts—find contact info here!