Chart employees vote to decertify union

Hourly workers at the Chart Industries plant in New Prague have voted to decertify the United Steel Workers of America (USWA) as its bargaining unit representative.

The election was held November 16, with a majority of voting employees choosing to decertify. The results became official on November 23. The vote was 119-99. There were 233 employees eligible to vote.

With the decertification, the collective bargaining agreement that was to have expired January 15, 2006, becomes null and void. The three-year contract was the second the union had negotiated with Chart Industries since workers voted to join the union approximately seven years ago.

Without a union contract, Chart Industries can now set its own pay scale.

We will go back to managing the company as we did prior to the union