History of U.A.W. Local 1869
Local 1869 is the first unit of design draftspersons to be organized at the GM Tech. Center. After a difficult organization drive and an election win in 1973, the Design Staff group was certified as a U.A.W. bargaining unit. UAW Local 1869 came into being. (At the time of this writing in the early 90’s the framed charter certificate hung on the wall of President and Chairman Dick Shattuck's work area.) There was a big push in 1974 to try and decertify Local 1869, but this action was defeated in January, 1975. Later in May, 1975 the first collectively bargained agreement was made between the U.A.W. and GM.
SPE and Fab Eng. Were both part of the original 1973 charter of UAW Local 1869, the Trim Shop joined around 1985.
Names
Over the years the three districts that make up Local 1869 have had many variations of departmental names, some of which are listed here; Experimental Engineering, Exterior Engineering Department, Interior Engineering Department, Automotive Product Engineering, Advanced Engineering, Surface & Prototype Engineering. Over time, Surface and Prototype Engineering became known as SPE, and finally Surface Production Engineering.
Fabrication Engineering (Fab Eng.) has a similar range of names that include; Prototype Engineering, SPE Buck Group, Buck Group, PPO, and Pre-Production Engineering.
Not to be left out, the Trim Studio also has been known as; Trim Shop, Trim and PPO Trim.
Side Note on the Name
Ken Pickering worked for Fred Walther in Experimental Engineering from 1952 to early 1954. The “regular” engineering group as it was known, was next door on the 9th floor of the Argonaut Building, Downtown, next to the General Motors building. Rudy Potocnik (Exteriors) and Bill Hess (Interiors) were in charge assisted by Joe Gilson, George Henderson and Edward Arnold Deely-Jones to name a few. Rudy P’s group would work from wooden templates traced from the clay model. However, Rudy would change the sections when he wanted to make the car look “better”.
When Design moved to the Tech Center, there was a photo taken when the group was on the second floor (in the space now called Buick Exterior) - about the late 50’s. Everyone was dressed in white, long sleeve shirts and everyone wore a tie. That was the way it was.
Ken was away from the Design group for 1974 till 1978, he returned as Director of Engineering. At that time, the department was called Advanced Engineering which he believed did not accurately reflect the kind of work the group did. So he renamed it “Surface and Prototype Engineering” because the group did the surface development of the cars for release to the Divisions, they also engineered the prototype fiberglass models. Over time, Surface and Prototype Engineering became known as SPE. Ken Pickering retired in 1989 as Executive Director of Engineering and Design Services.
The 1977 DESIGN STAFF Chapter
One of the most significant goals reached by Local 1869 was the reclassification of 57 senior design engineers and senior project engineers from exempt to non-exempt status. This was made possible by the legal action of "Calfin vs. General Motors", this action was filed on September 1, 1976 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, Southern Division. [Calfin, at the time was a member in good standing of UAW Local 1869.] The department of labor was also informed at this time. Prior to this decision, GM had paid less than the required time and one half under the FLSA (U.S. Fair Labor Standards Act.) for overtime work by classifying certain design draftsmen and others throughout the corporation as "professional exempt" (employees who are classified as non-exempt must receive full overtime pay.) [This practice was recently re-activated at the VEC.] Following much legal wrangling, in June of 1977 U.A.W. attorney Leonard Page was informed by the Dept. of Labor that they and GM had entered into a settlement agreement to reclassify several thousand white collar workers at GM from exempt to non-exempt.
On September 14, 1977, Judge James P. Churchill entered the following "Consent Judgement" against GM.
"Plaintiffs [Local 1869] have filed their complaint and defendant has agreed to the entry of judgement without contest in accordance with the consent of judgement previously filed herein. It is therefore,
ORDERED, ADJUDGED AND DECREED that effective August 1, 1977, each of the below listed plaintiffs herein shall be compensated at a rate of not less than one and one-half times their regular hourly rate for all hours worked in excess of 40 in the week when employed in salary position classifications 7-E-06, 7-E-07, and 8-E-21 at the General Motors Corp."
On hearing this judgement, Don Savage and Maury Calfin said it was "long overdue equity" and as a result some 3000 workers were reclassified to non-exempt. At the time the resulting increase in pay equated to as much as $1.70 for time and one-half overtime pay. It doesn't sound like much, but even back then they were working 300 or 400 hours of overtime a year.
UAW Vice-President Irving Bluestone and Region 1 Director Stephen P. Yokich announced that "without the union's lawsuit, the reclassification of 3,000 GM white-collar employees to non-exempt status, bringing them under the full overtime pay requirements of the federal law, probably never would have happened. Those non-union employees are receiving that benefit because of UAW and that is typical of many other benefits they enjoy.
Bluestone is Director of the Union's GM Department, Yokich's Region covers the GM Technical Center in Warren, Michigan where about 1500 of the affected salaried workers are employed. The remainder work at other GM facilities across the nation.
Symbolism
The traditional wheel logo underwent some slight personalization, the current logo used for UAW Local 1869, is the result of a competition ran in the early 90’s. Kevin Striker won with this design, it depicts a sewing machine for the Trim Shop, and a triangle and dividers for both SPE and the Buck Group at the time centered within the UAW wheel. Between the UAW wheel and the Local specific center is the wording that describes who we are (If you ask him, I believe there was a $50 gift certificate for the winner as well.)
People really do Make Quality Happen
When in 1999 SPE was recognized for the work the department contributed helping the corporation achieve a smooth implementation of UG, by enhancing the system’s ability to create “class A” surface and by clarifying and managing Design Center’s data management needs. SPE was awarded a PMQH Award. In 2007 a team mostly from SPE was again recognized with another PMQH Award, for the work done to analyze the minimum sweeps of 3D Math Data. In 2009 two teams gained PMQH recognition, the first for its work on regulatory criteria compliance checking. The second for the assistance given on implementing hide away infotainment systems.
The story continues when early in 2018 to be exact
Justice came recently for three UAW GM designers who were fired by the company in 2009 because – GM claimed – they weren’t capable of doing their jobs anymore. GM ignored the Local 1869 labor contract’s layoff and recall provisions and kept these long-term employees off the payroll even when they should have been recalled to open jobs. GM made the wrong move.
The UAW sued GM and started what would turn out to be a nine-year legal battle against the company on behalf of these members. In the end, a jury found GM violated Local 1869’s labor contract and the trial judge ordered GM to pay a combined $2.2 million in back pay and front pay to the three designers.
Let this case remind GM that the UAW will fight for as long as it takes to win justice for our members.