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New AT&T Relay Center Says
"Yes" To IBEW

July 2, 2002

Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service Commissioner Gary Eder, seated, certifies the election. Missy Devlin, director of the AT&T Relay Center (left), Local 1944 Recording Secretary Rose Fenstermacher and Business Manager Donna Howrylchak look on.

The two-week turnaround time is thought to be an IBEW record. AT&T honored a negotiated neutrality agreement and granted IBEW organizers access to the workers on site. The call center workers embraced the idea of joining a union.

"There were a lot of factors that helped," said International Representative Martha Pultar, a former AT&T employee who joined Local 1944 Business Manager Donna Howrylchak and Recording Secretary Rose Fenstermacher for the campaign. "They were eager to have a voice at work and a union to protect them."

The 24-hour call center opened on June 1 and will be fully staffed at 180 workers by September, Pultar said. AT&T won the contract to handle all relay calls for the deaf and hearing impaired in the state of Maryland earlier this year. Many of the workers, who were previously employed by Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon did not receive wage credits for previous experience. All the workers, the vast majority of whom are women, started at a $9 hourly wage. Wages, benefits, vacations and scheduling will be targets for Local 1944 negotiators as they begin bargaining later this summer, Pultar said. She said they will also aim for twice yearly wage increases and work rules for the common practice of requiring the operators to work split shifts. Local 1944 hopes to have a contract for member ratification by mid-August.

Each worker provides a vital service to the hearing impaired, an integral third party linking the hearing impaired to the outside world. The deaf and hearing impaired use telephones with a special keyboard and the operator speaks their typewritten messages to the other party. The free service is used to conduct any type of phone call -- from contacting family members, conducting business or ordering a pizza. The conversations take place in real time.

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