Mountaire announced that employees in the company’s Selbyville plant who are part of Teamsters Local 355 sent a letter to Mountaire Farms announcing an end to union affiliation.
Signed by a majority of the employees represented by the Teamsters at the Selbyville plant, the letter was addressed to management at Mountaire Farms. “We are writing to express our interest in no longer being represented by Teamsters Local 355,” the letter stated. “We are tired and simply want them out of our lives since they serve no purpose. We trust that our company will do the right thing,” a Mountaire release stated.
Mountaire notified Teamsters Local 355 by letter that it would no longer recognize the union as the collective bargaining representative of employees at the plant.
Mountaire spokesman Catherine Bassett said that under the “National Labor Relations Act, it would be illegal for Mountaire to continue to recognize a union that has lost majority status. This group of employees has chosen a different path than the previous group. We are just following our employees’ request.”
The employees previously represented by the Teamsters work in various departments at the facility, including live haul, live receiving, box room, cooler, shipping and sanitation.
An effort is underway to vote out the United Food and Commercial Workers at a Delaware Mountaire plant.
Mountaire employs nearly 10,000 people at facilities in Arkansas, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina.
