EVERETT — Negotiators from the Machinists union and Cadence Aerospace-Giddens resumed contract negotiations Tuesday after workers there overwhelmingly rejected a contract proposal last week.
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) members at Cadence-Giddens sent a “pretty strong message” last Friday, when 94 percent voted no on the company’s three-year contract offer, said Richard Jackson, who leads the union’s negotiating team.
Nearly 90 percent of the 220 Machinists union members at the company also voted to authorize a strike, meaning that is an option if further talks don’t produce a deal. Negotiations began in July.
A majority of workers at Cadence-Giddens’ two Everett plants voted to join the IAM’s District Lodge 751 last May. Several workers said low wages and safety concerns motivated them to vote for unionizing.
The plants make precision-machined parts and components and do sheet-metal forming, mostly for the Boeing Co. Parent company Cadence Aerospace also supplies Airbus, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Fokker, among others.
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