Incumbent Out in UAW Voting at Douglas Plant

United Auto Workers at Douglas Aircraft Co.’s main plant in Long Beach have narrowly elected a new union president who says he favors more cooperation with the company.

The election of Doug Griffith, who campaigned to end the union’s confrontational approach, sets up a resumption of contract talks stalled since March. Douglas, a subsidiary of St. Louis-based McDonnell Douglas Corp., has been hit by a worker slowdown that has delayed airliner deliveries.

Griffith received 51.3% of 8,794 votes to defeat incumbent Bob Berghoff, who warned that his loss would lead to a “company-dominated union.”

Berghoff, 43, leader of a failed 17-week strike in 1983 and 1984, was stripped of his authority by the UAW’s international union after running a local election in May in which vote stealing was charged by both sides. Berghoff was fired by Douglas after leading a half-day walkout in June.

“The people were just fed up with the chaos,” Griffith said.

Griffith, 48, who ran behind Berghoff in a three-candidate primary Aug. 11, denied Berghoff a third term as president of Lakewood-based Local 148. The local is the UAW’s second-largest in the West with 10,000 active members and 5,000 retirees.

Griffith’s 45-member slate also gained a majority of seats on the local’s executive committee and bargaining committee, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, which ran the election under federal court order.

Berghoff said he had no confidence in the accuracy of the tabulations, but he had not decided whether to challenge the results in court.

After the election is certified, probably within a month, Griffith said he expects to quickly reach an agreement with Douglas. A spokesman for the company said Wednesday that it hopes to settle “in the near future.” The two sides are not far apart on key medical insurance fee and seniority issues, Griffith said.

Labor agreements at the massive Douglas plant in Long Beach and a smaller one in Torrance expired last October. Of the nine unions at Douglas, only the UAW, which represents 10,000 of 28,900 workers, still has no contract.

A worker slowdown has been in effect at Douglas since last November, when the UAW, with cooperation from the 5,900-member local of International Assn. of Machinists, informally implemented the “build it by the book” strategy.

In late December, Douglas notified its customers that labor unrest would delay aircraft deliveries in 1987. It was 10 aircraft behind schedule in April and is now five behind, a company spokeswoman said.

Griffith said the slowdown strategy has been “stone-dead” since the machinists settled their contract in July.