Labor & Employment Law

We?ll be at the Massey Shareholder Meeting Tomorrow?Join Us Live on Twitter

By Mike Hall

We’re heading to Massey Energy Co.’s shareholder meeting tomorrow morning to protest the company’s shameful safety record and demand that CEO Donald Blankenship be held accountable and the three board members up for re-election be ousted.

(In the meantime, you can click here to sign a petition from American Rights at Work calling for Blankenship’s firing.)

Since 2000, 52 people have been killed on Massey Energy property, according to the Mine Workers (UMWA). On April 5, 29 coal miners were killed in an explosion at Massey’s Upper Big Branch Mine in West Virginia. The nonunion mine had a long record of safety violations.

Family members of the Upper Big Branch victims, UMWA President Cecil Roberts, AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker and UMWA members and allies will rally outside the shareholders meeting.

Following the rally, Roberts and UMWA Secretary-Treasurer Daniel Kane will enter the shareholder meeting as holders of shareholder proxies and present the case for holding Blankenship accountable and ousting the three board members.

American Rights at Work says that Blankenship should be fired because his record includes:

ignoring safety regulations, intimidating workers, and spending millions to elect judges who will protect his interests. And he even helps lead the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in its anti-worker campaigns!

He clearly put profits before safety. That should have been reason enough for Massey’s board to find a new CEO.

We will live tweet the Tuesday march and rally, and you can follow us on Twitter with the hashtag #firemassey or here at the AFL-CIO Now blog.

A heads up to those of you following the event on Twitter. To save some space for those precious 140 characters, here are a few abbreviations we’ll be using,  AHB for Holt Baker; CR for Roberts; DB for Blankenship; and UBB for Upper Big Branch.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on May 17, 2010 (boomark / email).