“WE CAME TODAY TO GET OURS”
More than 1000 protesters crowed the sidewalks outside a Bankruptcy Court in Lexington Kentucky yesterday. They were mostly coal miners and their families, and they were rallying to voice their extreme opposition to a July 6 formal request by coal operator Horizon Natural Resources to terminate its active and retired miners' health care benefits and void its negotiated contracts with the UMWA. This would mean a loss of guaranteed job rights for UMWA-represented miners if the Horizon properties where they work–or worked–are sold in the bankruptcy process. The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) says 1000 coal miners 2300 retirees of Horizon Natural Resources could be left without health insurance benefits if US Bankruptcy Judge William Howard voids the labor contracts. Attorneys for Horizon want the contracts be voided so that the company's mines, which are up for sale, would be more marketable.
"I don't think it's fair that one man could take medical care away from this many people," said Billy Morris, a retired miner from Dixie, W.Va., who stands to lose his UMWA medical benefits if the contracts are voided.

UMWA President Cecil Roberts, who led the protest before going into the courtroom where he testified Tuesday afternoon, said the nation's bankruptcy laws are flawed if they allow retirees to lose their medical benefits. "If you spend 35 years of your life in an underground coal mine, you certainly need health insurance coverage," Roberts said. "We have people with black lung, people who have lost limbs, and by the stroke of a pen, someone can say you don't have health care any longer." Roberts testified that if the union's contracts with Horizon are thrown out, retirees of other companies also would be affected because the health-care fund would dry up. He said 3,800 retirees would lose their health benefits and an additional 2,500 employees eligible for benefits when they retire wouldn't get any. "The fund would collapse, because there isn't enough money to support it," Roberts said.

"We didn't come down to Lexington today with our hats in our hands hoping for a handout," Roberts told the crowd before the march. "We came today to get what's ours.

Roberts explains that since entering into bankruptcy, Horizon has repeatedly tried to portray itself in court–and to the press and public–as trying early on in the process to work with the UMWA to renegotiate the contracts it had bargained with the union–but that the union would not play ball. "What Horizon has failed to mention throughout this entire process is that the cuts it was asking our members to take were extremely severe," explained Roberts. "In fact, we believe that from the start of our negotiations Horizon had its strategy all mapped out. Present us with draconian contract proposals that it knew we could not accept, tell the judge we would not agree and then ask him to simply void the contracts outright, which Horizon knew the judge could do. This is the sad reality of being a worker in America today. Work hard all your life to earn the benefits you need to sustain you through retirement, only to have them taken away by the stroke of a bankruptcy judge's pen. It is happening with more and more frequency across the nation, and the UMWA hopes people will join with us to denounce the practice and work with us to try to get the laws changed. We are prepared to help lead this fight."

The call went out for the rally after Horizon Natural Resources petitioned the judge to reject the terms and conditions of the current contract with employees. But the judges ruling would have an effect on retired workers like Paul Yadro, of West Frankfort, "They're just going to take it all away, after 30 years of service, they're just going to wipe me out. They're going against their word. We were given their word that when we retired we'd have health insurance. If that judge rules against us, he's not much of an American, in my opinion.”

Shirley Inman, a 60-year-old who is disabled by arthritis and other afflictions after operating heavy equipment at coal mines for nearly 20 years, said, "If the courts just keep letting these companies out of their obligations, it will eventually affect all of us and we are all going to be without medical benefits," she said. "I can't go back to work now and get a medical card anywhere."

"You work your whole life for a promise and then they take it away from you," miner Tom Vinnedge said. "You are right back where you were when you were 20." It isn't right, agreed Charlie Rogers, a Horizon miner from West Virginia. "They are trying to take away the health benefits of retirees," he said as he shook his head. "We are hoping to change somebody's mind here today."

Roberts declared, “The people protesting in Lexington worked hard all their lives to earn their health care benefits. They expect what they earned to be paid to them, just as a bank expects its loans to be repaid. We hope the judge will keep that in mind as he makes his decision and that he will do the right thing." Sources: WKYT (Lexington), Kentucky.com, KFVS (Cape Girardeau, Missouri), Herald Leader (Lexington), UMWA