Hydra-Lock employees vote to decertify their union

Michigan workers are still exercising their option to bargain on their own behalf even after last year’s repeal of the state’s right-to-work law. Maintenance and production employees at Hydra-Lock Corp. voted recently to decertify United Auto Workers Local 155 as their collective bargaining representative.

The vote came after Keith Woody, an employee of the Mt. Clemens hydraulic tooling company, circulated an election petition to decertify the union. The National Right to Work Foundation aided Woody’s effort.

With 11 eligible voters, seven cast their ballots to decertify the union. The National Labor Relations Board, which oversees union elections, certified the results Oct. 21. Employees are no longer required to join or pay the UAW as a condition of employment.

Only production and maintenance workers are affected. Nothing changes for security guards, janitors and other employees.

“This is the latest in a surge of Michigan workers rejecting union bosses’ forced dues powers since the repeal of Michigan’s popular right-to-work law,” Patrick Semmens, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation, told Michigan Capitol Confidential in an email.

Public opinion surveys show that Michigan voters, including unionized workers, strongly opposed the right-to-work repeal, Semmens added.

Semmens predicted more decertification elections. “As long as Michigan union bosses are authorized to force workers to pay dues or else be fired, workers will continue to exercise their rights to hold decertification or deauthorization votes to escape forced dues,” he wrote.

Shawn Fain, the current UAW president, is being investigated by federal monitor Neil Barofsky over alleged retaliation against a UAW leader and what Barofsky called a “lapse” in producing necessary documents. The appointment of the monitor is part of a consent decree that ended more than a dozen federal criminal probes after former UAW President Gary Jones was convicted of embezzlement in 2021.