Posted on: Friday, March 19, 2004

CONCRETE WORKERS STRIKE
Sites await concrete delivery

By Dan Nakaso
Advertiser Staff Writer

If striking Teamsters ratify their tentative contract today, Hawaiian Cement will be back in the business of pouring concrete at 7 a.m. Monday — beginning with Punahou School, Hickam Air Force Base and the High Pointe housing project in Makakilo.

Kevin Peña and his crew will be waiting.

"We're ready to go," said Peña, whose Foundations Hawaii, Inc. will receive 150 cubic yards of concrete from Hawaiian Cement first thing Monday morning to continue working on Schuler Homes Hawaii Inc.'s High Pointe project of single-family homes.

"I'm going to feel glad to see the guys working and getting a paycheck every week and providing for their families," said Peña, who laid off 50 employees during the 43-day-old concrete strike that has crippled O'ahu's construction industry.

"Just knowing the guys will get back on their feet makes me feel the best," Peña said.

Contractors, developers and do-it-yourself home remodelers began flooding Hawaiian Cement's phone lines asking for concrete immediately after Wednesday night's announcement of a tentative settlement between Hawaiian Cement and the Hawai'i Teamsters and Allied Workers, Local 996.

The requests add up to several thousand cubic yards worth of concrete every day.

But the company can only produce slightly more than 1,000 cubic yards on a busy day with 40 cement trucks and 40 drivers, who are limited by the Federal Motor Carrier Act to work no more than 60 hours in a week.

And that will limit how much market share Hawaiian Cement can gain from its competitor, Ameron Hawai'i — Hawai'i's largest concrete producer whose workers are also on strike.

"There's absolutely no way we can fill all of the demand for concrete," said Michael Coad, Hawaiian Cement's vice president. "We simply don't have sufficient numbers of trucks and sufficient numbers of drivers."

Should the Teamsters ratify the agreement, Hawaiian Cement will base its first "pours" on prior commitments and projects that had some urgency, Coad said.

"I got calls from developers as far away as New York City (wanting to know when they can get concrete)" Coad said. "I get regular calls from contractors and people in the building industry who want to know if they should start recalling their people."

The first concrete deliveries on Monday include 160 cubic yards for Actus Lend Lease's Hickam Family Housing project and 110 cubic yards for Punahou's Case Middle School, Coad said.

Then for the next several weeks, Hawaiian Cement will be operating at full capacity to deliver an average of 1,100 to 1,400 cubic yards of concrete per day.

After the first three deliveries, Hawaiian Cement plans to deliver concrete to such major projects as Albert C. Kobayashi company's 40-story Hokua condominium at Ala Moana and Auahi Street; the city and county's Sand Island Wastewater Treatment Plant; and Stanford Carr Development's Peninsula mauka development in Hawai'i Kai and nearby Colony condominium.

"We are going to balance the needs of all of our existing customers and service them in an appropriate order," Coad said.

Most of Hawaiian Cement's workers normally have Sundays and evenings off, but company officials said they can deliver more concrete to builders who can work odd hours, Coad said.

"Given the 60-hour limit that our drivers can drive," he said, "we have talked to our customers and we are getting a listing of any customers who are willing to work on weekends and evenings, say under a bank of flood lights. We will do whatever is necessary to help them get back up to speed."

Peña will welcome the 150 cubic yards of concrete he'll get on Monday. But the delivery isn't even close to the 2,200 cubic yards he would have gotten over the last 43 days.

And while he's glad to get the concrete, Peña will be less accepting of the drivers who will bring it.

"I'm going to have some real hard feelings," Peña said. "I understand to a certain extent what they tried to achieve, but they've affected a lot of lives."

Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8085.