Friday, March 21, 1997

Negotiators attempt to finish proposal

By KEVIN GALVIN

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Negotiators for American Airlines and its pilots met at an undisclosed Washington location Thursday with hopes of completing a proposal for presentation to the union's board.

No details emerged from the talks, in which officials endeavored to seal an agreement before the Allied Pilots Association's board convenes Friday in the capital.

"There's nothing to report. They're working away," said Capt. Michael Cronin, a spokesman for the pilots' association.

An American Airlines spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

Word of tentative agreement came Wednesday as an emergency board appointed by President Clinton reported recommendations aimed at ending the standoff.

Creation of the board, appointed minutes after the pilots voted last month to strike, headed off a work stoppage that could have shut down the nation's second-largest domestic air carrier.

Clinton welcomed news that tentative agreement was reached.

"When labor and management work together, as they did here, U.S. industries are better able to maintain their prominent positions in the global marketplace," Clinton said in a statement released Thursday from Helsinki, Finland, where the president was meeting with his Russian counterpart, Boris Yeltsin.

The tentative agreement calls for the pilots to receive raises totaling 9 percent through 2001 and stock options, according to sources familiar with the talks who spoke only on condition of anonymity. Within four years, the company would end a second-tier wage scale adopted in the early 1980s.

Union sources cautioned that several issues must be resolved before the plan goes to the union's board for approval.

A major sticking point has been a dispute over who will fly small jets with which American plans to replace turboprops now used on American Eagle commuter flights.

Settling this point involves talks about the relationship between the American Airlines pilots and the American Eagle pilots, represented by another union.

Neither side would discuss details. A spokesman for the third union, the Air Line Pilots Association, could not confirm whether ALPA was involved.

"Obviously whatever happens at American Airlines in this case is going to have some impact on American Eagle, and we represent the Eagle pilots and we represent their interests," said ALPA spokesman Bob Flocke.