The company and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which represents 2,200 Hawaiian Tel workers, have agreed to hire a Washington, D.C.-based firm headed by former Secretary of Labor William Usery as an independent mediator.

William Usery

"They bring a powerful force to the negotiating table," said Jerry Okamoto, Hawaiian Tel's director of human resources.

Usery served as labor secretary under President Gerald Ford and headed the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Services under the Ford and Nixon administrations.

In the private sector, Usery mediated the 1974 National Football League strike and last year's Major League Baseball players strike.

Okamoto said that the firm, Bill Usery Associates, will meet with company and union leaders next week to size up their differences. Okamoto said Hawaiian Tel will pick up the tab for Usery's services but he declined to say how much it will cost.

George Waialeale, the IBEW's business manager, said that he was pleased the company was taking up the union's idea to hire Usery. He noted that a former IBEW top official, Tom Hickman, now works for Usery and will be involved in the union's negotiations with Hawaiian Tel.

"We hope that with the hiring of Bill Usery Associates, the protracted negotiations which have lasted over two years will be concluded shortly," Waialeale said.

IBEW members have been working under an extension of a three-year contract that expired April 1, 1994.

Talks between the two sides have been stalled since February due to a dispute over medical benefits for retirees. The union said that management wants to remove contract language that obligates the company to pay for future retirees' health care costs.

The company has said that extending such benefits will be costly. Hawaiian Tel also noted that its latest offer is one of the most generous in the GTE Corp. system.

According to Okamoto, the company is offering workers a pay increase of 11.3 percent over three years, plus a 2.55 percent increase in incentive pay.