Hawaiian Air pilots
finally OK contract

The carrier is set to leave
bankruptcy by the end of this month

Hawaiian Airlines pilots, the carrier's last remaining union workers without a labor contract, ratified a new three-year agreement yesterday that clears the runway for the company to emerge from bankruptcy at the end of this month.

Air Line Pilots Association union members approved the deal 189-69 after rejecting a tentative agreement last month by 24 votes.

The latest vote followed a four-day hearing in Bankruptcy Court in which the company had sought approval to impose a contract on the pilots. The judge urged the two sides to reach a compromise before he ruled, and they did.

The company and ALPA, which represents nearly 400 Hawaiian pilots, announced a tentative agreement on April 28. Under the agreement, which is retroactive to July 1, 2004, pilots will get wage increases of 1 percent a year.

The pension plan for pilots under 50 will be converted from a defined-benefit plan to a defined-contribution plan, similar to a 401(k), in three years. The company then would contribute 17 percent annually of the total pilots' payroll to each of the under-50 pilots' defined-contribution plans. Pilots 50 and older will remain covered by the defined-benefit plan.

The provisions of the pension plan can be changed through future negotiations after the company exits bankruptcy.

"We're very pleased that it passed," said Kirk McBride, Master Executive Council chairman of Hawaiian's ALPA unit. "We have a lot of work to do ahead of us and we're going to press forward. We still have special negotiations coming up to talk about retirement. We still have open issues, and we see that as a lot of work."

Among those issues are an arbitration process to resolve 201 grievances against the company involving 71 separate issues, McBride said.

McBride said he wasn't surprised by the 73 percent approval margin or that 92 percent of the eligible pilots voted.

"We worked very hard to make sure that the membership had all the information they needed to be able to vote, and I think that got the results that we did," McBride said.

He said there are 283 active pilots -- most of whom were eligible to vote -- and 98 furloughed pilots who were not eligible to vote.

Hawaiian Airlines trustee Joshua Gotbaum said he was pleased to have completed labor negotiations with the unions.

"Hawaiian's success comes in large part from the caring, competence and enthusiasm of its employees," he said.

"Everyone is pleased that all our unions have now negotiated new contracts so Hawaiian can exit Chapter 11 and show how one of the nation's best airlines can become even better."

Hawaiian Airlines' unions representing flight attendants, clerical workers, mechanics, dispatchers and network engineers previously ratified new labor contracts.