Here is the entire text of that letter:

To All Goodyear Members, Retirees and their Families:

As you know firsthand, our strike against Goodyear continues. Your union is very aware of the concerns and difficulties this is causing you and your family and the questions that it must be raising in your minds.

Unfortunately, Goodyear continues to grossly misrepresent the facts of the situation and to put its misleading corporate spin on their proposals to end the strike. Your union wants to take this time to give you a detailed description of the facts, what is at stake for you and your families, and why we must continue to reject Goodyear’s efforts to undermine our unity and determination.

First, it is crucial to remember the progress we made at Goodyear and the effort each employee and retiree put forth under the last labor agreement to preserve this company and the good jobs we have. We made tough decisions and together did the right things to put Goodyear on solid ground and make it competitive in today’s global tire market.

The union did not bury its head in the sand, but instead, it implemented real cost savings initiatives, modified our benefits and, except for keeping up with inflation, has not had wage increases in years. In addition, we made the gut-wrenching decision to allow the closure of a tire plant to help the company survive. With that contract in hand, along with other changes made by management, the company’s fortunes improved dramatically.

In 2005, the company made a profit of $489 million before taxes and its shareholders saw the value of their investment in the company increase by more than 500% from 2003.

While the company still faces many challenges, it came to the table this year determined to ignore all that we had done. The Company’s demands on you and your families have been overwhelming. They have insisted – despite Goodyear being well on the road to recovery – that the company needs more! It’s as if demanding unbearable sacrifices from us has become a drug to them and now they just can’t stop themselves.

Goodyear’s healthcare costs, as is the case with all U.S. companies, are large and expensive. Our union recognizes that. But rather than have rational discussions about how best to manage this issue, the company insists that it must completely rid itself of its retiree obligation. In their own words, the company wants to “get out of the retiree insurance business.”

This is the centerpiece of its proposal and its negotiators refuse to discuss any other alternative. In its place they have offered to set up a trust with enough money, based on current spending levels, to provide the current levels of benefits for only the next few years or so. When the fund is exhausted, current retirees, as well as those now working, would be left without any healthcare benefits when they retire.

While there are better alternatives to this proposal, we had shown a willingness to consider such an approach if it could help solve this problem. But Goodyear has flatly refused to fund it in a responsible way. While the company has modified their position on some of the other issues, this is one of the major issues blocking an agreement.

Another major issue that is keeping us apart is Goodyear’s demand for more plant closings. The company insists it needs to close another tire factory in North America. They do this while continuing to import the very same tires that we make with tires from Latin America and other low wage countries. They have announced their intention to exit what‘s called the private label market, but their business plan continues to bring enough foreign made tires into the U.S. to keep our plants open if those tires were produced here.

We have been down this road before. They have shut down plants in the past and filled the gaps through off-shoring. This is a death spiral for us and there comes a time when we have to draw a line and stand and fight. That time is now. This Goodyear double-dealing tactic will never stop if we don’t stop it.

They have changed their minds a number of times during the course of our negotiations as to which plant is targeted – as if our livelihoods were commodities to be traded at their whim – while they hold an “auction” with the governments in the various states where we have our plants located and gather up tax dollars in a bidding war between those states. So while they attempt to abandon their legal and moral obligation to those who have worked years to build Goodyear and they close plants to run to China and other places and shut our factories, they stick out their hands for taxpayer dollars as incentives, the whole time writing themselves fat bonus and salary checks.

Soon Goodyear will launch an all out campaign to try to separate you and your Union at all our levels. They will try to convince you that your Union is wrong and that there is nothing in their proposal that will hurt you directly. They will have saved the harshest for those to be hired in the future and for those who have come before us, as for well as for the active workforce when we’re done working. Cheap wages, lousy healthcare – the list goes on.

We didn’t pick this fight with Goodyear. Their greed has consumed their common sense. We have made responsible counterproposals at every step of the process and continue to be willing to discuss alternatives that keep this a competitive employer based in our communities, but enough is enough.

Goodyear has become a poster child for all that has gone wrong with corporate America and now threatens to use its “global footprint” to crush us if we don’t knuckle under. Your local union leadership has taken the right stand. They have been reasonable and willing to try to solve problems, but Goodyear is intent on trying to have their way and at this point there seems to be no reasoning with them.

Don’t be misled by their slick PR and web site campaigns. This isn’t some abstract argument at the corporate and international union level. It’s about your retirement, your future and the future of your communities. It’s about how you’ll take care of yourselves when you’re done working. Trust your local leadership and their good judgment on these issues and don’t let this company scare you with its bluster. This is a fight we can and will win. This is a fight about our future and the well being of our families and the cities and towns where we live. This is a fight against an abusive bully.

Our union has made this fight its number one priority. We had already engaged every one of our 13 District Directors in the U.S. and Canada in this struggle and have provided them with a list of tire stores where Goodyear tires are sold in their districts. The entire AFL-CIO has joined our fight. The longer that Goodyear persists in insisting on shutting down our plants, undermining our members’ economic security and abandoning our retirees and communities, the more forceful we will become in making consumers aware that Goodyear is double-dealing: professing to be an American company, while systematically abandoning American workers and communities.

As long as we stand strong together and united, we will win this fight. The more solidarity we demonstrate, the quicker Goodyear’s negotiators will realize that they’re headed down a dead-end street and will relent from demanding the destruction of our members’ livelihoods.

This is the right fight because this company has done us wrong despite our sacrifices. The only way to overcome their unconscionable demands is to confront and defeat them.

Standing strong together, that’s exactly what we are committed to achieving.

In solidarity,

Leo W. Gerard
International President     

Thomas M. Conway
Vice President (Administration)

Ron Hoover
Executive Vice President, R/PI