Qwest, union reopen
contract talks
DENVER
- Denver-based Qwest Communications International met earlier this week with
union officials, to reopen negotiations on extending a contract. The contract
covers about 35,000 employees in Montana and 12 other states. Qwest hopes
to avoid the kind of labor dispute experienced by Verizon Communications
this summer. Qwests contract with the Communications Workers of America
expires in August 2001. About half the work force is unionized. Qwest and
union officials declined to comment on a negotiation agenda or timetable.
When it acquired U.S. West in June, Qwest gained 25 million local phone customers
in the West and
Midwest.
Federal board questions
BLM lease sale
UNDATED - A federal board has ruled it likely that
the Bureau of Land Management has violated environmental and administrative
laws in Wyomings Powder River Basin. Last weeks preliminary decision
by the U.S. Interior Board of Land Appeals says the BLM has been using an
outdated plan to lease land coal bed methane development. Specifically, the
13-year-old plan does not address coal bed methane extraction. The BLM had
contended that it is similar to oil and gas development. Two environmental
groups had challenged the BLMs lease offerings in the basin. They are
the Wyoming Outdoor Council and Powder River Basin Resource Council. Tom
Darin is an attorney for the Wyoming Outdoor Council. He says the boards
decision could jeopardize coal bed methane leases that were sold by the BLM
under the outdated plan.