Striking Rams Ask Other Unions to Picket Game Sunday

Striking Rams football players have issued a plea to their union brethren in Orange County to picket Anaheim Stadium on Sunday when non-union, fill-in players from the Rams and Pittsburgh Steelers are scheduled to play in Week 2 of “Strike Ball.”

At the request of Rams’ player representative Carl Ekern, the Orange County Central Labor Council mailed a notice Wednesday to more than 100 local unions. It urged a large rank-and-file turnout at the demonstration.

Mary Yunt, executive secretary-treasurer of the labor council, an umbrella organization representing 50,000 members in Orange and Los Angeles counties, predicted “at least 300 people” would show up to support the NFL Players Assn.’s bargaining position in its dispute with team owners.

Yunt said Ekern called Tuesday night, telling her that a settlement in the 17-day walkout was unlikely before Sunday’s game and that plans by striking Rams to picket Gate 1 at Anaheim Stadium were going ahead. Ekern, a Rams linebacker, also asked that the labor council support their demonstration and “encourage as many pickets as possible” to show up, Yunt said.

Although many NFL players make more money in a week than the average union worker makes in a year, Yunt said the council “is fully behind the players strike.”

“Regardless of what you make--$5 an hour or $20,000 a week--this is a strike, and good union members should be there Sunday,” Yunt said.

At least one union member disagreed.

“If they think I’m going to take my Sunday, my day off, and go march on behalf of those high-priced ballplayers, they are crazy,” said a Costa Mesa grocery checker, who identified herself only Carla.

“I haven’t seen (Rams’ star running back) Eric Dickerson around here supporting us when we were fighting for a new contract.”

Sunday’s 1 p.m. Rams-Steelers game will be the first at Anaheim Stadium since players went on strike Sept. 22 over salary, pension and free agency.

Ekern said striking players, including some San Diego Chargers and Los Angeles Raiders, are expect to picket and hand out informational leaflets near the ticket booths at Gate 1 beginning at 10 a.m., when the stadium parking lot opens. The job action will culminate with a rally shortly before game time.

Ekern pledged that fans will not be prevented from entering the stadium or harassed as they cross the picket lines.

“(It’s) their choice and their right to attend the games,” Ekern said. “We just want them to know we’re not happy with the way we’re being treated.”

Last Sunday, the first week of games involving non-union, fill-in players, fans in several NFL cities encountered noisy, at-times-abusive pickets who tried to discourage game attendance.

In Philadelphia, fans were forced to enter Veterans Stadium through a corridor of mounted police when three dozen trucks, tractor-trailer rigs and vans stopped bumper to bumper on the street next to the stadium, paralyzing traffic. The windshield of a fan’s car was smashed and several punches were exchanged.

Fans in Los Angeles, arriving at the Coliseum for the Raiders-Kansas City Chiefs game, were met not only by striking players but noisy members of nearly 20 unions, who turned out in the 100-degree heat to show support for the NFL Players Assn. and denounce the owners’ strikebreakers and fill-ins.

Anaheim police and Rams’ officials say they are aware of what happened around the league last week and will take steps to ensure that fans are not bothered as they move from the parking lot into the 65,000-seat stadium. Neither police nor team officials were specific about what measures will be taken to protect fans from demonstrators.

But Dick Beam, the Rams’ director of operations, said the “safety of the fans comes first, . . . and we don’t plan to let anything interfere with that.”

Don Nims, the club’s ticket manager, predicted Wednesday about 20,000 would show for the Steelers game.

But one Anaheim police official said: “We expect more people outside the stadium than inside.”

Normally, 55 Anaheim police officers are on duty at the stadium during a Rams game. Anaheim Lt. Del Wade, who oversees stadium security for the department, declined to say how many officers will be deployed for Sunday’s game, but he added, “There will be enough to keep everything quiet.”

Ekern pledged that there will be no violence Sunday and said that picket captains will be selected to “keep a lid on things.”

“Nothing whatsoever gets accomplished by hassling people,” he said. “I’ll be the first to go after whoever tries to start something.”

Some local union leaders said there is not enough time to alert their members about Sunday’s rally, so they questioned whether the action would be successful.

John Sperry, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 324, said it will be impossible to tell his 23,000 members of the Buena Park-based union by Sunday.

“We will post it in the office on the bulletin board,” he said, “but there’s not much more we can do.”

As a drawing card, Yunt said Ram players will sign picket signs and mingle with the rally-goers.

But Fred Lowe, president of the local chapter of the Service Employees International Union, said rank-and-file members should attend the rally on principle alone. The very existence of the players’ union and the right of players to strike is at issue in the dispute, said Lowe, who heads the Orange County Public Employee Council, which represents workers in Santa Ana, Anaheim and Costa Mesa as well as county maintenance workers.

He said team owners are trying to break the players union, which would “be a blow to all of us,” he said.

Tom Winston, a bartender at an Anaheim hotel and a former Teamsters member, views the whole strike and Sunday’s rally a bit differently:

“It’s funny, but it seems to me that everybody is treating this strike as if it was the first labor dispute in the history of man. All it is is a bunch of men who get paid a lot of money, looking to make more.

“I’ll toast their rally, but I’m staying home to watch the scabs play football on TV.”