Ketchikan Shipyard workers rejoin union after new operator said old contract didn't apply

Workers at the state-owned Ketchikan Shipyard voted 27-7 on Sept. 22 to rejoin their union, after the company that took over the yard last year said it wasn't bound by the contract they'd won under the previous operator.

The National Labor Relations Board certified SMART Northwest Regional Council, Local 23 on Sept. 30 as the bargaining representative for the yard's production workers, the people who build, convert and repair vessels, according to the board's case record. Certification means the operator, JAG Ketchikan, is legally required to bargain with the union.

It's the second time these workers have voted for Local 23. They first joined in 2022, when Vigor ran the yard, and the union says it then negotiated a three-year contract with Vigor that raised wages a total of 12%.

Then the state changed operators. The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, which owns the shipyard, declined to extend Vigor's agreement in February 2025, and JAG took over on Sept. 19, 2025, as Alaska News reported. As Vigor wound down, its workforce fell from about 97 to about 18, according to the authority's project page.

Local 23 argued that JAG, as Vigor's successor, had to recognize the union and honor the contract. JAG said it wasn't a successor employer and wasn't bound by Vigor's agreement, according to the union's account.

From December 2025 to March 2026, the union filed three charges with the labor board accusing JAG of refusing to recognize or bargain with it and changing working conditions without bargaining. The union says those changes included higher health care costs for workers and the end of "dirty pay." All three charges are still open in the board's records.

Rather than wait for those cases to be decided, workers petitioned for a new election in August, the union said. Sixteen of the ballots were challenged, but the board found they couldn't change the result.

The yard has grown under JAG. The authority says the workforce went from 15 on the day JAG took over to roughly 150. JAG also holds a federal contract worth about $102 million to modernize the NOAA research ship Henry B. Bigelow, federal spending records show.