Workers at Volkswagen's Chattanooga factory will vote next week on possible representation by the United Auto Workers union.
Volkswagen’s Chattanooga auto manufacturing facility has about 3,000 workers and is the German automaker’s only factory in the US.
The company has asked the National Labor Relations Board to oversee a secret ballot vote starting next Wednesday, February 12th and continuing through Friday, the 14th.
Labor representatives hold half the seats on the Volkswagen's supervisory board, according to German law. The Chattanooga plant is the company’s only large factory that doesn’t have formal labor representation for its workers.
If voted in, the UAW would create a German-style works council to represent employees on wages and benefits, working conditions and plant efficiency. Tennessee’s right-to-work law means that workers would not have to be union members in order to be represented.
Such a works council model would be the first of its kind in the US.