Striking employees of Auburn’s Belshaw Adamatic Bakery Group received a show of solidarity from their International Association of Machinist union-mates on Tuesday.

Tom Wroblewski, the president of IAW District Lodge 751, visited striking members of IAW Local 79, pledging the support of aerospace machinists at Boeing and donating $1,000 to the union’s strike fund.

“We’re here to support you whatever way we can,” Wroblewski said. “There are 30,000 members (at Boeing) standing right here behind you, and there are 10,000 retirees we’ll mobilize if we have to.”

The Belshaw employees have been walking the picket line since March 24, when 63 members of IAW Local 79 voted unanimously to strike. Belshaw Adamatic manufactures bakery equipment for wholesale and retail bakeries, specializing in donut fryers.

“We tried to negotiate a fair contract with the employer,” IAW President Dan Morgan said. “The employer’s only offer was very weak economically, less than 2 percent. But our major issues are training of employees for promotional opportunities and outsourcing work. The employer seems to want to outsource their work rather than train employees.”

The high cost of the company-sponsored health and welfare plan also played into the union’s decision to strike, Morgan said.

“We offered them an opportunity to participate in (the union’s) welfare trust, which would save the employer over $18,000 a month for the entire bargaining unit,” he said. “They think that’s a good idea as long as they get to keep all that savings. They offered us a $1,500 one-time bonus for each employee and said they don’t recognize any savings beyond that.”

Now, more than 85 days into the strike, Morgan said the company has hired permanent replacement workers.

“They have said they’re going to keep them, whatever offer they give us,” Morgan said. “Our guys would only come back on an ‘as needed’ basis. We voted on a second proposal from the employer on May 10, and it really didn’t matter what was in it, beyond that. It could have had a $10 raise in it, the group was not going to accept any contract where all of them would not go back to work. Even though they had been on strike for 50 days at that point, they voted unanimously against that, which speaks volumes of the solidarity of this group.”

In response to an email request for comment. Belshaw Adamatic released the following statement from President and Chief Executive Officer Roger A. Faw:

“The management team at Belshaw Adamatic Bakery Group sincerely appreciates and respects the interest shown by the press regarding the labor dispute we are involved in currently. At this time, we are respectful of the ongoing labor negotiations and do not think it is appropriate for us to discuss the issues on the table. We continue to bargain in good faith in an effort to bring resolution to this dispute.”

Morgan added that he hoped a resolution to the strike would soon be found.

“I hope at the end of the day we can find the common ground,” Morgan said. “This is not a solely economic strike. It contains a lot of work issues that, in my opinion, can be worked out if the employer would see some common sense and some common ground. I think we can find it.”