Grocery workers to vote on contract

The union that represents store workers in Southern California’s three largest supermarket chains has reached a contract agreement with those entities.

An estimated 60,000 employees of Vons, Ralphs and Albertsons, all of them members of the United Food & Commercial Workers Union, are scheduled to vote Wednesday on the proposed agreement, according to Local 770’s website.

That local represents grocery store workers in Los Angeles and Ventura counties.

Both sides have agreed not to discuss details of the contract until union members accept or reject it.

Greg Conger, president of UFCW Local 324, which represents workers in Orange County, said he was satisfied with the overall terms of the proposed agreement, according to a report published in The Press-Enterprise.

The union’s contract with the three chains expired March 2, but workers agreed to stay on the job under the terms of the expired agreement until a new contract was reached.

San Bernardino-based State Bros., the largest private employer in the Inland Empire, is negotiating its own contract with the union and will not be part of this agreement if it’s approved, according to the report.