The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-05-17


 Henry J. Allen, the town has changed from bucolic center to place with night clubs and labor racketeers all around. He admits they're a little bit backward on the labor racketeering but assumes that by the next world war, Wichita on that score will be as far along as any place else.
 Wichita was as much interested in the Montgomery Ward case as Chicago or Washington because the city had been through a similar ex- perience of it's own and the plight of Sewell Avery struck home.
 ONLY 4,OOO UNION MEMBERS
 Boeing Airplane Company, the citys largest employer, had Ma tional Labor Relations Board elec- tion to select bargaining agent in July, 1943, with l8,000 out of 25,000 employees eligible to vote, A. F. of L.. won the election, and in October Boeing signed years contract with War Labor Board imposed main- tenance of membership provision.
 Today, the oompany's check-off records show that only 4,000 of their l5,000 eligible employees are mem berS of the union. Those of the A. 0C0 who want to resign from the union can't because of the mainten- ance of. membership clause. Between now and the expiration of the con- tract, the company faces the deci- sion of whether to ride along with its contract or to petition for new election on the grounds that the union does not represent a majority of its employees the same issue as in the Montgomery Ward case.
 Boeing operates Defense Plant Corporation government-owned fac tory in Wichita, and the contract calls for maximum utilization of facilities. That was taken to mean a three-shift, War Manpower Com mission 48-hour week, but after the draft had taken 5000 Boeing em- ployeS and the labor supply has been thinned out so that it was difficult to man full shifts, WING authorized alternate 50-and-60-h weeks on a 10-hour shift basis. The result was that production went up. The company got third more man. hours from the same number of people, and the take-home pay of the employees was increased an aver age of 35 per cent week.
 VILE OPENS HEARINGS
 The Kansas City regional War Labor Board has just conducted an intertsting experiment in Wichita. in an effort to popularize itself and familiarize everyone with its prob lens and methods. The 12-man tri- partite board come to town for three days. On the first day, it met with employers and gave them a chance to file their bellyaches and have them talked over In the evening, it met to hear the beefs of the labor organization leaders. On the second and third days the board held pulp lie hearings on Wichita cases before it, inviting the people in to see how it worked in its goldfish bowl, and how and why it made its decisions as it did.
 Office of Price Administration is, of course, the most cussed of the government war agencies, but the feeling that OPA programs and the need for rationing were not under stood, frequntley hard from other parts of the country, was not found in Wichita. The city had its trou- bles at first with professor type ad- minsirtators. but business men have now taken over.
 The Better Business Bureau has tried to keep down ceiling price vio- lations. Landlords complain about the rent ceiling and the competition from 5000 family units of war hous- ing built by the government,