Kootenay Savings Credit Union (KS) announced this morning its plan to lock‐out employees at unionized locations for one day on Friday, October 28.

As a result, branches in Kimberley, Trail, Castlegar, Fruitvale, Salmo, South Slocan and Kaslo will be closed on this day only.

Services at branches in Nakusp, New Denver, Invermere and Radium Hot Springs are unaffected and will remain open. The lockout is for one day only. All employees are expected to return to their next scheduled shift on October 29 or 31, and services will return to normal.

Kootenay Savings and the United Steelworkers (USW) Locals 9705 and 1‐405 have been in negotiations for close to a year, have made many attempts to negotiate a renewed collective agreement, with and without the assistance of a mediator.

“Unfortunately the last mediation attempt resulted in an impasse as efforts failed to achieve an agreement, when the union asked the mediator to book out after the first of three scheduled mediation days. Talks continued last week, and the union rejected the company’s last offer, which was put forward on Monday October 24. “Both parties are in a legal position to strike or lockout as of Friday, October 21. On Tuesday, October 25, the union commenced strike action.

“We feel our only recourse at this point is to initiate a one‐day lockout to persuade the union to return to negotiate a fair collective agreement, and to help us address our critical issues while minimizing the impact to our employees and members,” the company stated in a press release.

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