Authored By chloe.morrison

Volkswagen met with members of the United Auto Workers Local 42 Thursday.

It appears to be the UAW’s first use of the engagement opportunities set up for organizations that have a certain level of employee support.

Company spokesman Scott Wilson confirmed the meeting took place after Politico reported Thursday that the meeting was set to take place.

It’s unclear what was discussed, but UAW leaders said last month they want the company to voluntarily recognize them for the purpose of collective bargaining and start talking to company leaders about wages, according to AutoNews.com.

In November, VW leaders announced a policy that set guidelines for engagement opportunities between the company and any labor organization whose membership includes a significant percentage of Volkswagen employees in Chattanooga.

After an independent audit, done by Henderson Hutcherson & McCullough, Volkswagen said Monday evening that the UAW has enough employee support to reach the highest level of engagement with the company.

Incentives?

In other Volkswagen-related news, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported that some Republican state legislators are less than excited to approve incentives for Volkswagen now that the UAW is taking more of a role in the plant.

On Thursday, Gov. Bill Haslam weighed in and said that-although he understands where the lawmakers are coming from-they shouldn’t let it destroy the $300 million in incentives to expand production at Chattanooga’s plant, also according to the Times Free Press.

Before last February’s election, some of those same Republican lawmakers, such as Sen. Bo Watson, R-Hixson, said that having the UAW here would make it difficult for the Legislature to approve incentives.

“It’s been widely reported that VW has promoted a campaign that has been unfair, unbalanced and-quite frankly-un-American in the tradition of American labor campaigns,” Watson said at the time.