AK Steel Corp. negotiators Wednesday presented six more final offers on its 29 contractual issues, which have kept 2,230 union workers out of the Middletown plant since March 1.

With the six new final offers included in the company’s latest contract proposal given during a negotiation session Wednesday, AK has presented a total of 13 offers that have been final, according to Alan McCoy, AK’s vice president of government and public relations.

“A ‘final offer’ means that’s our final proposal on that particular article,” McCoy said Wednesday.

McCoy said several of the 13 final offers have been on the table and unchanged “for some time.”

Members of Armco Employees Independent Federation have been locked out of AK Steel’s Middletown Works plant since midnight March 1.

At that time, the labor dispute involved about 2,700 members of the AEIF. The union stands today at 2,230 members, McCoy said.

Since March 1, both sides have come together and tentatively agreed on eight of 29 issues to resolve before the lockout could come to an end.

This latest session was a positive one, said Brian Daley, AEIF president.

“I think the dialogue has improved,” Daley said Wednesday. “There was not a rejection out of hand of further discussions. We got into more detail than we typically have, and I would say that’s progressive.”

The last time negotiators met was June 13. That 90-minute session tacked on four tentative agreements to another four that had previously been reached between the company and the union.

Meanwhile, two international unions — the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers and the United Steelworkers of America — are vying to represent AK’s hourly workers, who since 1943 have been represented by the independent AEIF.

AEIF leaders have endorsed the Machinists’ membership attempt, and have said that union’s national pension plan is best for AEIF members. But the Steelworkers, who have tried at least three times to represent AK’s Middletown workforce in 12 years, have been intervening. Several AEIF members now don “Steelworkers” ball caps at picket lines outside the mill, and many pass out information regarding joining the USW.

Much of the same is happening for the IAM, as red and white signs endorsing a vote their way were seen Tuesday and Wednesday along Roosevelt Boulevard.

The USW is hosting an informational meeting today at 4 p.m. at Middletown’s American Legion Post 218, located at 116 S. Main St. in hopes of garnering more interest among AEIF members.

USW’s vice president, Tom Conway, who is the union’s chief negotiator, is expected to share his plans on getting AEIF members back to work during the question-and-answer session. AEIF members and their families are invited to the event.

“A common thread among (AEIF members) is that they’re frustrated that nothing has been done to protest the scabs that are replacing them in their jobs,” said Shane Carlin, a USW collective bargaining and arbitration services representative.

Following the presentation, the USW will hold a demonstration at an unnamed Middletown-area employer in opposition to the use of replacement workers at the local mill.