Year: 2011

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Union Pacific profit rose 24 percent in first quarter 2011 compared with first quarter 2010, the railroad reported April 20. This follows a 47 percent jump in Union Pacific profit for calendar-year 2010.

UP Chairman Jim Young said the railroad would increase its 43,000 employee headcount by about 4,500 in 2011.

The railroad reported a best-ever first quarter operating ratio of 74.7 percent — one of the more difficult for railroads because of winter weather. The fourth quarter 2010 UP operating ratio was 73.2.

Operating ratio is a railroad’s operating expenses expressed as a percentage of operating revenue, and is considered by economists to be the basic measure of carrier profitability. The lower the operating ratio, the higher is profit.

Looking forward, UP Chairman Jim Young predicted significant volume growth in the second half of 2011. UP is “pretty confident right now we’re going to see a peak” that exceeds traffic volumes the second half of 2010, Young said. “We’ve started off strong in 2011 by achieving record results in the first quarter.”

Union Pacific operates some 32,000 route miles in 23 states in the western two-thirds of the U.S.

Arbitrator Michael H. Gottesman will hear presentations by the UTU and the Sheet Metal Workers International Association during five days of arbitration in June to determine whether the merger agreement between the UTU and the SMIWA is an enforceable agreement.

Gottesman, a law professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., was named to arbitrate the dispute by AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka following a March 4 ruling of Federal District Court Judge John Bates.

The choice of Gottesman was jointly approved by UTU International President Mike Futhey and SMWIA National President Mike Sullivan.

Judge Bates, in his March 4 ruling, said a separate action brought by several UTU members challenging the validity of the merger — alleging violations of Titles I and V or the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act — is not within the arbitrator’s jurisdiction and that he would delay a ruling on that complaint pending the outcome of the arbitration.

Gottesman will hear evidence from each organization June 7-9 and June 14-15. There is no deadline on his issuing a ruling.

CSX profit jumped 30 percent during the first quarter 2011 versus the first quarter 2010, the railroad reported April 19. This comes on the heels of a 35 percent improvement in operating profit for calendar year 2010.

The CSX employee headcount rose in March to 30,464 employees, up 3 percent from March 2010, the railroad said.

More positive financial news is expected from other major railroads as they report first quarter results in the days ahead. Union Pacific will report its first quarter results April 20.

The CSX operating ratio for the first quarter 2011 — one of the more difficult for railroads because of winter weather — was a record low 72.5 for any first quarter. The fourth quarter 2010 CSX operating ratio was 71.1, and the railroad predicted its operating ratio could fall to a record-low 65 this year.

Operating ratio is a railroad’s operating expenses expressed as a percentage of operating revenue, and is considered by economists to be the basic measure of carrier profitability. The lower the operating ratio, the higher is profit.

“Shipments across all major markets — merchandise, intermodal and coal — increased as the economy continued to grow,” the railroad told financial analysts.

CSX operates some 21,000 route miles in 23 states and the District of Columbia.

OKLAHOMA CITY — The Oklahoma legislature, following in the footsteps of Ohio and Wisconsin, has repealed a 2004 state law granting collective bargaining rights to non-uniformed public employees in cities with populations greater than 35,000.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin is expected to sign the bill into law.

Cities may still choose, on their own, to bargain collectively with their non-uniformed employees.

Separately, the Oklahoma Senate has approved legislation prohibiting cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) to retired state employees so long as the pension fund is not fully funded. The state pension fund currently has an unfunded liability exceeding $16 billion. The bill now heads to the Oklahoma House of Representatives for consideration.

By Calvin Studivant
Alternate vice president — Bus Department

A tragic bus accident in New York City in March, which killed 15 passengers, has put an unfriendly spotlight on low-fare tour bus drivers.

The driver of the ill-fated low-fare tour bus reportedly had previously been charged with driving on a suspended license, and it will be up to investigators to determine the facts of this accident.

What we do know is that many low-fare tour bus companies that are non-union force their drivers to work under horrendous conditions at low pay — and often with little sleep.

It is common for non-union drivers employed by low-fare tour bus firms to sleep in their coaches between driving assignments. Many of these bus companies have been cited for safety violations

The New York Times reports that low-fare tour buses transport millions of passengers annually and regulators rely on handwritten logbooks to determine if drivers are working with insufficient rest.

An official of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety called the logs “comic books” and alleged they are often falsified or not filled in at all.

In fact, reported The New York Times, the owner of the low-fare tour bus involved in the New York City accident had been cited previously by regulators for “several logbook violations.”

As proud union members, we must continue to organize the unorganized because the entire transit industry takes a hit when something goes terribly wrong.

As union drivers, we cannot be forced to violate federal hours-of-service regulations. And we can refuse to operate a bus that is unsafe without fear of losing our jobs.

It our duty as union brothers and sisters to educate fellow drivers who may think it okay when pressured to work multiple shifts without proper rest, or to operate an unsafe vehicle.

Above all, we must inform non-union drivers that the UTU negotiates good contracts with competitive wages, health care and working conditions, allowing drivers to operate within the law.

If we don’t, their faults become our faults, as we are all viewed the same by the public. We cannot afford to be looked upon that way.

The UTU has set the standards for the transit industry. We will continue to raise the bar because we represent the finest transit and school bus operators in America.

RED OAK, Iowa — A BNSF conductor and an engineer were killed in a rear-end train accident near here Sunday morning, April 17.

Red Oak is southeast of Council Bluffs and is part of BNSF’s Creston subdivision, which has centralized traffic control, according to the Federal Railroad Administration.

Killed were conductor and UTU Local 199 (Creston, Iowa) Vice Local Chairperson Patricia Hyatt, and engineer Tom Anderson, both age 48. Hyatt, a resident of Creston, hired on with BNSF in March 2005. Anderson was president of BLET Division 642.

A BNSF spokesperson was quoted in news reports that an eastbound freight train pulling 130 loaded coal hoppers collided with the rear of a second BNSF train pulling 34 cars of railroad maintenance equipment. The accident occurred around 7 a.m, Central Daylight Time.

Reports say 10 of the cars in the lead train, two locomotives of the three-locomotive coal train and the two locomotives of the maintenance train derailed.

Witnesses to the accident told the Des Moines Register newspaper that the lead locomotive of the coal train was engulfed in fire, which spread to at least one of the coal cars.

There were no reported injuries of the two-person crew of the maintenance train.

The tracks on which the accident occurred are used by Amtrak’s California Zephyr as well as 40 freight trains daily, according to the BNSF spokesperson. Reportedly, the line linking Galesburg, Ill., and Omaha will be closed indefinitely, with trains rerouted to other track.

The FRA and National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the accident, and a member of the UTU Transportation Safety Team is assisting the NTSB in its investigation.

Hyatt is the first UTU member killed in an on-duty accident in 2011.

In March, a conductor trainee was killed — as was an engineer and a crew-van driver — in Kelso, Wash., when the crew van was struck by a BNSF freight train at a private highway-rail grade crossing. UTU conductor Dwight Hauck, a member of UTU Local 324, was seriously injured in that accident.

In February, UTU conductor Alvin (A.J.) Boguess, a member of UTU Local 623, was seriously injured when he fell 55-feet from a CSX rail bridge over the Jackson River during a switching movement in Covington, W.Va.

And earlier this year, a BLET member, Stanley Watts, was killed in a Norfolk Southern switching accident in Kankakee, Ill.

Eight UTU members were killed in on-duty accidents in 2010, and eight were killed in on-duty accidents in 2009.

Hyatt, daughter of Evan Aubrey Shiver and Christine (Elliott) Shiver, was born Feb. 25, 1963, in Fort Ord, Calif. She graduated from Crystal River High School in Crystal River, Fla. She went on to study for two years in college and served six years in the U.S. Army.

Online condolences may be given under the obituary category at www.powersfh.com.

WASHINGTON — A former John McCain aide, Ann Begeman, has been confirmed by the Senate as the one Republican on the three-member U.S. Surface Transportation Board.

Two other presidential nominees — Walt Barrows to become the labor member on the Railroad Retirement Board, succeeding Butch Speakman; and Republican Thomas Beck to the National Mediation Board, succeeding Elizabeth Doutherty — are awaiting hearings before the Senate Labor Committee. If the committee recommends confirmation, the nominations will move to the Senate floor for a vote.

Begeman succeeds Republican Chip Notthingham, who departed the STB following expiration of his term. Begeman’s term expires in December 2015. She joins Democratic Chairman Dan Elliott and Democrat Frank Mulvey.

Most recently, Begeman was Republican staff director for the Senate Commerce Committee, which recommended her nomination. From 2004-2009, Begeman was McCain’s legislative director and served as a McCain spokesperson during McCain’s unsuccessful run for the White House against President Obama. Earlier, she was a legislative aide to Sen. Larry Pressler (R-S.D.), who made an unsuccessful run in 1980 for the White House.

Begeman earned a degree in business from the University of South Dakota.

The three-person STB has regulatory authority over railroad mergers and labor protection for rail employees adversely affected by mergers, line sales and leases, and line abandonments. The STB also regulates railroad freight rates and freight-railroad dispatching of intercity Amtrak passenger trains.

WASHINGTON — The vote by Congress April 15 on a budget that keeps the federal government operating through Sept. 30 contains harsh spending cuts for Amtrak, transit and high-speed rail.

Especially troubling to UTU members are the Amtrak and transit budget cuts, which could result in worker furloughs, although none have been announced.

More troubling is that additional Amtrak and transit budget cuts are probable when Congress begins working on a fiscal year 2012 budget for the 12 months beginning Oct. 1, 2011.

As for the budget bill keeping the federal government operating through Sept. 1, the cuts include:

  • Amtrak funding for the remainder of this federal fiscal year through Sept. 30 was cut by some $78 million. The fiscal year 2011 Amtrak budget is thus cut from more than $1 billion to $924 million.
  • Federal Transit Administration funding was cut by $400 million, plus an additional $280 million was cut from unobligated fiscal year 2010 funding, all of which will affect transit system capital and operating subsidies and expanded training for transit workers.
  • All funding was cut for the high-speed and intercity passenger rail program for the remainder of fiscal year 2011, and an additional $400 million in unobligated funds from the fiscal year 2010 budget were eliminated. This is an especially harsh blow to President Obama’s vision to spend $53 billion to create high-speed and higher-speed rail corridors and expand conventional passenger rail to where 80 percent of Americans would have access to passenger trains by 2035.

Among the funds lost will be the billions initially intended for high- and higher-speed rail lines in Florida, Ohio and Wisconsin. As those funds had been rejected by those states and not reallocated yet to other states or Amtrak for improvements on the Northeast Corridor, the funding is now lost as part of the budget cuts.

Also lost in the budget cutting agreement were federal grants of some $50 million to help develop and implement positive train control (PTC) technology, plus some $24 million to assist with rail line relocation and improvement.

Railway Age magazine reports that the withdrawl of the $50 million for PTC asssistance “does not override or end the federal mandate for PTC by 2015, and it is in itself a small portion of the estimated cost of establishing PTC nationwide; much of the estimated $9.55 billion cost is to be sholdered by the railroads themselves.”

The House voted 260-167 and the Senate voted 81-19 to pass the budget cutting bill, President Obama said he will sign the bill into law.

UTU-represented conductors and engineers on Iowa Northern Railway have ratified their first agreement covering wages, benefits and working conditions.

Iowa Northern T&E employees chose the UTU as their collective bargaining agent in November 2008.

The agreement was negotiated with the assistance of UTU Alternate Vice President Doyle Turner.

“We will continue to look for railroad and other unorganized transportation workers who want and need union representation,” Turner said. “We are trying hard to bring parity in wages, work rules and benefits to the unorganized.

“Among gains workers obtain with UTU representation include job security, a defined grievance procedure and discipline rules, a work schedule that enhances their quality of life, and a defined set of benefits and work rules,” Turner said. “These are benefits workers cherish and they won’t obtain them without joining a union.”

Iowa Northern, headquartered in Cedar Rapids, operates more than 160 miles of former Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific track, running diagonally through the state between Manly and Cedar Rapids, with a branch line between Waterloo and Oelwein.

It connects directly with Union Pacific, Canadian National and Canadian Pacific. The railroad, which moves almost 14,000 carloads of grain annually between elevators and production facilities, calls itself “a proud link in the chain from farmer to market.”

The UTU is extremely proud of the fraternal activities performed by our members and is asked to report these activities to the National Fraternal Congress of America.

This data is used by the NFCA to increase public awareness of the benevolent activities of its fraternal organizations. The data also demonstrates to legislatures, insurance companies and public officials the impact of our fraternal efforts.

UTU General Secretary and Treasurer Kim Thompson would like all local secretary/treasurers to report to the International the fraternal activities in which they and their fellow members participate.

To read a letter from Thompson regarding these activities, click here. To view some examples of fraternal activities or community service, click here.

The report can easily be completed online and e-mailed directly to the International with just a few clicks of the mouse. Just click on the blank spaces on the report and enter the data for your local. When the form is complete, just click on “Submit by E-mail” in the top right-hand corner.

To view and complete the activity questionnaire, click here. The questionnaire should be completed and returned no later than March 31, 2009.

The forms and letter above are all in PDF format and the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, version 6.0 or higher, is required to open these forms. The Adobe Acrobat Reader, if needed, can be downloaded free of charge at www.adobe.com.