Year: 2011

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By UTU Assistant President Arty Martin

While watching the Major League Baseball Game of the Week Saturday between the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox, I was reminded of how important history and heritage are.

Prior to the start of the game, a special guest of the Red Sox was honored — 100-year-old Arthur Giddon, who had been a bat boy for the old Boston Braves as a 13 year old, 87 years ago. The Braves, until they left Boston for Milwaukee in 1952, were in the National League, while the Red Sox have remained Boston’s American League team.

Arthur was a bit slower as an honorary bat boy during Red Sox batting practice on Saturday, but no less enthusiastic in handing bats to sluggers Kevin Youkilis, Jason Varitek, Jason Bay, and David Ortiz.

Wearing uniform number 100, with the name “Big Pappy” on the back (not to be confused with Ortiz’ nickname of “Big Poppy”), Giddon and almost 40,000 Boston baseball fans celebrated a game that has long been the American pastime, linking generations and strengthening family ties.

As a Red Sox official observed, “Baseball is a celebration of generations, and a celebration of bringing them together.” The parallels with the UTU, its history and heritage, are significant.

In the UTU, our roots run deep. Our predecessors are the ones we humbly thank today for labor laws protecting our right to organize, the requirement that employers bargain in good faith and the appointment of neutral arbitrators to hear our grievances.

UTU predecessor organizations were formed when the predominant mode of transportation in America was the horse.

In the generations that followed, rail — and later bus and aviation workers — looked to the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers & Firemen, the Order of Railway Conductors and Brakemen, the Switchmen’s Union of North America, the International Association of Railroad Employees, and the Railroad Yardmasters of America (all now part of the UTU) for job security and improved wages, benefits and working conditions.

Our roots run deep, and our heritage was built on personal sacrifice and success. Our future — the future of our members and their families — will prosper, as baseball in Boston has prospered, by celebrating our heritage and never forgetting who brought us to the dance. Indeed, we can learn a lot about life, progress and success from baseball.

President Futhey, General Secretary and Treasurer Thompson and myself encourage all UTU members to take the time to learn of our history and heritage and what it means to you and your families.

This year is the UTU’s 40th anniversary, although the roots of our predecessor unions stretch back more than a century.

We will be celebrating our roots and history at the regional meetings this summer. You owe it to yourselves and your families to be educated and involved. 

I also remind all members to attend the regional meetings in San Francisco and New Orleans, where our heritage, along with many other leadership topics, will be discussed in workshops.

The members of Local 1596, Charlotte, N.C., have ratified a new three-year deal with Transit Management of Charlotte (CATS) by an overwhelming margin.

UTU represents bus mechanics on the property.

Major advances were made in job classifications and job protection, with a guarantee of no employee layoffs for 15 months following the ratification date.

UTU members also received a signing bonus, wage increases with guarantees, increases in tool allowances and company-supplied winter clothing.

Increases in the agency’s portion of contributions to the employee pension plan and agency maintenance of medical benefits were also part of the deal.

I congratulate General Chairperson Alvy Hughes, Vice Local Chairperson Craig Patch, Local Committee of Adjustment Secretary James Hinton Jr. and Secretary and Treasurer Anthony Sandle for their patience and hard work throughout the negotiations.

I assisted these fine local officers with negotiations, but these local officers and other members of the committee did an outstanding job from start to finish. It was a privilege to work with such a hard working and dedicated group of members.

Despite sales tax revenue for the months of November and December being down 25 percent and 15 percent respectively, ridership and fare revenue are up on this property. CATS says year-to-date through the first seven months of fiscal 2009, ridership has increased 25.8 percent and fare revenue rose 53 percent. That’s good for the job security of these hard-working members.

MIAMI — A tentative agreement between Veolia Transportation — operator of South Florida Tri-Rail — and the UTU has been reached, covering both sides of the locomotive cab.

The agreement now goes to members for ratification, with the vote count scheduled May 9.

The tentative agreement includes pay increases retroactive to July 1, 2010, an increase in certification pay for engineers, certification-pay parity for conductors, overtime pay for employees assigned to training classes or examinations on rest days, improvement in bereavement leave, restrictions on the use of videos for purposes of discipline, a cap on health care insurance contributions, and the addition of a vision plan.

UTU International Vice President John Previsich assisted with negotiations. He congratulated the negotiating team, which included General Chairperson Roger Lenfest (Amtrak, GO 769), Local 30 (Jacksonville) Chairperson Andy D’Egidio and Vice Local Chairperson Steven Klemm for “an excellent job of bringing the membership’s wishes to the negotiating table.

“Because of their efforts, the negotiating team was successful in securing the excellent pay increases, certification pay and positive changes to the contract that the members desired,” Previsich said.

South Florida Tri-Rail operates over 71 miles for former CSX track linking West Palm Beach, Ft. Lauderdale and Miami, and is owned by the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority.

In January, employees of Tri-Rail’s operations center voted to be represented by the UTU.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — School bus drivers employed by First Student here and represented by the UTU have ratified a new agreement by a 213-90 vote.

The agreement ratified by members of UTU Local 1908 provides for wage increases retroactive to June 2010, no loss of benefits and improvements to a 401k plan.

Calvin Studivant, alternate vice president — East for the UTU Bus Department, helped to negotiate the new agreement. He praised the efforts of the Local 1908 negotiating team that included Local General Chairperson Dale McClain, Vice Local Chairperson Debbie Orlowski and Local Secretary Geneva Crutcher.

For UTU District of Columbia Legislative Director Willie Bates the recognition and honors keep rolling in.
The latest is from the State of Virginia, which on April 7 bestowed upon Bates the Governor’s Transportation Safety Award in the category of rail safety.
His accomplishments in earning the award speak for themselves:

  • Volunteering as a mentor, Bates has frequently declined premium-pay assignments to work overnight on safety-training sessions for newer Amtrak employees.
  • Under what the award describes as his “commitment, dedication and daily active support of safety,” his Richmond, Va., train and engine crew base has worked injury-free for three successive calendar years.
  • Bates has worked injury-free for 25 years as an Amtrak conductor and never had a safety-rules violation.

In June 2010, Bates was selected from among 79 applicants by U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood for appointment to the Obama administration’s Transit Rail Advisory Committee for Safety (TRACS), created to assist the Federal Transit Administration in drafting national safety measures for rail transit. LaHood said Bates was selected based on his leadership and organizational skills in the area of rail safety.
And in 2009, Amtrak President Joseph Boardman awarded Bates Amtrak’s highest safety honor — the Charles Luna Memorial Safety award that is named in honor of the UTU’s first International president, who later was an Amtrak board member. The award, presented annually since 1990, recognizes Amtrak employees who demonstrate the highest degree of safety awareness.
In presenting the award, Boardman described Bates as “a consistent participant in safety programs and safety committees.”
Bates is a former president and vice local chairperson of UTU Local 1933 in Richmond.

For UTU District of Columbia Legislative Director Willie Bates the recognition and honors keep rolling in.

The latest is from the State of Virginia, which on April 7 bestowed upon Bates the Governor’s Transportation Safety Award in the category of rail safety.

His accomplishments in earning the award speak for themselves:

  • Volunteering as a mentor, Bates has frequently declined premium-pay assignments to work overnight on safety-training sessions for newer Amtrak employees.
  • Under what the award describes as his “commitment, dedication and daily active support of safety,” his Richmond, Va., train and engine crew base has worked injury-free for three successive calendar years.
  • Bates has worked injury-free for 25 years as an Amtrak conductor and never had a safety-rules violation.

In June 2010, Bates was selected from among 79 applicants by U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood for appointment to the Obama administration’s Transit Rail Advisory Committee for Safety (TRACS), created to assist the Federal Transit Administration in drafting national safety measures for rail transit. LaHood said Bates was selected based on his leadership and organizational skills in the area of rail safety.

And in 2009, Amtrak President Joseph Boardman awarded Bates Amtrak’s highest safety honor — the Charles Luna Memorial Safety award that is named in honor of the UTU’s first International president, who later was an Amtrak board member. The award, presented annually since 1990, recognizes Amtrak employees who demonstrate the highest degree of safety awareness.

In presenting the award, Boardman described Bates as “a consistent participant in safety programs and safety committees.”

Bates is a former president and vice local chairperson of UTU Local 1933 in Richmond.

Robert Kerley

By Robert Kerley
UTU International Vice President

America’s soldiers and their families are sacrificing to preserve liberty and ensure justice throughout the world.

As labor unionists, we can follow their example of service by remaining resolute in our struggle against injustice and the denial of human rights and dignity here at home.

Liberty means freedom from tyranny at home. Justice must be demanded in corporate boardrooms and the workplace.

Working men and women are under attack in states throughout America. It is an attack on all that unions have fought so long and hard to achieve — the right to organize and bargain collectively for good wages and safe working conditions.

The attack is by those who cannot make their case at the bargaining table.

Working families, whose purchasing power sustains our economy, absolutely did not cause the economic collapse that has driven states into the red.

Yet those families are now told that their breadwinners don’t deserve a seat at the table when the elimination of their jobs and a reduction in their negotiated wages and health care and retirement plans are discussed.

A half century ago, Americans of every color, creed, faith and age stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the fight against racial and social injustice, and made America a better place for us all.

We must renew that spirit, reaffirm that message and reignite that flame of righteous indignation against this denial of democracy and dignity in the workplace.

We must reach out to young people for whom the American dream is becoming a legendary paradise lost, and to the unorganized, because their future depends on our success.

Without strong labor unions and labor laws, America’s middle class will disappear into a nation of masters and servants.

America is better than that. Our cause is just. Our motives and our actions must be honorable, but unequivocal.

We must prevail, because the loss of these precious rights will dishonor all who came before us, and resign the generations who follow to lives of meager toil without the just rewards of honest labor.

MILWAUKEE — The CEO of privately owned regional railroad Wisconsin & Southern, William Gardner, says he will plead guilty to felony charges of making some $53,000 in illegal political campaign donations to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Gov. Walker has been leading his state’s attack on public-employee collective bargaining rights. Lesser amounts of alleged illegal political contributions also were made by Gardner to other state Republicans and some Democrats, reports the newspaper.

Gov. Walker said he returned to the railroad all contributions deemed to have been improperly made, and Democrats say they donated to charity all improper contributions made to them. Contributions returned by Walker to the railroad were then donated to charity, the Journal Sentinel reported.

Gardner, according to the Journal Sentinel, said that while he will plead guilty to two felony charges, he was not aware he had broken any laws.

According to the state’s criminal complaint, Gardner asked railroad employees to donate tens of thousands of dollars in political contributions to Walker and other Wisconsin political candidates and then reimbursed those employees out of railroad and personal funds.

The felonies in the criminal charges filed April 10 against Gardner include exceeding campaign contribution limits and reimbursing employees for their personal campaign contributions.

The two felonies carry a combined maximum penalty of seven years in prison and $20,000 in fines, but the Journal Sentinel reports that in exchange for Gardner’s guilty plea, state prosecutors will recommend Gardner serve just two years of probation. The railroad has already paid a fine to the state of some $167,000, reports the Journal Sentinel.

In 2005, according to the criminal complaint, Gardner paid a fine to the State of Wisconsin Ethics Board for a violation of campaign finance laws.

The criminal complaint quotes the railroad’s chief financial officer that state grants and loans to the railroad are “essential” to the railroad’s operations.

In March, Gov. Walker issued a press release that the state had awarded some $14 million in state grants to Wisconsin & Southern for bridge and track rehabilitation and replacement. The Wisconsin & Southern grant announced by Walker was included in a list of more than $25 million in state grants for rail infrastructure projects in the state.

Gov. Walker last year rejected more than $800 million in federal grants for a high-speed rail project for his state.

Wisconsin & Southern operates 700 miles of mainline and branch line track, primarily in southern Wisconsin.

The UTU does not represent Wisconsin & Southern workers.

To read the criminal complaint, click on the following link:

http://media.jsonline.com/documents/railroad-exec-041111.PDF

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. — A Union Pacific machinist here was ordered rehired with back pay in a ruling by the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) that found Union Pacific violated the worker’s rights under the Federal Rail Safety Act of 2007.

OSHA ruled that in firing the machinist, after he had reported a work-related injury, Union Pacific had improperly retaliated against him.

The railroad also was ordered to post a workplace notice admitting it was found to have retaliated against an employee for reporting a work-related injury.

In December 2010, OSHA ordered a UTU member employed by BNSF to be reinstated with back pay after finding BNSF guilty of improper retaliation after the worker filed an injury report with the Federal Railroad Administration.

The Federal Rail Safety Act of 2007 protects rail workers from retaliation and threats of retaliation when they report injuries, report that a carrier violated safety laws or regulations, or if the employee refuses to work under certain unsafe conditions or refuses to authorize the use of any safety related equipment.

Retaliation, including threats of retaliation, is defined as firing or laying off, blacklisting, demoting, denying overtime or promotion, disciplining, denying benefits, failing to rehire, intimidation, reassignment affecting promotion prospects, or reducing pay or hours.

An employer also is prohibited from disciplining an employee for requesting medical or first-aid treatment, or for following a physician’s orders, a physician’s treatment plan, or medical advice.

This protection is known as “whistle-blower protection,” and the federal law is enforced by OSHA, as it was against UP and BNSF.

Relief may include reinstatement with the same seniority and benefits, back pay with interest, compensatory damages (including witness and legal fees), and punitive damages as high as $250,000.

A rail employee may file the complaint directly with OSHA, or may contact a UTU designated legal counsel, general chairperson or state legislative director for assistance.

A listing of UTU designated legal counsel is available at www.utu.org, or may be obtained from local or general committee officers or state legislative directors.

To view a more detailed OSHA fact sheet, click on the following link:

http://www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA-factsheet-whistleblower-railroad.pdf

Effective May 1, Social Security and Railroad Retirement checks for new recipients no longer will be mailed.

Instead, all benefits payments — retirement, survivor and disability — will go electronically to the recipients’ bank accounts via electronic direct deposit.

Those already receiving Social Security and Railroad Retirement benefits via check through the postal service will have until March 1, 2013, to establish direct deposit at a financial institution, or arrange for the benefits to be credited to a debit card.

An advance notice of this change was posted on the UTU website in December. This is a reminder.

An exception will be made for those at least 90 years old and those living in remote areas. Those recipients may continue receiving benefits checks via the postal service indefinitely.

Already, eight of 10 benefits recipients receive benefits electronically through direct deposit.

Electronic payment eliminates the problem of lost or stolen checks, and makes it easier and more prompt for those away from home to ensure payments are available for use.

Beneficiaries who do not have bank or credit union accounts may obtain a Direct Express debit MasterCard by clicking on the following website:

www.GoDirect.org

Or, you may call (800) 333-1795.

For new Railroad Retirement and Social Security recipients, beginning May 1, payment must be accepted as electronic payments.

Beginning May 1, when new recipients apply for benefits, they will be asked to provide bank account information.

If an individual does not have a bank account, payments can be made through Treasury’s Direct Express debit card. The benefit amount will automatically be loaded onto the card, which carries a MasterCard logo and functions as an ordinary debit card.

The debit card may be used for cash withdrawals at a nationwide network of automated teller machines and point-of-sale purchases at most merchants and retailers.

By making electronic payments mandatory, the federal government will realize significant cost savings. Since it only costs 10.5 cents to issue an electronic payment, compared to $1.03 for a paper check, replacing the 136 million federal benefits checks issued in a year with electronic payments will save the federal government more than $120 million annually.