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WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court will hear an argument by CSX in 2011 challenging standards for rail workers bringing lawsuits under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA), reports Bloomberg.

The decision could affect future FELA cases.

The specific case to be heard, reports Bloomberg, involves a CSX engineer who won a $184,250 FELA award for a hand injury suffered while on duty.

Said Bloomberg, “The case centers on the test for determining whether a railroad’s negligence was the cause of an employee’s injury.”

The federal judge hearing that case, reports Bloomberg, told the jury “that the railroad was responsible for negligence if its negligence ‘played a part — no matter how small — in bringing about the injury.'”

CSX, according to Bloomberg, contends that injured rail workers should meet a more demanding standard, as is required in other types of personal-injury lawsuits not covered by the FELA, which applies only to railroads and their workers.

The more demanding standard would require the employer’s action to be the “primary cause” of the injury, known as “proximate cause” in legal jargon.

The UTU’s negotiating committee and railroads party to the national rail agreement — affecting some 40,000 UTU members — have met seven times since the contract came open for amendment Jan. 1.

“Nothing has been agreed to, but progress is being made on wages, benefits and working conditions,” said UTU International President Mike Futhey. “It is impossible to say that any issue has been finalized until all issues are agreed on.”

The existing national agreement remains in force until amendments are concluded under provisions of the Railway Labor Act.

Carriers in national handling, under the umbrella of the National Carriers’ Conference Committee (NCCC), include BNSF, CSX, Kansas City Southern, Norfolk Southern, Union Pacific and many smaller railroads.

In addition to UTU lead negotiator President Futhey, UTU officers on the negotiating team include Assistant President Arty Martin; UTU International Vice Presidents Robert Kerley and Delbert Strunk; and General Chairpersons John Lesniewski (GO 049), Pate King (GO 680) and Doyle Turner (GO 347).

Negotiations also continue between the NCCC and two rail-labor coalitions.

One, led by the Teamsters Rail Conference, includes the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes, the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen, the Brotherhood of Boilermakers and Blacksmiths, the National Conference of Firemen and Oilers, and the Sheet Metal Workers International Association.

The other, which has asked for mediation under provisions of the Railway Labor Act, includes the Transportation Communications Union, the American Train Dispatchers Association, the International Association of Machinists, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and the Transport Workers Union.

A zero-tailpipe-emissions transit bus is in the works from GE Global Research, report canadiandriver.com and wired.com.

The new technology, according to canadiandriver.com, combines an energy-dense sodium batter with a high-power lithium battery, and could “help accelerate the electrification of bus fleets by combining the best qualities of each battery for cost efficiency.”

GE is pursuing the research in conjunction with the U.S. Federal Transit Administration and Northeast Advanced Vehicle Consortium, reports wired.com.

Canadiandriver.com explains that lithium batteries, while providing power, “are not optimized to store energy for driving range, while sodium batteries store large amounts of energy but are less optimized for power. The key cost advantage of a dual system is that it provides flexibility to integrate less-expensive battery chemistry without having to increase the size of the battery to address the vehicle’s power and energy storage needs,” reports canadiandriver.com.

“Over the past decade,” reports the Minneapolis Star Tribune, “court records show [that] judges around the country have disciplined BNSF after finding that the company or its lawyers broke rules aimed at ensuring fair legal proceedings in 13 cases involving collisions or workplace injuries.

 “From Minnesota to California, BNSF has drawn judicial penalties for misconduct,” reports the Star Tribune in a four-part investigative series. Links to all four parts of the series are found at the end of this article, along with BNSF’s response.

 The newspaper says judges have cited BNSF for “a range of actions, including destroying evidence and other obstructive discovery practices. In four of those cases, judges declared mistrials or ordered new trials after concluding the company or its attorneys engaged in misconduct.”

 The Star Tribune quotes BNSF officials as “strongly” denying allegations that BNSF “has attempted to thwart the legal system in lawsuits over deaths or injuries related to the railroad’s operations.”
 
BNSF attorney Charles Shewmake told the Star Tribune that “litigation is an adversarial process where both sides try hard to win. Occasionally, Shewmake said, attorneys on both sides break the rules.”

 BNSF launched a dedicated webpage Dec. 5 to refute the Star Tribune’s allegations, saying:

 “Criticisms of our conduct in court occurred in a miniscule fraction of a percent of the cases involving our railroad over the past decade. The Minneapolis Star Tribune has chosen to focus on those very few cases to falsely portray BNSF as not committed to safety and ethical conduct when our overall record plainly refutes this. The Star Tribune also has failed to fairly report on the extent to which plaintiffs’ counsel and plaintiffs themselves have been sanctioned by the courts.”

 The Star Tribune did report that “BNSF has complained repeatedly about plaintiffs’ attorneys abusing the legal system by making burdensome demands for evidence and deposition testimony. In June, a federal judge in Seattle was so irritated at a noted Minneapolis rail attorney in an injury case brought by a BNSF worker that he ordered him to explain why he shouldn’t be disqualified from representing the worker,” reported the newspaper.

 The Star Tribune recalled that in 2004, the New York Times reported on other railroads alleged to have “engaged in cover-ups to hide their responsibility for rail crossing accidents.” That 2004 series, written by Walt Bogdanich, assistant editor of the Times’ investigative desk, won a Pulitzer Prize — the third Pulitzer Prize won by Bogdanich for investigative reporting.

 To read Part 1 of the Minneapolis Star Tribune series, click on the following link:

 www.startribune.com/investigators/111318284.html?elr=KArks:DCiU6:5DiaPQEacyiUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aULPQL7PQLanchO7DiU

 To read Part 2 of the Minneapolis Star Tribune series, click on the following link:

www.startribune.com/investigators/111318324.html?elr=KArks:DCiUHc3E7_V_nDaycUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aULPQL7PQLanchO7DiUr

 To read Part 3 of the Minneapolis Star Tribune series, click on the following link:

 www.startribune.com/investigators/111405579.html

 To read Part 4 of the Minneapolis Star Tribune series, click on the following link:

 http://www.startribune.com/investigators/111461894.html?elr=KArks:DCiU6:5DiaPQEacyiUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aULPQL7PQLanchO7DiU

 To read the BNSF response, click on the following link:

  www.bnsf.com/media/casefacts/

All UTU locals are now required to make federal tax payments on-line using the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System (EFTPS).

This is because the Internal Revenue Service announced that effective Jan. 1, 2011, it no longer will accept Form 8109 FTD (federal tax deposit) coupons for filing federal tax payments.

The EFTPS is a free service from the Treasury Department. It is available by phone or online 24/7.

UTU treasurers should start using EFTPS beginning with December 2010 payroll tax liability payments due in January 2011. An exemption will be for employers who have $2,500 or less in quarterly payroll tax liability for 941 returns and pay this liability when filing the return.

Note that federal tax payments due Jan. 15, 2011, for the December payroll tax liability will not be accepted if you try to pay with a paper coupon. Any December 2010 federal payroll tax payment due on any date of January 2011 must be submitted electronically, either by phone or online. Therefore, you must be set up for electronic filing before Dec. 31.

If you are already making deposits using EFTPS, you need to do nothing.

Failure to remit your payroll tax payment electronically after Jan. 1, 2011 may result in a 10 percent penalty charge on the deposit amount for each non-electronic payment.

A letter with more information is being mailed to treasurers.

A cost-of-living adjustment will be made Jan. 1 to UTU-member wages governed by the national rail contract.

The amount of the COLA, based on a formula contained in the national rail contract, is three cents per hour.

The COLA reflects a low rate of consumer inflation. By contrast, Railroad Retirement and Social Security benefits will be frozen at the 2010 level in 2011 owing to the low-rate of consumer inflation as calculated by the U.S. Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The national rail contract also provides that health care insurance cost sharing will increase slightly in 2011. Effective Jan. 1, the employee contribution will be $202.90 monthly for operating craft employees, and $202.71 for yardmasters. The difference is due to the straight-time equivalent-hours component in the national rail contract formula that determines health care insurance cost sharing.

To view the 2008 national rail agreement, click on the following link:

https://static.smart-union.org/worksite/PDFs/Agreements/utu_nccc_070108.pdf

SUPERIOR, Wis. — A BNSF employee was killed at a taconite facility Dec. 1, reports the Duluth News-Tribune.

Kelly Yadron, 43, “was found pinned between two steel beams beside a conveyer belt,” a Superior fire chief told the newspaper. He was a member of the Transportation Communications Union.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating the accident.

It has been fifty-five years since Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Ala., bus — “an act that challenged the moral conscience of an entire nation,” said President Obama Dec. 1 in honoring her legacy

Most historians date the beginning of the modern civil rights movement in the United States to Rosa Park’s act of courage on Dec. 1, 1955.

The Montgomery bus boycott lasted 382 days and brought Parks to the attention of the world. The Supreme Court subsequently struck down the Montgomery ordinance under which Parks had been fined, and outlawed racial segregation on public transportation.

Obama said the Montgomery bus boycott “marked a turning point in American history … and the eventual outlawing of racial segregation and discrimination. 

“Rosa Parks and the many other leaders and foot soldiers in that struggle for justice championed our founding principles of freedom and equality for all, and today, as we commemorate the anniversary of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, I encourage all Americans to honor their legacy — the legacy of Americans who marched bravely, worked tirelessly, and devoted their lives to the never-ending task of making our country a more perfect union,” said Obama.   

In 1996, President Clinton presented Parks with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She received a Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.

After her death in 2005, at age 92, Parks’ casket was placed in the rotunda of the United States Capitol for two days — making her the only the only woman and second African-American in American history to lie in state at the Capitol.

A Federal Railroad Administration safety specialist has been honored with an Excellence Award by the U.S. Department of Transportation for what Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood called “his role in uncovering the widespread failure of a Class I railroad to maintain their fleet of equipment up to the federal standards.”

Honored was FRA Motive Power & Equipment Specialist Timothy McQuaid, assigned to the agency’s Region 4 office in Chicago. The railroad was CN, and the violations McQuaid documented occurred within Region 4, which includes Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

“Because of McQuaid’s efforts,” said LaHood, “the railroad committed to upgrading their inspection and oversight processes, improving safety on our nation’s freight corridors.”
 
According to the FRA, McQuaid “demonstrated superior initiative, leadership, and tenacious attention to duty in finding widespread failure of a Class 1 railroad to conduct proper mechanical inspections on their equipment and locomotives. 

“Over the course of the past year, Mr. McQuaid reviewed hundreds of reports from his inspectors, studied the reports on mechanically caused accidents on the railroad, and conducted countless inspections across the region to determine, first hand, the widespread failure by the railroad to maintain their fleet of equipment up to federal standards,” said agency is honoring McQuaid.

“During 2009,” said the FRA, “Mr. McQuaid noticed an increase in the mechanically caused derailments on a Class 1 railroad. He deployed his inspectors to the key terminals, inspecting for the mechanical defects identified as the causes for the derailments.

“Inspecting after the railroad’s carmen had performed their mechanical inspection, Mr. McQuaid’s inspectors discovered a consistent failure on the railroad’s part to correctly identify and repair these defects. He personally conducted scores of inspections and interviews with employees to ascertain the level of managerial culpability. Following this preliminary phase of his fact finding mission, he thoroughly documented his findings and presented it to the railroad and to the regional FRA leadership. 

“The railroad was not convinced of his findings, and dismissed the findings as ‘minor,'” said the FRA. 

“In the face of these obstacles, Mr. McQuaid briefed his supervisor, recommended a series of mechanical audits to identify the breadth and scope of the non-compliance, and led a multi-state, multi-regional audit,” said the FRA. “After several audits spanning months and meetings with railroad officials, the railroad began to conduct their own internal audit to determine the seriousness of the offense.  

“During a joint FRA-railroad senior management meeting, the railroad acknowledged the seriousness of their shortcomings, identified the need for improved training standards, focus on safety rather than performance, and began tracking all mechanical inspections performed by their personnel,” said the FRA. “In addition, the railroad has committed to upgrading their inspection and oversight processes.”

Concluded the FRA, “Mr. McQuaid’s thorough inspection and meticulous documentation of the audits and the findings were reviewed at the highest levels of FRA, and was the key factor in strengthening federal oversight of the railroad’s mechanical inspection process and implementation.”

WASHINGTON — Long term federal unemployment benefits expired Dec. 1 for hundreds of thousands of jobless as the lame-duck Congress failed to take action to extend them. Millions more will lose benefits if Congress does not act.

Federal unemployment benefits had begun after an initial 26 weeks of state-provided jobless benefits.

If Congress does not extend those federal benefits, the 26 weeks of state-provided unemployment benefits will be the maximum for most American jobless, although individual states can provide additional assistance.

The New York Times reported earlier this week that there are five applicants for every available job.

The Associated Press, quoting the National Employment Law Project, says 26 states will phase out extended benefits between Dec. 4 and Jan. 1.

Ten states, however, guarantee some extended benefits when unemployment is high, no matter what Congress does. They are Alaska, Connecticut, Kansas, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island and Washington state.

The Labor Department, according to the Associated Press, estimates that 635,000 jobless will lose federal unemployment benefits this week; an additional 1.6 million will lose them by Christmas; and 3.29 million jobless Americans will be cutoff by Jan. 29, if Congress does not act.

The Associated Press said that those who run out of jobless benefits must depend on food stamps. The number of food stamp recipients is already at a record-high 42.4 million, said the Associated Press.