July '07 Executive Vice President's Report

The Union for the Information Age

July 2007 Executive Vice-President's Report
by Stan Wylie, Vice President

Nothing to exciting to report this month. I did spend a lot of time in meetings and working on several grievances. It is starting to sound like an old hat but the company is still up to it's antics in regards to discipline and office policies etc…

I have found that if you look hard enough the company does not seem to treat everyone equally not that they are practicing discrimination by class but maybe on a personal level… I can't really put a finger on it but that’s what it seems like. It seems almost that management decides this individual is causing me too much work so instead of developing and training they decide some sort of discipline is more in order. We will keep an eye on that and continue to point out unfairness in treatment in the workplace.

The Education Committee has met and selected the folks to attend this Years Leadership School opportunities. Bill Engle will be going to 1st year, Alexis Stine will be going to 2nd year and Terry Mitchell as well as myself will be attending 3rd year. These are great opportunities for learning and truly a value to the local in regards to representing our members. I want to thank all the people who applied and congratulate those selected.

In regards to grievances the company continues to work on their timelines but is not hesitant to bring it up if we are not timely. One issue seems to be when we try to problem solve an issue and they drag there feet in responding and when it becomes clear problem solving is not going to work and we have to grieve we could have inadvertently gone over our 30 days. So we will be vigilant in that regard going forward to just file the grievance if we get near the end of the time frame. So far the company has agreed to meet on those but in the future we don't want to be in that position.

At this time last year the Local had filed 70 grievances this year we are at 140. Clearly something is up… Hmm what could it be… about 45 of those are QJD related which have pretty much been resolved. Another 30 or so have been settled or closed in one form or another and currently we have close to 70 open and active grievances that are being worked through the system. Again I can't thank enough all the stewards and AVP's who spend a lot of their personal time working these gathering information and preparing for the meetings. These processes frankly can take a lot of time and do require a lot of effort.

Bargaining begins in a year and will be interesting. With Notebaert leaving and no clue on his successor at this point it is going to be difficult to figure out the new CEO's positions and such. I can only ask that we as union members remember we did what the company asked us to do when they were near bankruptcy and in return they would return the favor. I don't know about you bit I feel like I am still waiting… Oh Wait we are supposed to be thankful for still having a job… True I suppose but it wasn't our fault to be in the mess we were in…It is time for the company to make good on their promise.

On the legislative issues facing our country all I can say is I can't wait till 2008. That said as you have heard before 2006 was great in regards to electing working family candidates but clearly not enough… So hopefully we can continue to gain in 2008. One way to do that is through the COPE program. Funds we voluntarily donate which are then used to help elect candidates in local as well as national races that we believe will work on issues important to working families. So if you are not contributing and need more info please talk with any steward or call the Local.

For our techs out there I would like to send a reminder to please keep a detailed log on your day. The company has a new tool that mirrors tech tab job locations with GPS on vehicle locations to see if what a tech is logged on and the truck is in the same place. It is important because as most of us know you could be logged on a ticket but a couple blocks away doing come cross connects or whatever. The techs just need to have notes so if questioned they can explain if the data does not match. For more information please see a steward or call the local.