Leaders of Teamsters for a Democratic Union met on Sat., Jan. 6 to discuss Teamster reform goals for 2007. Local union reform and winning strong contracts were at the top of their list. At the meeting, TDU’s International Steering Committee (ISC) decided to support the Make UPS Deliver campaign, building a movement of freight Teamsters for a stronger NMFA, and helping groups run for local office on a reform platform.  “UPS wants to keep members...

When your union president writes to you that “it may or may not be that some modifications to the contract are necessary,” then sit on your wallet, because someone may be reaching for it.  On Jan. 9, Teamster President James Hoffa wrote that to 3,700 U.S. carhaulers who work for Allied. Many more Canadian Teamsters work for Allied, where it is not in bankruptcy. Any possible concessions agreed to by the IBT would have to...

March 5, 2007: On Jan. 15, Local 728 proudly joined in the Martin Luther King Day march here in Atlanta, Dr. King’s home and also the headquarters of UPS. It’s time for UPS to recognize the Martin Luther King holiday that our country celebrates, but too many corporations ignore. If we win this at UPS, we can take that win to lots of other Teamster employers. One of UPS’s two big competitors, the Postal Service,...

March 5, 2007: From the LA Times: "On Friday, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court filing in Georgia disclosed plans for Yucaipa to take over Allied Holdings Inc." Click here to read the full article.

Observing Vote Count an Honor I went to Washington to be an observer of the vote count. When I got to the vote count, I walked out into this big open room, filled with tables, chairs, mail bins and lots of noise: people talking, mail bins being moved, votes being counted by the counter. This was really exciting. I was assigned to Remarks and Remakes. Here, ballots that could not be read were either remarked or entirely remade....

CONVOY DISPATCH is the voice of Teamsters for a Democratic Union. We are the united rank and file movement to reform the Teamsters, created out of the merger of PROD and TDU. We are truck drivers, dock workers, production workers—every kind of Teamster, and spouses, too. We are a grassroots organization with chapters from coast to coast in the USA and Canada. We believe in returning this union to the membership and we are doing...

Hit by a 30 percent pension cut, many New York Local 804 Teamsters feel it’s time to fight back. Local 804 President and fund trustee Howie Redmond voted against the cuts, but never informed members that UPS management was seeking cuts. “Local 804’s officers certainly knew we had a problem and that management wanted cuts. Why was that hidden from the members?” said Local 804 alternate steward Jim Reynolds. “Now they’re going to blame everyone...

December 5, 2006: A Look at the Facts & Figures Hoffa won with 65 percent of the vote, in a 21 percent turnout. That is the same margin as in 2001, but with a slightly smaller turnout this year. The Hoffa campaign spent over $3 million to Leedham's $300,000 according to forms filed by each campaign with the Election Supervisor. The IBT and Central States and Western Conference Pension Plans spent millions more on propaganda...

Our union faces serious challenges in the next five years. Reversing pension cuts. Protecting our health benefits. Winning strong contracts. Organizing the nonunion competition that is undercutting us nationally (like UPS Freight) and at the local level. In short, we’ve got to rebuild Teamster Power. It’s no secret that TDU thought Hoffa was the wrong man for this job. One hundred thousand Teamsters agreed. But not enough. It’s no time to cry in our beer....

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