December 22, 2010: Over 75 waste Teamsters came from across Southern California to discuss their rights and how to enforce them at the TDU Southern California Chapter meeting. “We have a lot of new members at Waste Management,” said Rodrigo Hermudes, a Local 396 member at Waste Management in Chino. “I want to help show the new members how to protect their rights. If we don’t, the company will walk all over us.” Members came...

December 20, 2010: The weather was terrible with wind and rain when we brought Sandy Pope to meet with Teamsters here in Sacramento. Nevertheless, we got a great response from the members we met and we’ve formed a committee of members to put together a delegate slate supporting Sandy. First stop was Campbell’s Soup, the second-largest employer in Local 150. We had already been petitioning there before, so members were familiar with Sandy and excited...

Hear from new members about why they joined TDU. And find out how you can help make a difference, too. Winning with TDU “When we were organizing to take back our local, we turned to TDU leaders and TDU’s knowledge and experience to help us understand what works and what doesn’t. “Now we’re taking those tools to win strikes and better contracts for Local 814 members. “Our union needs TDU. Join TDU if you want...

December 16, 2010: James Hoffa has picked five more candidates to fill out his slate running for International officer posts next November. His final five candidates are Sean O’Brien, Steve Pocztowski, Steve Vairma, Kevin Moore, and Jim Kabell. O’Brien is the president of Boston Local 25 and Joint Council 10 and is running for International VP for the east; Pocztowski is the secretary treasurer of Chicago Local 705 and is running for VP for the...

December 15, 2010: Teamster members collected 50,000 signatures to successfully accredit Sandy Pope as a candidate for General President. The Sandy Pope Campaign turned in the petitions to the Election Supervisor on Tuesday, Dec. 14, easily surpassing the 33,437 signatures required by the election rules. As a result, Sandy and the campaign will be able to reach out directly to 1.3 million Teamsters, including in the pages of the February issue of the Teamster magazine....

December 10, 2010: The International union has responded in detail to the lawsuit filed by ABF against the IBT and YRCW. The lawsuit demands that ABF be given concessions by the IBT to match those given to YRCW and approved by YRCW Teamsters. A point-by-point response is provided in an affidavit by Jim McCall, the IBT attorney for the Freight Division. That document is available here.

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December 2, 2010: Are you thinking about running for delegate to the Teamster Convention? Now is the time to get started. Almost all Teamster locals will hold an election early next year for delegates and alternate delegates to attend the Teamster Convention, which will be held in Las Vegas on June 27 – July 1, 2011. Why delegates are important The Convention will nominate candidates to run for Teamster president, and all the vice president...

Updated November 22, 2010: YRC local management wasted no time abusing the newly ratified agreement at the barns. At Chicago Heights, they laid off some 50 Local 705 drivers. These include Teamsters who shuttle trailers to the rail yard: now the company claims they can have road drivers do the shuttle work en route. Chicago drivers are up in arms over this betrayal. They see it as corporate revenge because Local 705 members have been...

November 19, 2010: YRC local management wasted no time scurrying to implement the newly ratified agreement at the barns, and in ways that destroy long-standing practices. At the Copley Ohio breakbulk, their high-handed actions included firing a shop steward for a nonexistent work slowdown. A strong pushback from members and Local 24 helped to reinstate the steward and to stop unilateral changes, at least for now. Normally contract changes as big as those in the...