Support Locked Out Waste Management Teamsters
July 10, 2007: Waste Management has locked out 500 Teamsters in Oakland, Calif. for refusing to give in to company demands that they pay a larger share of their healthcare benefits. The lockout is entering its second week. These locked out Teamsters deserve our full support. Teamsters Local 70 and Waste Management met with a mediator on Monday, July 9th but both sides reported no progress. The company has brought in 200 scabs but has...
YRC Watching Teamsters' Negotiations with UPS
July 9, 2007: By Randolph Heaster:The Teamsters union has begun contract talks with UPS that could affect the direction of future negotiations with YRC Worldwide Inc. and other unionized trucking companies. Although the current contract with the parcel giant does not expire until the end of July 2008, bargaining has already begun in hopes of obtaining a new agreement early. One issue that UPS has put on the table is pension benefits for the company’s...
TDU Exposes Payoff: Union Investigates Haynes
July 3, 2007: The International Union and New York Local 237 claim to be investigating HMO "consultant" payments received by International VP Carroll Haynes. This action came in response to a report in the June Convoy Dispatch, following research by TDU. Haynes, who has routinely made over $300,000 from his multiple salaries and pensions, has been pulling down an extra $54,500 as a "consultant" to Health Insurance Plans (HIP) of New York. HIP provides benefits...
Pension Rights Center: Pension Bill Introduced in Senate
June 28, 2007: At a press conference today, Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) introduced the Restoring Pension Promises to Workers Act of 2007, which contains a number of provisions “to help ensure Americans’ pensions will be there for them when they retire.” For one, the bill would create an Office of Participant Advocacy, which would be a resource for people who are affected by shortcomings in the laws. The bill also includes a provision that would...
Former CF Teamsters Finally Get Paid
June 28, 2007: Former Consolidated Freightways Teamsters are receiving checks this week in partial payment of moneys owed to them for the past five years. CF Teamsters who do not receive checks soon should contact their local union. The first check received covered most of the WARN Act settlement of $2150 for the abrupt closure, in the "Labor Day Massacre" of 2002, when over 10,000 Teamsters lost their jobs. The second check should cover a...
Pensions Dominate Teamsters’ Talks with UPS, Freight Carriers
June 26, 2007: Logistics Management says there is good news for shippers in our union's current round of bargaining with UPS, and in the upcoming NMFA negotiations. "There is scant chance of a national strike as happened 10 years ago when Teamsters walked out against UPS and when they struck the LTL sector in 1994." The article notes that Ken Hall is "seriously considering" UPS management's proposal to split up the Central States Pension. "That’s...
Part Time America Won’t Work
June 20, 2007: Do Hoffa and Hall still believe in the principle that powered our 1997 strike victory? When we drew the line at UPS in 1997, we did more than win a strong contract. We won a stronger future at UPS. Now that legacy is in jeopardy. In 1997, Teamster unity forced the company to create 10,000 new full-time jobs—by combining 20,000 part-time jobs. Still smarting from the 1997 strike, UPS management agreed to...
Traffic World: Playing the Freight Card
June 18, 2007: By John Gallagher, for Traffic World - Pension benefits are in play as never before in the current round of negotiations between UPS and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, and the future of LTL giants YRC Worldwide and Arkansas Best - as well as UPS's own freight division - may hang in the balance. When the $48 billion parcel giant inked its last deal for 230,000 union drivers in 2002, it had...
Yellow Wants to Close Columbus Breakbulk
June 18, 2007: Yellow has given the union a proposed change of operations that would lead to the closing of the Columbus Ohio breakbulk and road operation. Local 413 would lose 182 jobs (92 road plus 90 dock, shop and yard). The work would be aligned, most of it through Chicago, Cleveland and Indianapolis. Management wants the proposal to be heard and approved by the Change of Operations committee on July 17. For a copy...
Oregon Set to Ensure Freedom to Form Unions for Public Employees
Jun 12, 2007, By Mike Hall: Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski (D) is poised to sign legislation that will give the state’s public employees the freedom to form a union when the majority of employees at a workplace put their signatures on union authorization cards. Yesterday, the Oregon Senate approved the majority sign-up legislation, which also allows workers to opt for an election if they so choose. It now goes back to the House, which approved...