December 5, 2005: TDU members who filed a class action lawsuit against Tyson Foods have won a landmark victory at the Supreme Court that will put millions in the hands of more than 800 meatpacking workers and help tens of thousands of poultry workers win litigation for unpaid wages.

In the first decision of the court under the leadership of Chief Justice John Roberts, the Court cleared the way for 815 Tyson employees to receive $7.3 million in a class action suit originally filed by TDU members in Pasco, Washington in 1998.

In a unanimous decision, the court ruled that workers should be paid for the time it takes them to put on their protective clothing and walk from the locker room to the production line. Previously, Tyson management saved millions of dollars by forcing workers to do this work off the clock.

The case was closely watched by organized labor and big business alike. The victory means that tens of thousands of poultry workers will likely succeed in two nationwide class action cases that are now pending against Tyson.

The Supreme Court victory also paves the way for workers to collect an additional $11.4 million in unpaid wages that they were awarded in 2004 a second class action lawsuit against Tyson. More litigation is expected.

The following is an interview with Bill Gibson, the President of Local 96 in Washington, D.C.

Why is it important for your local to be involved in this activity?

Basically to help out other locals that are having problems with employers. In turn we expect their help when we have problems. We do that through the Washington metro Central Labor Council (CLC), AFL-CIO and through other community agencies such as the Gray Panthers, ACORN and Jobs with Justice (JwJ). We help them out with their fights and then eventually they’ll help us out if we have problems.

What are examples of your own solidarity work?

What the CLC has here is what they call a street heat. They picket employers who are unwilling to let us organize workers for different locals. The Teamster joint council also does picketing. Another program through the CLC and JwJ is the freedom ride for immigrants. Two years ago our local received a golden picket award from the CLC for the most participation in street heats. I’m pretty proud of that.

What basic suggestions would you have for other Teamsters who are interested in getting involved in their areas?

If they have an active CLC in their area to participate in, do that. And if they look around they will find plenty of groups that are trying to work in the community to improve it. Organizations like ACORN and JwJ are nationwide. Even if your local refuses to get active, you may be able to go around the local and work with groups directly.

See these related Articles:
Building Solidarity Beyond Your Work Place or Local
LA TDU Solidarity
Vermont Workers’ Center

The following is an interview with Frank Halstead, a grocery worker at Ralphs in Los Angeles Local 572.

What are some examples of solidarity, within the IBT and without, that your chapter has been involved in?

Our solidarity work is all within the Teamsters. We have our hands full right here!

Currently we have a project around organizing a contract campaign for the Sysco facility. This has tremendous promise because we have numerous issues to rally around and we have a core group of TDUers who work there.

One important thing to keep in mind is that often solidarity work involves coming into play late in the game. For example, we got involved with the International Window workers (Teamster manufacturing workers) after they had been on strike for three months. Although our TDU chapter did a lot of good work, including a picket of the shareholders meeting, things were too far along and the local union in this case was not willing to do what needed to be done to win.

What basic suggestions would you have for other Teamsters who are interested in getting involved in their areas?

Every project we get involved in we have always been able to count on TDU and fellow reformers for sound advice and strategic suggestions.

It is vital to lead by example. Getting involved to help other workers also helps build credibility for TDU. The more people that see the truth about TDU the less effective the old guard’s attacks and lies will be. We are all human and we will make mistakes. Don't let that possibility prevent you from helping other workers. Your sincere desire to help your fellow workers will shine through and you will make a difference

See these related Articles:
Building Solidarity Beyond Your Work Place or Local
Vermont Workers’ Center
Street Heat in DC

Teamster members are taking action now to protect our pensions from dangerous proposed legislation that makes it easier for multi-employer plans to cut retirement benefits.

Your urgent action is needed to contact the leaders of the Senate’s Health Education Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee — and your Congressional Reps and Senators — to ask them to stand up for our retirement security.

he Red Zone Amendment to the Pension Protection Act would allow troubled pension plans to cut benefits that members have already accrued—and even cut the benefits of Teamsters who have already retired for less than one year.

The Pension Protection Act contains many positive provisions. It is supported by the IBT leadership, as well as UPS. But the dangerous Red Zone Amendment was added at the last minute to the House version of the bill (HR2830). This bill will now be considered by the U.S. Senate. The Act should be passed, but without this amendment.

TDU urges you to contact the Chairman and Ranking Democrat of the Senate HELP Committee to urge them to pass the bill without the Red Zone Amendment.

You can also contact your Senators by email or phone. All the information you need is just a click away.

The Red Zone Amendment threatens guarantees that have protected millions of workers from pension cuts. The anti-cutback provisions of ERISA make it illegal to cut benefits that employees have already accrued. Only future pension accruals can be cut.

We know that once a past gain is given away, it is hard to restore it. Help keep the anti-cutback provisions in ERISA. Tell Congress to pass the pension act without the Red Zone Amendment.

Click Here: to take action to protect your pension by emailing the leaders of the Senate HELP Committee.

Click Here: to download a sample fax to Senator Enzi

Click Here: to download a sample fax to Senator Kennedy

After you contact the leaders of the Senate’s HELP Committee, click below to find out how to contact the senators from your home state.

Click Here: to find out how to contact the senators from your state

The Western Conference Pension Fund has announced a big cut in pension accruals, effective July 1. This cut, if it stands, will seriously diminish pensions of those who retire in the coming years. (By law the fund cannot decrease pension credits already earned.)

Teamsters in the West have formed the Western Teamsters Pension Improvement Committee (WESTPIC) and are calling on the trustees to rescind the cut.

The trustees are insisting that they must have “full funding.” Below are answers to some questions on that issue. For more information, webmaster [at] tdu.org (contact TDU).

Why were our pension benefits cut so drastically?

After several years of record growth, the stock market has been in a cyclical downturn.

As the cycle plays itself out the market will rebound. But, in the meantime, the trustees had to choose between keeping the pension fully funded or maintaining our benefits at the historic minimum level set in 1987 (2 percent per year and 2.65 percent for members with over 20 years in the fund).

The employer trustees wanted to maintain full funding and cut our benefits. Our union trustees gave in to the employers. Thus the drastic cuts.

Don’t I want my pension to be fully funded?

“Fully funded” has a reassuring ring to it. But it’s important to understand what full funding is and who it serves.

Full funding means that if every single employer in the fund were to simultaneously go out of business, the fund would still have enough money to pay every Teamster their vested benefits.

But it is absurd to imagine that would ever happen.

That’s why other Teamster pension funds can and do responsibly assure members’ benefits with funding levels of 75, 80 or 90 percent.

Is there a downside to full funding?

Yes. Because employers want full funding, our pension benefits are being slashed!

Trustees take cyclical market swings into account in their plans. But instead of riding out the latest dip in the market, the trustees have cut our pensions, in the name of full funding.

The market will recover, but our pensions won’t. We will never make up the money we will lose while our accrual rate is slahed.

Concerned?

contact [at] nopensioncuts.org (Contact WESTPIC) at PMB #313, 10611 Canyon Rd. East, Puyallup,Wash. 98373 or at www.nopensioncuts.org. Or webmaster [at] tdu.org (contact TDU) for more information or materials.

This will mean earlier retirement and larger monthly checks for many Teamsters who have worked as both part-timers and full-timers at UPS.

Agreement Broken

Central States and the UPS Pension Plan have long had a reciprocity agreement that let members combine years worked in both plans when calculating their retirement benefit.

For example, if a member had 10 credited years as a part-timer in the UPS Plan and 20 credited years as a full-timer in Central States, they could retire with a pro-rated 30-and-out benefit.

The 2002 UPS contract provided that members would be given a full year of pension credit in the UPS Pension Plan for any year in which they had worked over 750 hours as a part-time employee, nine-months credit if they worked between 501 and 749 hours, and three-months credit if they worked between 375 and 500 hours in the year. An age-25 requirement for earning pension credit was also eliminated.

The UPS Pension Plan lived up to this part of the agreement, but the employer and union trustees at Central States refused. Central States said they would not credit members for their part-time years unless the UPS Plan went back to calculating benefits the old way. In other words, they wanted UPS to violate the 2002 contract.

UPS Teamsters who wanted to retire got caught in the crossfire between Central States and UPS. When they would write to ask for an estimate of benefits, instead they would get letters from both sides pointing the finger at one another.

Member Pressure Wins

Some of these Teamsters contacted the Central States Pension Improvement Committee (CSPIC) and TDU.

TDU and CSPIC included these members’ concerns in our movement for pension justice. The publicity generated by TDU and CSPIC - and the threat of legal action - increased the pressure on Central States to settle the matter.

Kevin Bowman, who retired from Cincinnati Local 100 in February, took a leading role in the campaign to get Central States to respect the reciprocity agreement.

Bowman started as a part-timer at UPS when he was 17 years old. He kept at Central States to give him straight answers and pursued his appeals as high as he could with the Central States trustees. He also called on the IBT to intervene and help enforce the contract.

Because of his good work and that of other Teamsters in the pension movement, Bowman will be receiving a big hike in his monthly pension check.

Before the change, his monthly pension check was $2,000. With it, he will now get just under $2,500 a month. Central States also gave him a one-time $2,875 check to cover what they owed him for the months since he retired.

“If it had not been for TDU helping a guy like me make a lot of noise this would not have happened,” says Bowman. “It shows that people going to meetings, throwing money in a bucket, and working together can make a difference.”

Many other UPS Teamsters and their families will also benefit from this win.

“My husband and I fought Central States for almost a year to get the benefits they owe him” says Brenda Kelley, wife of Lexington Local 651 member Jim Kelley. “We filed all our appeals with Central States and even consulted an attorney. But it took getting involved with TDU to win this change. Jim is now looking forward to retirement.”

Central States Teamsters need to bring the same kind of unity and pressure to bear on Central States and the IBT to win back the benefits that were taken from us last November.

As of April 7, U.S. Department of Labor personnel report that no form has been filed, either in paper form or electronically. A spot check of the Department of Labor website reveals that nine of the other ten largest unions have 2005 forms posted.

A request to the International Union for a statement or explanation got no response.

The failure to file was predicted in advance by Hoffa administration insiders, who claim that Hoffa and Keegel want to delay the negative political impact of the contents of the report. LM-2 reports now contain information on union funds paid to PR firms, consultants, and other business associates, as well as salaries to officials.

March 2006: New York City Teamsters rallied on the steps of City Hall on March 5 to protest comments by the head of the city’s Economic Development Corporation (EDC) calling Teamster warehouse workers “the lowest rung workers” whose jobs should be scrapped. Local 805 members have been fighting the city’s EDC, which is trying to shut down the last working port in Brooklyn. Teamster Local 807 jobs are also on the chopping block. Carrying signs that said, “Save my job,” and “We are NOT low-rung workers,” Teamsters rallied on the steps of City Hall along with supporters from other locals and pro-labor politicians. Local 805 President Sandy Pope told the rally, “This city is not run by Wall Street or the city bureaucrats. It is run by the people who move the goods.” Pope called on the mayor to save the port jobs and make a “public commitment to respect the workers of this city.”

Politics of Division

The day before the rally, Local 805 members received a pre-recorded message from the Teamster General President. But Hoffa wasn’t calling members to turn them out for the rally. Instead, Hoffa called to attack Sandy Pope. Hoffa has poured thousands of dollars into the Local 805 delegate election to try to defeat Pope, a candidate for International Vice President. But you would think the General President could put politics aside for one day while members are fighting for their jobs. “The day before we’re uniting at City Hall to save Teamster jobs, including mine, President Hoffa was phoning us to try to divide our local. And he’s the head of the ‘Unity Slate?’ said shop steward Michael Ambrose. “To me, unity is about bringing workers together to win a better future for ourselves. That’s what Sandy Pope has done for us at American Warehousing.” In January, a mobilization by Teamster members forced the Port Authority to allow a blockaded ship to dock at the port so it could be unloaded by Teamsters. That victory has saved their jobs for now. The fight to preserve Teamster port jobs continues. It would be nice if Hoffa would join it.