Unions contribute to affordable housing in NYC

The shortage is workforce housing is a real problem in cities and towns across the country. But five New York City union pension systems are doing what they can to help problem, investing some $150 million in projects to erect 20,000 units of affordable housing in the Big Apple, the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust (HIT) announced.

The money is being sent to the HIT to leverage some $1 billion in total investment in the housing in all five boroughs, the trust added in a mid-October statement. Union labor will build the housing in an economically targeted investment program. Economically targeted investments are designed to address market inefficiencies by providing capital or liquidity to under-served communities and populations across the city, added Comptroller Scott Stringer, New York City’s chief financial officer.

Stringer also advised the union pension systems on the projects. Working with the HIT on investing in housing “is a fiscally smart marriage of resources and housing policy,” he added. The investments provide market returns to the pension funds, HIT noted.

The HIT invests in affordable housing, and sometimes other projects, nationwide. As its key condition, union labor totally builds all the projects. But the new New York investment marks the first phase of a new HIT strategy for investing in the city over the next seven years, Housing Trust Chief Executive Stephen Coyle said.

The strategy, developed by HIT, union leaders, developers, community groups and Stringer’s staff, “aims to preserve the affordability of 12,500 to 15,000 housing units, construct 5,000 to 7,500 new housing units” and to “work with city and state agencies to finance and improve affordable public housing,” the Housing Investment Trust stated.

HIT estimated the seven-year plan would produce 7,300 union construction jobs, double that number in total jobs and $1 billion in wages and benefits to workers.

• Press Associates contributed to this report.

Today's Teamster News 07.10.15

Teamsters
Local 330 PACE Bus Drivers Secure Strong Contracts  The Teamsters  ...Full- and part-time PACE River Division bus drivers represented by Teamsters Local 330 recently ratified separate collective bargaining agreements guaranteeing new raises and enhanced job security. The Teamsters voted overwhelmingly to approve new seven-year contracts, which provide fair and equitable wage increases...
Teamster Magazine: About, For and Printed By Teamsters  Teamster.org  ...Recently, the printing operation of the magazine was awarded to a company near Milwaukee, the Arandell Corporation. Arandell employs hundreds of employees at their facility, many of whom are members of the IBT’s Graphic Communications Conference Local 577m. Quality workmanship is what Arandell is known for and the Teamsters Union has already received compliments on the improvement...
New Contracts For Niles Police, Fire  Journal and Topics ...Niles village trustees approved five-year retroactive union contracts with patrolmen and firefighters Tuesday, July 2. Both groups have been working without contracts since 2012. The deals, both with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 700, expire in 2017...
Cranesville Truckers Picket In Scotia  Albany Times Union   ...Unionized truck drivers walked the picket line at Cranesville Ready Mix in Scotia Wednesday in a dispute over who would pay for health insurance in their new contract. Bill Latulipe, shop steward for Teamsters Local 294, which represents about 20 drivers at the plant and another in Albany, said the company "gave us a final offer," telling the union "to take it or leave it"...
Teamsters Local 357 Files Lawsuit Against Republic Airways  Teamster.org   ...Today, Teamsters Local 357 in Plainfield, Ind., filed a lawsuit against Republic Airways for unilaterally changing pilots’ working conditions regarding “open time” flying without first agreeing with the union about those changes. More than 2,200 Republic pilots are members of Local 357 and have been seeking a fair contract from the company since 2007...
Medford Mayoral Candidate Stephanie Muccini Burke Scores Two More Union Endorsements  Medford Transcript   ...“Teamsters Local No. 25 officers, agents and the entire membership is pleased to support your campaign for mayor of Medford with a donation from our DRIVE political action committee,” wrote President Sean O’Brien. “Teamsters Local Union No. 25 is an organization made up of 11,000 members from across Greater Boston including nearly 400 active and retired members that live in the city of Medford...
In Rare Step, Workers At California Group Home Unionize  ProPublica   ...Workers at a former orphanage in San Francisco that now functions as a large group home for troubled children have unionized -- a rare step by frontline employees who work at facilities that can be both demanding and dangerous...
Hoffa Statement On State Department's Upgrading Of Malaysia On Trafficking List  Teamster.org   ...Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa in response to reports that the State Department is about to upgrade the Malaysian government’s standing in its annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report in an effort to smooth the approval of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP): “For years, we have heard from TPP supporters that this 12-nation deal will improve labor conditions for workers around the world. Yet the public can now see there are no obstacles Pacific Rim trade supporters are unwilling to push aside in order to get this agreement done."...

Global Labor &Trade
Japan, U.S. resume working-level TPP talks  Japan News ... Japanese and U.S. government officials resumed their talks related to Trans-Pacific Partnership multilateral free trade negotiations in Tokyo on Thursday, seeking breakthroughs on differences over “sensitive” rice and auto parts trade. Tokyo and Washington will hold the working-level talks through Friday, ahead of the upcoming ministerial meeting of the 12 TPP-negotiating countries...
Obama To Upgrade Malaysia On Human Rights Despite Mass Graves  Huffington Post  ...The Obama administration will remove Malaysia from its official list of the world's worst human trafficking offenders, according to Reuters, a move human rights advocates fear will damage U.S. credibility. The maneuver would allow the administration to continue negotiating a controversial trade agreement with Malaysia and 10 other Pacific nations...
Are Human Rights Violations Already Being Trumped By Corporate Trade Deal?  Common Dreams  ...The Obama administration is reportedly poised to upgrade the ranking it gives Malaysia on its efforts to stamp out human trafficking.  The move is being criticized as an affront to human rights that could help move forward a pending controversial trade deal. The State Department gives the ranking it its annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report...
Radical austerity’s brutal lies: How Krugman and Chomsky saw through dehumanizing neoliberal spin  (opinion) Salon  ...The referendum in Greece refuting the European Union’s unbending insistence on radical austerity as the medicine Greeks must continue to swallow is simply not to be missed for its multiple layers of significance. To put the core take-home first, we are all Greeks as they stand against the neoliberal orthodoxy. Their battle is perfectly of a piece with one that needs to be called by its name and waged in our great country...
Sharing the Voices of Marginalized People in Pakistan  Solidarity Center  ...“Our problem is that since we are the residents of [the] riverside and known as ‘Boat People,’ our children are suffering,” says a man who lives along the Indus River in Pakistan. The residents of his community make baskets and sell fish, and transport people along the river with boats they spend months making by hand. Some say “these sailors are self-dependent, they are not a burden on the Pakistan economy,” explains politician Zartaj Gul. But in reality, she says, “we have cornered them and made them the untouchables of Pakistan"...
Possible Greece Bailout Deal Emerges As Pro-European Greeks Rally In Athens  Vice   ...The proposals are currently being evaluated by the European Commission, European Central Bank, and International Monetary Fund. On Friday morning, French President Francois Hollande described them as "serious and credible," but stressed that nothing was final...

State & Living Wage Battles
The Struggle For Fairness For Transgender Workers  New York Times   ...Americans’ understanding of transgender people has been shaped recently by the riveting, glamorous lives of the former Olympian Caitlyn Jenner and the actress Laverne Cox. The two, though, are far from representative of an economically disadvantaged community that continues to face pervasive employment discrimination, partly as a result of lagging legal protections...
NLRB Backs Off -- For Now -- From Undermining State Right-To-Work Laws  Business Journals   ...The NLRB suspended a request for briefs on whether it should allow unions to collect fees in right-to-work states from non-union workers who are represented by unions in grievance procedures. That’s because the case that prompted this request has been settled...
Chris Christie Looks Likely To Veto New Jersey Voting Reforms  Huffington Post   ...The Democracy Act was passed out of the state Senate on June 29 and sent to Christie's desk. The bill would introduce online voter registration, establish in-person early voting, require that election materials be available in more languages, allow pre-registration for 17-year-olds and enact automatic voter registration when voters apply for driver's licenses. It would also require the governor to appoint temporary U.S. senators from the same party as outgoing senators...
Slay Proposes Compromise Setting City Minimum Wage At $11 Per Hour By 2020  St. Louis Post Dispatch   ...Mayor Francis Slay is proposing a compromise bill setting a city minimum wage of $11-an-hour by 2020. Slay and Alderman Shane Cohn had originally proposed instituting a $15-an-hour minimum wage within the same time frame, but the bill was met with opposition and a series of delays...
Florida Court Finds Politics Determined District Lines  New York Times   ...The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday rejected political gerrymandering by state legislators and ordered eight congressional districts redrawn within 100 days, a decision likely to complicate preparations for next year’s elections...

U.S. Labor
The Real Problem With Jeb Bush’s Claim That People Need To Work Longer Hours  Think Progress  ...Bush claimed that if workers were able to get scheduled for more hours, they would “through their productivity gain more income for their families.” Obviously more hours would equal a larger paycheck. But Bush’s suggestion that being more productive will produce individual prosperity for American workers in the 21st century is flat wrong...

Miscellaneous
Organizing for Affordable Housing in the South  Truthout  ...Stagnant wages, ballooning rental costs and the shrinking supply of affordable housing are heaping an ever-growing burden on low-income families. "Out of Reach," a new study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, found minimum-wage workers can no longer afford an average one-bedroom apartment in any state in America. Since 2009, the federal baseline wage has remained stagnant, but rents have jumped 15.2 percent...
Are Uber And Lyft Driving Recalled Cars?  American Prospect   ...It turns out that despite Uber and Lyft’s public rhetoric about safety, consumers that use these services may be riding in vehicles with unfixed safety recalls. Neither company requires its drivers to repair recalled cars; in fact, the mandatory safety inspections do not even involve checking to see if a car has been recalled...
The Arne Duncan Era Has Not Been Good For Students  Common Dreams   ...When Obama was elected, many educators and parents thought that Obama would bring a new vision of the federal role in education, one that freed schools from the test-and-punish mindset of George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind. But Arne Duncan and Barack Obama had a vision no different from George W. Bush and doubled down on the importance of testing...
Feds: Hackers Stole Data Of 21.5 Million People  Politico   ...Hackers stole sensitive information on 21.5 million people in a recently disclosed cyber-attack that breached the federal government’s database of security background checks, the Office of Personnel Management disclosed Thursday...
George W. Bush Charged $100K For Speech At Wounded Veterans Event  The Hill   ...Former President George W. Bush billed a charity for wounded military veterans $100,000 in speaking fees three years ago, a new report says...
Marking Historic Moment, South Carolina Removes Confederate Flag  NPR   ...During an emotional ceremony and amid popular cheers, the Confederate battle flag was brought down from a 30-foot flagpole that sits on the grounds of the Statehouse in Columbia, S.C. The historic ceremony marked the end of an era and was conducted by South Carolina state troopers, who marched in formation in front of a cheering crowd of hundreds...
New York City To Relax Bail Requirements For Low-Level Offenders  New York Times   ...New York City officials announced a plan on Wednesday to change bail requirements for some low-level offenders in an effort to keep thousands of people accused of nonviolent crimes and misdemeanors out of the troubled Rikers Island jail complex...

NYC carriage horses are angst-free, report finds

Opponents of the iconic New York City horse-drawn carriage industry have repeatedly told anyone who would listen that the practice is inhumane to the animals used in such work. A new report, however, proves otherwise.

A study conducted by a California-based professor specializing in equine medicine found the horses to be stress-free, even after a full day of working in Central Park. Joe Bertone, who teaches at Western University of Health Sciences, said he and his team looked at the level of cortisol in 13 carriage horses over a three-day period in August. Cortisol is a hormone produced when animals and humans are stressed.

Horses were examined four times a day, including both before and after they went out on the job. Their body temperature was checked and saliva samples were taken. And he told the New York Daily News they showed no signs of distress:

I couldn't find more content animals. They were very relaxed.

But what about all the stories about mistreated horses? Those must be true, right? No. The only ones being mistreated are 300 Teamster workers who operate these carriages and bring happiness to thousands of riders each year.

It's time to end this failed campaign, Mayor Bill de Blasio!

New York's new mayor's top priority: Get rid of Teamster jobs

Our Teamster Brother Steve Malone.

It seems there's only one person on the planet who thinks New York City's top priority is to ban horse-drawn carriages and eliminate the drivers' good Teamster jobs.

Unfortunately, that person is the new mayor of New York City, Bill deBlasio.

DeBlasio says he'll replace the iconic carriages with electric replicas of antique cars. (We're not kidding.) Teamsters Local 553 is fighting to save the jobs of the 100 carriage drivers who, by all accounts (except for obsessed animal rights activists) treat their horses very, very well.

George Miranda, Teamsters Joint Council 16 president, said:

Our members in the iconic Central Park horse drawn carriage industry are proud of their heritage, take tremendous care of their horses and support their families with good blue collar jobs. The Teamsters will fight for their survival.

Demos Demopolous, secretary-treasurer of Teamsters Local 553, is leading the fight. He told Politico:

We are against the thought of the electric car replacing the horse carriage industry. 

These are all horse people. This is what they do.

(To help save the jobs of our equestrian brothers and sisters, click here.)

Here are just some of the people who think Mayor deBlasio has, um, the wrong priorities.

Actor Liam Neeson:

I was in the stables today and many days over the past few years, I know some of these guys, and I just hate how they’re — the horse-drawn carriage industry is being attacked nowadays...these are the fittest, well-fed, best kept horses I’ve ever seen. I’m a horse rider and lover for many, many years.

Jimmy Fallon:

He wants to get rid of horse-drawn carriages in Central Park because they're inhumane. Meanwhile, thousands of unemployed New Yorkers said, 'I'll pull the carriage.'

American Spectator writer Robert Stacy McCain:

Defenders of the carriage industry point to a real-estate executive who is one of de Blasio's major campaign donors as the driving force behind the effort to abolish the carriages.

Journalist Michael Gross, writing about real-estate executive Steve Nislick:

What are the odds that good neighbor Nislick, the out-of-state real estate developer, simply covets those valuable, underdeveloped New York lots — and has teamed up with ambitious pols to use the emotions of animal rights activists as fuel for their own agendas?

The Daily Beast columnist Nick Gillespie:

A hundred-plus years of tradition and a hundred-plus jobs (for humans) gone, just like that, because de Blasio believes that horse-drawn carriages “are not humane.”

New York Times writer Andrew Rosenthal:

Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio ... has a problem prioritizing. While we wait for him to appoint his team (oh so slowly) and we wonder what his policies are going to be, exactly, on things like schools, Mr. de Blasio announced yesterday that one of his first acts will be … to ban carriage horses from Central Park.

Conservative Washington Examiner columnist Judson Phillips:

De Blasio is starting his term as dictator by dictating. He is dictating a group of people out of their jobs. These are the iconic horse drawn carriages in New York.

Christina Hansen, carriage driver and liaison for the Horse and Carriage Association of New York City:

De Blasio has never visited our stables,” , told FoxNews.com. “This really has nothing to do with the welfare of the horses. If it did, we could sit down with Mayor de Blasio or the City Council ... and have a discussion. This is about radical animal rights ideology, it’s about money power, politics and real estate. 

Dr. Harry Warner, former chairman of American Association of Equine Practitioners' (AAEP) Equine Welfare Committee, who examined the horses:

I didn't see a single horse that didn't show all the signs that we associate with contentment.

James Baussmann, a senior account manager with Text100 Boston, a global communications firm:

It should be left alone! My wife and I just moved from NYC after 10 years of living in Manhattan/Queens. A hansom cab ride was/is on our ‘NYC bucket list’ that we created before we moved. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to it before we moved … and now we’re afraid we’ll never get the chance.

Father Brian Jordan, Rabbi Gershon Tannenbaum and Maryam Kashmir, president of the Muslim Student Association at St. Francis College, writing in the New York Daily News:

Many of New York City’s horse carriage drivers ... have followed a calling to work with animals, and they have been denied basic respect by those seeking to ban their carriages. These drivers must be permitted to continue their good work and carry on the tradition of caring and respecting the horses that help provide them a fair living.

Rush Limbaugh:

...these people think that automobiles and fossil-fueled vehicles are destroying the climate and would love to take us back to the horse and buggy days, except the new mayor of New York thinks it is cruel and inhumane for horses to pull carriages with people in them.

Once again, help our brothers and sisters out. Click here.

NYC Teamsters begin campaign to create good commercial waste jobs

Teamsters Joint Council 16 President George Miranda with Sean Campbell,
president of Teamsters Local 813.

(Updates to add photo)

New York City Teamsters and their allies have high hopes for a campaign launched today to increase good jobs, recycling and justice in the commercial waste industry. New Yorkers are paying attention.

This morning the New York Daily News reported the Alliance for a Greater New York (ALIGN)  is recommending the city adopt a franchise system involving competitive bidding, a reduced number of companies and higher environmental and labor standards.

What the newspaper missed was the creation of a strong new alliance -- Transform Don't Trash NYC -- to make that happen. The campaign to tackle the problems of New York City's commercial waste industry involves the Teamsters, ALIGN, environmental justice and community advocacy groups.

A month away from Election Day, mayoral and city council candidates would do well to listen to their message.

Teamsters Joint Council 16 President George Miranda said at a City Hall news conference today:

Today is the day we make New York City a better place to live and work.

Miranda told the press wages are falling in New York's commercial waste industry, with new hires in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Staten Island earning just below $20,000 a year:

This industry has become a "Wild West." Unsafe and sometimes illegal operators are driving a race to the bottom in wages and health and safety.

The news conference followed the release of a study showing the city could recycle and compost more than 90 percent of commercial waste, but the current rate is much lower than that.

"This stinks," wrote Daily News reporters Daniel Beekman and Stephen Rex Brown:

...of the 3.2 million tons of commercial waste generated each year, 2 million tons are buried in landfills or burned in incinerators. 

The Alliance for a Greater New York, which wrote the report released Wednesday, blames a dysfunctional commercial waste industry that reeks of inefficiency.

Eddie Bautista, executive director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, said  it's time to stop burying low-income communities of color under mountains of commercial waste.

The time has come for New York City to stop burying communities -- as well as burying potential recycling jobs. ... the next mayor can really jumpstart a commercial recycling program that both increases long-neglected recycling work opportunities, while continuing to decrease our carbon footprint.

Teamsters Joint Council 16 includes Teamsters Local 831, which represents New York City sanitation workers.

NY Teamsters, NOW fight for equal pay for school safety agents

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday heard demands for equal pay for equal work from Teamsters and NOW officials. More than 5,000 Teamster school safety agents are bringing the largest pay discrimination suit in the United States against the City of New York.

The school safety agents, mostly women, receive $7,000 less pay a year than male-dominated peace officers in the city. Members of Teamsters Local 237 want Bloomberg to intervene in the class action suit and fix the problem.

The agents are put in harm's way every day.  They had to confiscate five firearms in the last five weeks. Their duties include patroling New York City's schools and making arrests. They are authorized to use deadly force while protecting children, teachers and staff.

According to the press statement,

Teamsters Local 237 President Gregory Floyd and Sonia Ossorio, President of the New York City Chapter of NOW, took to the steps of City Hall today on the occasion of National Equal Pay Day, to pressure Mayor Mike Bloomberg to intervene in the ongoing school safety agent federal class action lawsuit against the city demanding pay parity. 

...Teamsters Local 237 represents the school safety agents and has repeatedly tried to address this 20 percent pay inequity through contract negotiations with the city’s Office of Labor Relations, but it has refused to engage. The retroactive settlement the parties seek is about $35 million.

Floyd urged the mayor to engage:

We don’t understand why the city has chosen to drag this suit out against the brave women who are putting themselves on the line each and every day to ensure the safety and well-being of our public school children. Mr. Mayor, equal pay for equal work is one of our fundamental rights.  Let's act now to end gender-based wage discrimination among city employees. 

Sonia Ossorio, president of NOW NYC, said too many New York women suffer from pay discrimination.

When we tackle pay inequity and women earn the same as what men earn, it is our families and our economy that will benefit. Equal pay for equal work needs to be the highest priority. Mayor Bloomberg needs to stop turning a blind eye to these women school safely agents and this egregious example of gender pay discrimination.

Last month, Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa joined Floyd at a press conference at the local’s offices demanding the city stop stalling on a three-year old lawsuit.

Labor Press reported the Teamsters will be back in court next month:

The next court date is May 22 before U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein of the Southern District of New York. Floyd said, despite no response from the city regarding the three-year old lawsuit, he’s hopeful about the upcoming hearing. 

“I’m never more optimistic but we’re going to continue to talk about this issue until it reaches the attention of the Mayor and he does something about it.”

Teamsters vow to end 'race to the bottom' in wake of NYC bus strike

During the strike, Local 854 President Danny Gatto spoke to the media
about the importance of job protection. 

New York's billionaire mayor may have won the latest battle in the war on workers, but New York Teamsters will never give up on workers' fight for decent wages and job security.

The strike by New York City school bus drivers and matrons ended Tuesday night after Mayor Bloomberg refused to negotiate with Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1181.

Teamsters Joint Council 16 President George Miranda pledged to hold politicians accountable in the fall -- and whenever the issue of school bus workers' job security is raised.

Miranda said that when New York Teamsters endorse a mayoral candidate, they will take into account their position on school bus workers' wages and job protection. Five Democratic candidates signed a letter supporting the workers.

Miranda said the mayor's attack on workers will hurt all New Yorkers.

It’s a race to the bottom. Drivers and matrons with years of experience caring for our children will be replaced with new drivers and matrons with no experience, background or comparable levels of training. 

The mayor wants to sell our children’s safety to the lowest bidder and create a revolving door of school bus workers. He will let companies hire inexperienced workers to navigate New York City streets and care for children, many of whom have significant special needs.

The Teamsters Union represents school bus drivers, matrons and mechanics in New York City. Daniel Gatto, principal officer of Local 854, represents almost 1,000 drivers and matrons. Gatto said,

School districts need to provide the protections that New York City drivers fought for in order to have middle-class bus drivers and quality, safe school bus services.

Teamster school bus contracts do not allow strikes, and those contracts were honored. But Teamsters fully supported the members of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) in their school bus strike and honored their picket lines.

Some ATU bus workers lost their jobs as a result of the strike, the Carroll Gardens Patch reported:

More than 100 drivers were fired from Boro Wide Buses in Red Hook this morning, confirms the New York Post. 

"Matrons who came back to work this morning after their union ended its monthlong school bus strike were abruptly terminated—after being told their company had folded," says the report. 

Members of Local 1181 of the Amalgamated Transit Union were allegedly told they could reapply for positions with affiliated bus companies—but only under a different union.

NYC school bus strike: Protecting middle-class jobs against wealthy predators

Teamsters Local 854 President Danny Gatto speaks to the media about the importance of the Employee Protection Provision.

The New York City school bus worker strike is in its second day as Teamsters honor picket lines wherever their contract allows.

Teamsters Local 854 represents about 1,000 school bus drivers, matrons and mechanics. Most of the school bus workers are represented by Local 1181 of the Amalgamated Transit Union.

Unsurprisingly, New York's billionaire mayor is trying to smear bus drivers and matrons. Matthew Cunningham Cook sets the record straight in The Nation:

...the city is seeking to open a competitive bidding process for city contracts without guaranteeing job security provisions for those currently employed. But while decision-makers in the city claim that this is about fiscal responsibility, what it would do in practice is enrich wealthy contractors at the taxpayer’s dime while undermining solid middle-class jobs... 

Demanding a new competitive bidding process for school bus contractors while defenestrating job security for experienced drivers is ultimately a gloss for the Mayor’s free-spending contracting policies, which have resulted in such cost overruns as the CityTime scandal (costing more than $600 million) and the Emergency Communications Transformation Program (costing more than $250 million). The city’s largest municipal union, AFSCME District Council 37, has been exposing the details of Bloomberg’s contracting policies, to (unfortunately) little media attention. 

...The city has more than 3,000 contractors who continue to receive city contracts despite failing to meet the conditions of prior contracts, yet it is school bus drivers making $35,000 per year who are somehow to blame for the city’s fiscal woes.

Cook asks the crucial question:

Should we have experienced bus drivers making a living wage taking care of disabled children, or should the city be a playground for the rich, with low-wage jobs for everyone else?

And here is a letter from an angry New York City parent to Richard Scarpa, director of the city's Pupil Transportation Bureau:

My son ... goes to PS 19. Since Thomas was assigned a bus route in September his driver and matron have picked him up and dropped him off every single day without being absent. Scott and Gaston are caring and conscientious. I have experienced it firsthand. 

There have been situations that I have personally witnessed where students were engaging in very difficult behaviors and the bus staff handled the situation so well and so professionally, that I wasn't concerned about my son's safety. He is in good hands. 

I am totally and completely disgusted with the administration's disregard toward the stability to workers and for their callous regard towards special needs children. 

These trained professionals deserve a fair wage. They deserve decent benefits. And as important, they deserve job security. 

On the flip side, the parents of special needs children need the security of knowing that our children are safe and frankly that the bus personnel are trained, experienced and care about our kids. 

I will be outside picketing with the drivers in support. I have been following all of the parent blogs and e-mails lists and frankly, the administration is sorely underestimating the parents devotion to these important people.

Stay tuned.

Today's Teamster News 11.02.12

Shock Doctrine, American-Style: Hurricane Sandy Devastation Used to Push for Sale of Public Infrastructure to Investors  Naked Capitalism   ...The wreckage from Hurricane Sandy hasn’t even been cleared, yet financial entrepreneurs are looking to profit from it...
Nonpartisan Tax Report Withdrawn After G.O.P. Protest  New York Times   ...The Congressional Research Service has withdrawn an economic report that found no correlation between top tax rates and economic growth, a central tenet of conservative economic theory, after Senate Republicans raised concerns about the paper’s findings and wording...
With paychecks, size matters (opinion)  Los Angeles Times   ...Unemployment is still too high, but we also need to focus on the problem of declining pay and the shrinking middle class...
Mexico is now a top producer of engineers, but where are jobs?  Washington Post   ...while the number of graduates in engineering has soared during the Calderon presidency, the number of Mexicans employed as engineers has grown only slightly, from 1.1 million in 2006 to 1.3 million in 2012...
Romney's Delphi scandal involves his undisclosed 2009 taxes & Bain Capital  DailyKos   ...Mitt Romney made a fortune off of the auto-bailout by investing in Delphi and screwing those workers. And instead of using its extra capital to do right by the American worker, Delphi just finished buying factories in Asia that make car parts, for the same amount of money Delphi cost those workers' pensions...
Gritty New York faces grimy mess: Rotten meat, failing toilets  NBC News   ... The sanitation department was also handling hurricane debris cleanup citywide...

NY Teamsters donate pay to fired brothers

This is what solidarity looks like today at Local 584.

More than 300 members of Teamsters local 584 in New York City voted just now to make a one-hour-per-month contribution to support 42 Elmhurst Dairy members who were fired.

The laid-off Teamsters are skilled, experienced and have seniority at the Jamaica, Queens-based dairy. Owner Henry Schwartz replaced them last month by lower-paid workers -- in violation of the contract.

It looks like this, too.

The Teamsters filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board to get them their jobs back.

Teamsters Joint Council 16 President George Miranda said the union would not allow its members to be treated like that:

Teamsters have made this plant a success for years only to be dismissed at the whims of management bent on increasing their own profits on the backs of workers. Their dismissal violates the collective bargaining agreement we had with Elmhurst Dairy and the rights of these 42 Teamsters. This is worse than bad faith from Henry Schwartz – It’s an attack on these employees and their families...There is no excuse for these actions.

Teamster Local 584 President Frank Wunderlich said it was a disgrace for Schwartz to hurt working families in such hard economic times. Two members of the New York City Council issued statements saying they support the workers.

Once again, Teamsters write the book on solidarity.

Today's Teamster News 09.24.11

Global economy alarm bells ring  CNN   ...The recession alarm bells were ringing across the globe Thursday, spooking investors and economists alike...
Oklahoma labor commissioner calls public workers “feral hogs”  Oklahoma World   ...Oklahoma Labor Commissioner Mark Costello likened Oklahoma's public sector workers to "feral hogs." Going further, he said, "I don't know if you know much about feral hogs, but they reproduce three or four times a year, they eat anything and everything...
Wis. gov.’s spokesman, 2 others granted immunity in secret investigation of aides  Associated Press   ...Retired Waukesha County Judge Neal Nettesheim said Friday that he granted immunity to Walker spokesman Cullen Werwie, Wisconsin and Southern Railroad spokesman Ken Lucht and Milwaukee County Republican Party official Roseann Dieck...
Mayors call for repeal of SB5  TribToday.com   ...In a public display of solidarity, mayors of five municipalities in Trumbull and Mahoning counties gathered Friday to express opposition to Senate Bill 5 and to say they endorse repealing it...
Teamsters Local 237 President Considers Running For Mayor  NY1   "...We will make a big announcement when we decide which office we are going to run for, but right now we are exploring our options,” said Floyd...
Rick Scott, GOP to consider taking courts out of foreclosure process  Miami Herald   ...Supporters of the concept — which is used in nearly 30 states — say it will speed foreclosures, get houses back onto the real estate market and boost the economy. Opponents say it puts property owners at the mercy of banks...

VIDEO: Bloomberg's attack on NYC

The Bloombergville folks put out this video to illustrate the damage that budget cuts do to the city. P.S. It isn't the public workers who are attacking New York.

Here's a shock: No evidence that NYC snowplow drivers did anything wrong

There's an old saying, "s**t flows downhill," and it couldn't be more true than in New York City. At the top of the Big Apple's hill are the Wall Street fraudsters who caused the Great Recession. Also at the top: New York's mayor, a multi-billionaire who made his money at Salomon Brothers (now the bailed-out Citigroup) and Bloomberg News. At the bottom of the hill are the government workers who get blamed for -- well, you name it.

Here's how it works: Wall Street's recklessness, corporate mismanagement and regulators' failures caused the economic meltdown. The meltdown caused the recession. The recession caused New York's tax revenues to shrink. The shrinking tax revenues caused the mayor to lay off 400 snowplow drivers. Then it snowed and the billionaire mayor didn't declare a snow emergency quickly enough from his waterfront home in Bermuda. But somehow it ended up being the snowplow drivers' fault that Wall Street wasn't plowed quickly enough! 

FreeRepublic, a hideous blog that you should never read, took aim at the unions:

Various news outlets have reported that leaders of the Service Employees-affiliated Sanitation Officers Association ordered their Teamsters-affiliated work crews to slack off as a protest against recent City Department of Sanitation budget cuts and demotions.

It was obvious that these shameful attacks on New York's sanitation workers were part and parcel of the shameful attacks on unions throughout the country. But it gets better. The attacks on the snowplow drivers started with a crackpot city councilman, Daniel Halloran, who claimed that five city workers told him personally of a deliberate slowdown. His accusation inspired a grand jury investigation (we're still waiting for a grand jury investigation on Wall Street fraud, btw) . And now Halloran, about to face the grand jury, is changing his story. At first he said the workers were told to take off routes and plow major roads slowly. Now he's saying they were "subtly informed there was no need to rush."

According to the New York Times,

Mr. Halloran said he had been visited by two supervisors in the Transportation Department and three workers in the Sanitation Department. But the two transportation supervisors did not back up his story in interviews with investigators, according to two people briefed on the inquiries. And Mr. Halloran has steadfastly refused to reveal the names of the sanitation workers.

We'll settle for a public apology, thank you, from the media outlets that reported flimsy allegations as fact, the mayor who should have been man enough to take the blame and the government officials who wasted taxpayer money on investigating snowplow drivers when they could be investigating crooks on Wall Street.   

Today's Teamster News 1.6.11

Sanitationmen tell their side of Christmas blizzard  (Local 831)  New York Daily News  ..."We were short 400 men and we had crappy equipment"...
IPhone -Eye Phone Group, Zing Launch iTRUCKit Delivery Assistant  (Local 804)  TMCnet     ...In collaboration with UPS package delivery drivers...Eye Phone Group together with Zing launched a new delivery assistant iPhone  application called iTRUCKit (which) allows simplified recording of day-to-day activity along with enhanced tracking...
At brewery, cost-cutting was the priority  The Virginia Gazette  ...Around 50 layoffs were anticipated at the brewery as more local cuts were imposed by InBev...
Las Vegas Convention Business Up From Last Year  8NewsNow  ...The convention center's recovering business is giving local workers some job security...
Fedex Adds China-India Air-Cargo Flights on `Dramatic' Growth  Bloomberg News  ...The company expects “dramatic growth in trade” between China and India...
Canadian oilsands pipeline 'crucial' to American economy: U.S. oil industry  The Vancouver Sun   ...American Petroleum Institute president Jack Gerard hailed Calgary-based TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline as vital to the recovery of the nation's economy...
Port of Seattle says emissions enforcement going smoothly  Land Line Magazine   ...the first few days of enforcement of the port’s new Clean Truck Program have resulted in few delays...
China to open Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail in June-Xinhua  Reuters   ...The ...819-mile... railway, which has cost ...$33.45 billion ...began construction in April 2008 and was originally planned to open in 2012...

VIDEO: NYC government workers unfairly blamed for snow removal snafus

The corporate-funded attack machine is scapegoating government workers for digging too slowly out of the blizzard that hit New York City. Massive layoffs had nothing to do with it, of course. Laura Flanders warns that this line of attack may becoming to your town soon.