Today's Teamster News 02.22.14

Teamster News
Teamsters Local 326 Welcomes Law Enforcement Officers  teamster.org   ...By an overwhelming majority, law enforcement officers in the city of Milford, Delaware's police department have voted to join Teamsters Local 326 in New Castle, Delaware...
Warehouse Workers in Texas Join Teamsters Local 745  teamster.org   ...On February 20, by a vote of 25-4, warehouse workers in Grapeview, Texas voted to join Local 745 in Dallas...
Teamsters Aviation Mechanics Coalition to Launch Investigation into Allegiant Air Maintenance teamster.org  ...The Teamsters Aviation Mechanics Coalition (TAMC) announced it will launch an investigation into reports of a disproportionate number of engine failures, air returns and declared emergencies at Allegiant Air...
High-Speed Rail Supporters Rally in California  teamster.org   ...Teamsters, Laborers, community members and environmental groups rallied February 20 to support high-speed rail. Watch the video...
Spring Grove school bus drivers strike averted, at least though March  York Daily Record   ...The possibility of a strike for Spring Grove, Penn. school bus drivers is at least temporarily averted, and contract negotiations between Teamsters Local 776 and Durham School Services continue...
Penn Station Marks Contributions From African-American Men And Women  teamster.org
BLET member Carlyle Smith, an Amtrak locomotive engineer and member of Division 482 in Washington, D.C., is featured in this Black History Month story on the rail industry. Read the article and watch the video, here....
UPS Honors South Carolina Drivers for 25 Years of Safe Driving  Wall Street Journal   ...On Wednesday, UPS announced 29 elite drivers from South Carolina are among 1,519 newly inducted worldwide into the Circle of Honor, an honorary organization for UPS drivers who have achieved 25 or more years of accident-free driving...
The War on Workers
Fed Misread Fiscal Crisis, Records Show  New York Times   ...The hundreds of pages of transcripts, based on recordings made at the time, reveal the ignorance of Fed officials about economic conditions during the climactic months of the financial crisis. Officials repeatedly fretted about overstimulating the economy, only to realize time and again that they needed to redouble efforts to contain the crisis...
Union still wants to organize Boeing's North Charleston workers, official says   The Post and Courier   ...The union that represents thousands of Boeing Co. workers in the Pacific Northwest is still looking to make inroads at the company's North Charleston jet-making operation...
Boeing Paid No Federal Income Tax Last Year  Huffington Post   ...One of the largest recipients of federal government contracts paid nothing in taxes last year, according to an analysis from the Center for Effective Government...
McDonald’s workers’ horror story: 25-hour shifts and bunking in their boss’s basement!  Salon  ...A former McDonald’s franchisee will pay out a six-figure settlement after allegedly subjecting student guest workers to 25-hour shifts, substandard housing and repeated retaliatory threats...
McDonald’s fires employee for buying meals for firefighters working in the cold  Death and Taxes   ...Heather Levia of Olean, New York, was fired from her job at McDonald’s after she personally bought breakfast for some on-duty firefighters, who were working in the freezing cold...
Majority of port truckers misclassified, pro-labor groups say  FleetOwner   ...A report issued by several pro-labor organizations concluded that about 49,000 of the nation’s 75,000 port truck drivers are misclassified as independent contractors...
Private Prison Firm CEO Collected $22 Million In Compensation Between 2008 and 2012  ThinkProgress   ...A new report from the Center for Media and Democracy dubs GEO Group CEO George Zoley America’s highest paid “corrections officer,” in a ranking of top-earning “government workers” — those in privatized industries...
Despite Receiving Millions in Public Money, Private Prisons are Impenetrable "Bastions of Secrecy"  Alternet   ...Public prisons are beholden to a dizzying array of record-keeping programs under the Bureau of Justice Statistics.  By contrast, the only data released by private facilities about their prisoners and facilities is that which is mandated by business contracts or particular state laws. Even then, the information provided by prison corporations is often falsified -- or even “all the time,” in the words of one high-ranking GEO Group executive...
Secret Plans and Clever Tricks: How Information About Public Contracting Is Hidden From the Public  truthout   ...reporters, elected officials, community activists, public-interest lawyers and other concerned individuals and organizations often hit a brick wall when they attempt to unravel privatization plans...
State Battles
UAW appeals outside interference in union representation election for Chattanooga Volkswagen workers  UAW   ...The UAW filed an appeal (“objections”) with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) today related to the interference by politicians and outside special interest groups in the union representation election held last week at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga plant...
Walker Staff on the Mentally Ill: "No One Cares about Crazy People"  Center for Media and Democracy   ...One of the more disturbing exchanges in recently-unsealed court documents shows callousness among Scott Walker's staff and campaign as they worked to deflect criticism over mismanagement in a county mental health facility...
Illinois Lawmakers Eye $600 Million Tax on Sugary Drink  Heartland Institute   ...In Illinois, it’s called everything from pop to soda to sodi, but the state’s Democrats are now calling soda pop a money maker...
Arizona Senate repeals 2013 election law  Associated Press   ...The Arizona Senate has voted to repeal a sweeping 2013 Arizona election law that included trimming the state's permanent early voting list and a host of other provisions that incensed voter-rights advocates...
Trade
TPP Trade Officials Received Hefty Bonuses From Big Banks  Bill Moyers   ...Officials tapped by the Obama administration to lead the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations have received multimillion dollar bonuses from CitiGroup and Bank of America...
Crucial TPP ministerial meeting begins in Singapore  Global Post   ...Ministers from the 12 countries involved in the envisioned Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade accord began talks in Singapore on Saturday seeking to achieve the challenging goal of reaching a broad agreement after missing an end-of-2013 deadline...
AFL-CIO Executive Council Calls for Commitment to Broad-Based Wage Growth, Ending Job Export, Stopping Fast Track and More  AFL-CIO   ...The AFL-CIO Executive Council adopted several policy statements addressing wage growth and economic inequality, job outsourcing, Fast Track and trade,  higher education and performers' rights at its winter meeting in Houston on Tuesday...
Miscellaneous
Wall Street Landlords Buy Bad Loans for Cheaper Homes  Bloomberg News   ...Wall Street-backed landlords are showing a greater appetite for bad mortgages as a source for cheap property as the supply of foreclosed homes declines while housing prices continue to climb...
Social Identity Markers are NOT a proxy for left wing social policies  Ian Welsh   ...They may love the gay (or at least not mind it), but that doesn’t mean they don’t still intend to create a society in which there are aristocrats, and if the serfs want to marry same sex, let’em...
Former USGS head endorses Keystone pipeline  Washington Post   ...A former head of the U.S. Geological Survey endorsed the idea of building the Keystone XL pipeline Thursday in an editorial contending that the pipeline would be less damaging to the environment than the “viable alternatives” of transporting oil by rail and truck...

Today's Teamster News 10.03.13

NYC Teamsters begin campaign to create good commercial waste jobs  TeamsterNation   ...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...
Teamsters at work after rejecting Wegmans contract  Democrat and Chronicle   ...Truck drivers, warehouse workers and other Wegmans Food Markets employees, who are members of Teamsters Local 118, were at work as scheduled Tuesday following a union vote Monday rejecting a company contract offer...
Northumberland County agrees to union raises  News-Item   ...Northumberland County commissioners approved Tuesday a collective bargaining agreement with court-appointed, non-professional employees that grants them at least a 3 percent raise next year. The workers are represented by Teamsters Local 764, based in Milton, Pennsylvania...
Rail Safety Report Shows Increase in Fatal Incidents in Fourth Quarter  BMWED ...A comparison of roadway worker fatality data over a span of 21 years (1986–1994 and 1997– 2010) indicates that the highest number of roadway worker incidents occur in the 4th Quarter...
How Less Than 5% Of The US Population Caused The Government To Shut Down  Business Insider   ...it's just stunning that such few people — a group slightly larger than the population of Illinois — can hold that much power...
Union calls for fed workers to ‘fight back’ against shutdown  Washington Post   ...A labor leader representing federal employees is exhorting them to “take to the streets” to protest a partial government shutdown that began Tuesday...
Which lawmakers will refuse their pay during the shutdown?  Washington Post   ...Hundreds of thousands of rank-and-file federal employees were forced out of the office Tuesday morning because of the start of a government shutdown and won't be paid over the course of the impasse. As of noon Wednesday, here is the tally of  lawmakers who have said that they plan to donate or refuse compensation earned over the course of the impasse...
Fixing exorbitant CEO pay: All is not lost  Fortune   ...Despite what has felt like relentless insanity, the prognosis for positive changes to executive pay looks better than it has for a decade...
NOT SHOCKED: Five States With the Worst Food Insecurity are “Right-to-Work” States  We Party Patriots   ...A recent USDA report provides details on our growing trend of food (in)security. In 7 million homes, a family member has skipped meals because money was tight. A look at the five states where food insecurity is a problem (North Carolina, Alabama, Texas, Arkansas, and Mississippi) are also “Right-to-Work” states...
Independent Contractors – Keeping it Real  Construction Citizen   ...Real independent contractors are easy to identify. They are hired to perform a specific project, bring their own tools, have their own business cards, and send you an invoice when the work is done. If people are hired to perform ongoing work, told when to show up and what to do, those workers are not independent contractors...
The Cost of Crushing Dissent in New York City  Wall Street on Parade   ...Today, we have still not restored the Glass-Steagall Act, the largest Wall Street banks of 2008 are even larger and more dangerous today, and unprecedented levels of wealth and income inequality, enforced by the structure of Wall Street, is spreading economic misery to ever greater numbers of Americans...
GOP’s newest target: The postal service  Salon   ...The government itself wasn't enough. Led by Darrell Issa, they now want to go after your mail delivery...
Google Accused of Wiretapping in Gmail Scans  New York Times   ...Wiretapping is typically the stuff of spy dramas and shady criminal escapades. But now, web company giant Google must defend itself against accusations that it is illegally wiretapping in the course of gathering data about Internet users and showing them related ads...
Bill would require Michigan cities to buy American-made flags for veterans' grave sites  Detroit Free Press  ...A bill unanimously passed by the state Senate Wednesday would require Michigan cities to buy American-made flags and flag holders for veterans’ grave sites if those flags are competitively priced with foreign-made products...
New York to Sue Wells Fargo Over Mortgage Settlement  New York Times   ...Fielding complaints from borrowers struggling to save their homes, New York’s top prosecutor is preparing a lawsuit against Wells Fargo, accusing the bank, the nation’s largest home lender, of flouting the terms of a multibillion-dollar settlement aimed at stanching foreclosure abuses...
Poll: Majority in state support fully privatizing wine, spirit sales  Pittsburgh Tribune-Review   ...Millions of dollars in lobbying efforts by groups on all sides of the liquor privatization issue had little impact on the opinions of everyday Pennsylvanians, according to two groups that released a poll Tuesday...
An overdue trash overhaul (opinion)  New York Daily News   ...Cleaning up commercial collection would help Bloomberg burnish his environmental legacy...
NY Thruway Authority cuts more workers  Times Union   ...New York’s Thruway Authority last week quietly laid off about a half-dozen non-union employees. Saying it was a personnel matter, Thruway spokesman Dan Weiller declined to comment on the precise nature of the job cuts or the reason...
N.C. voting rights advocates applaud federal lawsuit  USA TODAY   ...Voting rights advocates applauded the U.S. Justice Department's move Monday to sue North Carolina for racial discrimination over its tough new voting rules while Republicans in the state called the allegation "baseless."...
Pennsylvania House nudged to implement online voter registration  NewsWorks   ...A bipartisan coalition is urging the state House to pass a proposal allowing online voter registration in Pennsylvania. The measure, which passed unanimously in the Senate earlier this year, is currently before a House committee...

Today's Teamster News 09.26.13

(UPDATES with items about federal contract worker pay)

Hoffa Calls On Cruz, Right-Wing Extremists To Stop ACA Misrepresentations  teamster.org   ...Here's an official statement by Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa...
Hundreds of Manufacturing Workers Ratify First Teamster Contract  Joint Council 25   ...Approximately 340 manufacturing employees at Senior Flexonics ratified their first contract with Teamsters Local 330 by a 3-to-1 margin...
Teamsters: Private Prison Quotas Rob Taxpayers  teamster.org   ...The Teamsters Union is denouncing the findings of a new study revealing that private prison management firms have contracts that directly link profits to inmate capacity. The Teamsters Union represents 30,000 correctional officers in 20 states across the country...
Teamsters Capital Strategies Speaks Out On Wage Disparity  The Leslie Marshall Show ...A proposed rule for the Security and Exchange Commission would shed light on the ratio of media worker pay versus that of a company’s CEO...
BASIS TLA Scheduled October 7-11  teamster.org   ...The IBT Training and Development Department will conduct a Teamsters Leadership Academy for new local union business agents, October 7-11, 2013, at the union's headquarters in Washington, D.C...
Organizational Skills for Office Managers Scheduled for November 6-8  teamster.org   ...The IBT Training and Development Department will conduct a TLA for Teamster Office Managers and key administrative staff, November 6-8, 2013, at the union's headquarters in Washington, D.C...
Federal Contracts Send Billions Of Dollars To CEOs But Pay Workers A Poverty Wage  ThinkProgress   ...The contracting practices that make the federal government the largest low-wage employer in the country are also paying top corporate executives nearly $24 billion per year according to new research from the think tank Demos...
Federal workers to strike, march on White House Wednesday  Salon   ...Cleaning and concessions workers in federal buildings will protest their taxpayer-funded poverty jobs...
How Bad Data Warped Everything We Thought We Knew About the Jobs Recovery  The Atlantic   ... the jobs report's real margin of error has been about as big as the average jobs report itself the past few years...
Wal-Mart Cutting Orders as Unsold Merchandise Piles Up  Bloomberg News   ...Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) is cutting orders it places with suppliers this quarter and next to address rising inventories the company flagged in last month’s earnings report...
Steelmakers rally against China  Pittsburgh Business Times   ...Steel manufacturers in the U.S. have been filing complaints with U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. International Trade Commission against a number of countries, including China, charging that unregulated imports are causing material injury to the domestic steel industry...
Austerity measures push Greek universities to point of collapse  The Guardian   ...Internationally mandated austerity measures have pushed universities in Greece to the point of collapse with many of the debt-stricken country's pre-eminent higher education institutions being forced to suspend operations...
Revealed: Qatar's World Cup 'slaves'  The Guardian   ...thousands of Nepalese, who make up the single largest group of labourers in Qatar, face exploitation and abuses that amount to modern-day slavery, as defined by the International Labour Organisation, during a building binge paving the way for 2022...
Union to Protest Staffing Levels at Iowa Prisons  Associated Press   ...The union that represents correctional officers at Iowa prisons is planning an informational picket to raise awareness about what it calls dangerously low staffing levels...
CFPB Takes Aim At Sallie Mae For Student Loan Servicing  Huffington Post   ...A federal consumer regulator has taken aim at the Department of Education’s preferred companies for servicing the agency’s $1 trillion in student loans, highlighting potentially poor customer service and raising the specter of increased government scrutiny...
Is President Obama In Denial About the National Threat Wall Street Poses (opinion)  Wall Street on Parade   ...This is not a banking system – this is an institutionalized, legalized, mechanized, wealth transfer system bearing the imprimatur of the President of the United States and the U.S. Congress through their refusal to take the simple measure that can stop the looting in its tracks – the restoration of the Glass-Steagall Act...
The Republican Vote to Cut Food Stamps is Really a Decision to Kill the "Useless Eaters" (opinion)  AlterNet   ...15 million Americans were “food insecure” in the United States during 2012. The Great Recession has increased the number of Americans who do not have sufficient food by 30 percent. The fastest growing group of people who need some assistance is the elderly...
Some public companies are divulging more details about their political contributions  Washington Post   ...Some of the nation’s largest publicly traded companies are divulging more details about their political contributions, in part to ward off lawsuits and mounting pressure from shareholders, who increasingly have thrust the issue before boards of directors...
City workers protest Emanuel over contract talks  Chicago Tribune   ...Scores of union workers protested outside city buildings during lunch Tuesday, taking aim at Mayor Rahm Emanuel for what they contend is an attempt to retroactively freeze their wages after privatizing hundreds of jobs in the past couple of years...
Exposing The Pay Gap  New York Times   ...Of all the provisions in the vast and complex Dodd-Frank financial reform law, one of the most far-reaching is also the most direct and easily understood. It requires public companies to compute and disclose the ratio of a chief executive’s pay to that of a typical employee...
For-Hire Trucking Tonnage Index Rose in August  Journal of Commerce   ...The American Trucking Associations’ advanced seasonally adjusted For-Hire Trucking Tonnage Index increased 1.4 percent in August from July, to 126.9, after slipping 0.6 percent in July...
How A New Job Application Form Could Save Hundreds Of Californians From Returning To Prison  Think Progress    ...In an attempt to cut down on employment discrimination against felons and reduce recidivism rates, a bill waiting for California Gov. Jerry Brown’s signature would remove a question on local and state job applications asking applicants about their criminal record...

Today's Teamster News 01.22.13

Obama's second term foe - China: Column  USA Today   ...roughly 30% of American manufacturing job loss since 2001 can be tied to the China PNTR decision...
Hilda Solis, Outgoing Labor Secretary, Reflects On Economic Recovery, Right-Wing Attacks  Huffington Post   ...Although mine safety reform has stalled in Congress, Solis said the department has worked to make improvements, including a new rule issued this week that would make it easier for the government to shut down mines with a history of safety violations...
Investigation ordered after Spanish politicians got ‘salaries’ from private companies  AFP   ...senior members of the party, which Rajoy has led since 2004, had received undeclared salaries, mainly from private companies, over a 20-year period...
Back down on austerity, Osborne urged as Britain slips towards triple-dip  The Guardian   ...A second negative quarter, from January to March, would mark the onset of Britain's third recession in five years...
$240 billion amassed by 100 richest people enough to end extreme poverty four times over: Oxfam  Raw Story   ...The report found that the richest 1% had increased their incomes by 60% in the past 20 years, with the financial crisis accelerating rather than slowing the process...
Cayman Islands to Disclose Tax Shelter Companies  The Progressuve   ...After decades of secrecy, the tax-haven country is considering a public database that will make the names of thousands of previously hidden companies and their directors, public...
Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein Gets 75 Percent Raise: Report  Huffington Post   ...Lloyd Blankfein made $21 million last year, including a $2 million salary and a $19 million bonus...
Goldman bankers get rich betting on food prices as millions starve  The Independent   ...Goldman Sachs made more than a quarter of a billion pounds last year by speculating on food staples, reigniting the controversy over banks profiting from the global food crisis...
Analysis: 201,000 in Florida didn't vote because of long lines  Orlando Sentinel   ...The long Election Day lines around Florida may have turned away more than 200,000 frustrated would-be voters who gave up and went home before they cast ballots — or else saw the lines and elected not to join them...
Sanitation workers march for union rights in DeKalb Co.  My Fox Atlanta   ...DeKalb County sanitation workers marched in downtown Atlanta on Monday in an effort to have their union recognized by the county commission. They had the support of two retired sanitation workers who marched in Memphis nearly 45 years ago just before the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr….
Turner and Leach are supporting attempts by DeKalb County sanitation workers to get the county commission to recognize them as members of Teamsters Local 728...
More Bad News From Private Prison  City Beat   ...Since the end of 2012, four have been arrested and charged with smuggling. Another four were arrested Monday and police suspect they were in Conneaut for a smuggling job... the four suspects arrested Monday were only caught due to the increased police presence outside the Lake Erie prison...
Virginia Senate Sneaks Through Gerrymandering Bill While Country Watches Inauguration  ThinkProgress   ...the move could potentially eliminate at least one Democratic seat, the 25th district, which currently belongs to former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Sen. Creigh Deeds (D)...

Today's Teamster News 12.20.12

Social Security Checks Enter the Debate  New York Times   ...As part of a deal being negotiated by President Obama and Speaker John A. Boehner to avert the worst of the year-end tax increases and spending cuts, Social Security payments might be lower in the future for millions of Americans...
2 million will lose jobless benefit if Congress fails to act  McClatchy   ...While most states provide jobless workers up to 26 weeks of unemployment insurance, the federal program adds an additional 14 to 47 weeks, depending on the state’s unemployment rate...
Boehner’s Plan B Fails; Inmates Running Asylum  New York Magazine   ... Boehner isn’t going to get a chance to make his plan work, because Republicans themselves have revolted against it...
“Fix the Debt” - Defense Contractor Ties Exposed  Washington Monthly   ... the group Fix The Debt - which advocates for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security cuts while pushing corporate tax reform - has 38 leaders with “ties to 43 companies with defense contracts totaling $42.3 billion in 2012...”
Breaking the hold of corporate welfare on America's incarceration industry  Guardian   ...because incarceration has become a virtual jobs program in many states and because certain corporations are profiting handsomely from the incarceration binge that has been in place for the past few decades, the reduction in prison populations and prison closures is being met with huge resistance...
Labor Voices: A new coalition to fight for Michigan  Detroit News   ...This past Friday, faith, labor, community and progressive groups announced the formation of We Are Michigan, a coalition of Michiganians who are ready to work together to fight back against Snyder's attacks on working people...
Greenburgh Teamsters Relieved To Settle Contract  Greenburgh Daily Voice   ...After almost four years without a contract ... The new contract will give Teamsters union members a 1.75 percent salary increase in 2012 and 2013 plus an additional $500 each year and a 2.25 percent increase in 2014 with an additional $400...
Illinois Central School Bus Workers Join Teamsters Local 777  IBT   ...School bus drivers and monitors at Illinois Central School Bus in Aurora and Montgomery, Ill., have voted by an overwhelming 4 to 1 margin to join Teamsters Local 777 in Lyons, Ill...