Oh Travel, it gets better or maybe worse?
Jeff's public reply clearly advocated by that incompetent boob of a president those poor west fa's have. Mike didn't portray Jeff's comments any way. I took them exactly as an insult to me and the fine pilots we work with and have worked with for the better part of 30 years. His apology is no apology at all.
AFA 66 eCommunication - Wednesday, May 12, 2010
A Message from Your AFA Council 66 MEC
As promised at our recent Local Council Meeting, your MEC is committed to communicating events that affect the MEC and our Flight Attendants. Instead of hearing this as “jumpseat gossip”, we would like to inform you of recent events that have occurred with members within the Joint Negotiations Committee.
On May 8, Jeff Albers, member of the Joint Negotiations Committee, vented his frustration on the new AFA Discussion Site. His frustration was in regard to the possibility that a joint contract would not be ratified based upon a singular issue and not upon looking at the improvements of an entire contract. Jeff vented his frustration in a place he believed was private, safe and meant only to be seen by his peers at Council 66, the new AFA Discussion Site, which was redesigned for added security and privacy. Sadly, someone took the private posting by Jeff and made it public.
Unfortunately, JNC member, Mike Flores, contacted the Council 66 MEC believing that this statement portrays East Flight Attendants negatively. You be the judge.
Jeff’s statement as posted read: First of all I would like to say that I would have posted my thoughts on here sooner, but Lisa and I were busy negotiating a contract. Negotiations that resulted in two more sections being Tentatively Agreed this week. We are getting extremely close to bringing something out to our members to vote on. And what we need now more than ever is to unite! The East FA's are claiming to vote down any deal due to the ignorant fact that they would have to separate from their pilots. They are willing to ignore a vastly improved reserve lifestyle, a better scheduling system, pay increases, and many many more improvements just to stay with their childish moronic pilots! We need the support of our members, not a ridiculous recall.
Not only did Jeff contact Mike Flores, he also sent letters to each member of the East US Airways MEC apologizing for the perception of his statement that was on our private discussion site. Following is Albers written apology to members of the East MEC:
Dear East Officers:
I am writing you today to offer my sincere apology for the statement I posted on the Council 66 discussion board (May 8, 2010) My remarks, while posted on a private discussion site for our Council, was done so out of frustration which led to a poorly worded point of view. I was not trying to insult or demean any flight attendant group. The way I wrote my comments was in no way the intent of the message I was attempting to convey.
Members of the East and West Joint Negotiations Committee (JNC) have worked tirelessly to bring an agreement to our flight attendants. The East flight attendants while having experienced the pain of bankruptcy and concessions are now receiving snap back on many of those concessions along with the fact their own contract is amendable in 2012. While flight attendants on the West (former America West) at no fault of their own had their Section 6 negotiations placed in recess as a result of pending joint negotiations. Again at no fault of either East or West flight attendants, the joint negotiations have seriously lagged in progress mainly due to the legal issues surrounding the pilots (East and West), legal issues which are currently dragging on with the end in sight. In fact, this long legal battle among our pilots has been projected to last for years unless there is another merger.
Mike often reminds the JNC of how important the issue is for the East flight attendants when it comes to separating from their pilots. In addition, he has mentioned the numerous amounts of e-mails he receives on a weekly basis from flight attendants saying they will not ratify a contract that does not keep them with their pilots. We had the same issue on the West when we separated from our pilots in 1999, yet the agreement was ratified when the benefits of separation became obvious.
It has become increasingly frustrating to work on a contract that contains numerous improvements only to be told on a weekly basis that the agreement will fail due to one issue. Unfortunately I allowed my frustration to take precedence over better judgment. My poor choice of words, clouded the true intent of my message, which was to convey that if a flight attendant voted against an agreement for one reason alone over a multitude of reasons to vote for it, I would personally consider that an uninformed, decision. Yet In my typing I used the word ignorant. In no way did I mean to stereo-type the east flight attendants with that word.
When I heard that my post, on what is suppose to be a council 66 discussion board was made public and disseminated to fuel the second attempt to recall our MEC President, I immediately called Mike to apologize and explain myself. I was shocked to be met with complete and utter disrespect. Mike insisted I only wrote what I did to protect Lisa. Who, by his own words was “going down”. He also stated that if I show up in the east I would be “stoned”. He then demanded that I resign my position on the JNC. During our negotiations time I have witnessed months of what I believe is stalling tactics. I will not back down from fighting for an important contract for my flight attendants on the west and as well as for the east.
I am here to finish the job that was started over four years ago.
Once again I am sorry that my words, intended to rally our flight attendants to unify, were misconstrued to seem like an insult. That was never my intention.
Sincerely,
Jeff Albers
Unfortunately, East MEC President Mike Flores, saw this as an opportunity to portray Jeff’s statement as a personal insult to East Flight Attendants.
As you can see in Jeff’s statement (above), he does not call the East Flight Attendants ignorant.
Mr. Flores decided to disclose to his membership and US Airways management his inability to work through internal issues directly. Rather as he stated in his eline (May 12, 2010) he would prefer to take this issue in front of the AFA International Hearing Board, yet again. This avenue could only delay the negotiations process further. Your MEC is committed to keeping negotiations on track to assure all of our Flight Attendants, East as well as West have a joint contract with the necessary wage and benefit improvements that are so desperately needed.
