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On 9/10/2002 6
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43 PM AOG-N-IT wrote:
This morining, I attended the 0630 meeting being held in the CLT Hangar breakroom. Thankfully , this meeting did not turn into a "Screaming Contest" , like the two previous meetings the day before. To be perfectly honest , I did not learn anything of value from our paid representation. I have become convienced that the IAM is not..or did not listen!..or failing to make it's memberships views clear to the company. The IAM stated a number of points they brought up , as being "Deal Breakers". Somehow the so called "Deal Breakers" became part of the issues anyway. The only exception being "R&D" (Pushbacks). I do not see for a moment where the IAM stuck to thier so-called guns for a moment. The majority in attendance..seemed to be of an alike mindset. "Where's the Leadership"??? in this union?? Why are we voting again?? When No , meant No the first time? Here again, I feel the issues are too often involving the IAM itself...it's every bit as much of a problem..as the concessions being asked for are, to the ripple (Shockwave) affect , this will have to the industry. My first and foremost concern is the surviveability of USAirways. My biggest fear...is failure to achieve the needed financial backing to insure this hopeful future. I hope many will begin to see..that your frustration is with failed "Union Leadership" at this point. The past failures of "U" management are beyond anyone's control. We either attempt to repair things from our current location?..or we need to be prepared for drastic changes beyond the employment realm of USAirways. Basically , It's up to you , to pick your poison. I would rather gamble with the Devil I know...as opposed to a complete career change.
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The meetings at TPA got pretty ugly. The worst part was management just rehashed the same old, same old over again. No one up there seems to get it - no means no. It means go back to the table and try again. It did seem that a big fear of management's is the labor unrest that an imposed contract will incur and how the flying public will steer away from an airline with a labor dispute. But, instead of coming up with a reasonable proposal, they are half-heartedly pushing this one. Honestly, it didn't seem like any of the management presenters were too gung-ho about this either.
I'm sorry. I'm not settling for less vacation than a Wal-Mart greeter or McDonald's mop boy! Two weeks period. Second, I'm not giving up the raise we got on July 15th. The company, in good faith signed a letter of agreement with the planners for our pay raise back in April, fully knowing that the airline was in deep trouble. Now, they want it back? I never saw a parity raise.
Maybe this might be the end of US Airways. But, people will still fly and eventually jobs will be back. However, when it was discovered that 40,000K (more than I make in a year and half!) went to Nardello (sp) as a bonus, I'm fit to be tied.
Anyway, check out the article from the Saint Petersburg Times (Florida) [url="http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/14/Business/Workers_miffed_at_air.shtml"]http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/14/Business...ed_at_air.shtml[/url]. It's pretty clear where TPA stands in this mess. Funny thing is, for being as disgruntled as management painted us to be, we're still putting a plane on the gate every morning for our customers [img src='http://www.usaviation.com/idealbb/images/smilies/1.gif'] . We are still busting our butts with a nasty personell shortage (especially in planning, thanks to this moronic 8 hour work day they imposed two weeks ago).
Anyway, AOG-N-IT, you MCU guys kick butt up there! Keep up the hard work.
Jon C.[img src='http://www.usaviation.com/idealbb/images/smilies/1.gif']
TPA Planner.