--Native American Proverb, quoted in RTD's Monday Morning Q
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
DON'T DRIVE IN THE LEFT LANE.
DON'T DRIVE IN THE RIGHT LANE.
Some pet peeves when driving on the highway:
The left lane should be for passing if you can manage it. Leave it open for those idiots who are always running late.
The right lane should be for entering and exiting the highway, or for slow moving traffic. Really, get out of the way there too!
People who drive faster than me are jerks.
People who drive slower than me are idiots.
People who drive the same speed as me are really the worst of all.
DON'T DRIVE IN THE RIGHT LANE.
Some pet peeves when driving on the highway:
The left lane should be for passing if you can manage it. Leave it open for those idiots who are always running late.
The right lane should be for entering and exiting the highway, or for slow moving traffic. Really, get out of the way there too!
People who drive faster than me are jerks.
People who drive slower than me are idiots.
People who drive the same speed as me are really the worst of all.
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
RTD Welcomes us back!
The RTD blog on paper, the Monday Morning Q, is RTD manager Cal Marsella's communications with his employees.
Cal, You do a great job speaking and writing to us. You are really excellent at promoting your point. The only error that I saw was your implying that the RTD Board of Directors was being attacked by the union. Far from it, we found that the Board was very enlightened. They have said they would make sure future negotiations go much smoother.
As you might expect, most of the employees I spoke with did not change their views after reading your defense. It was nice of you to admit that you based our raises on selected average wages in the region, and the high raises of upper management were based on national or international wages. I hope that in the future you at least base our wage raises on comperable cities: cities where the cost of living and inflation rates are similar. Maybe you could even use cities in states where there are no right-to-work-for-less laws. The lack of such a law in Colorado helps to keep the average wages in Colorado well above the states around us.
And by the way, we do support better wages for supervisors and middle management as well.
The RTD blog on paper, the Monday Morning Q, is RTD manager Cal Marsella's communications with his employees.
Cal, You do a great job speaking and writing to us. You are really excellent at promoting your point. The only error that I saw was your implying that the RTD Board of Directors was being attacked by the union. Far from it, we found that the Board was very enlightened. They have said they would make sure future negotiations go much smoother.
As you might expect, most of the employees I spoke with did not change their views after reading your defense. It was nice of you to admit that you based our raises on selected average wages in the region, and the high raises of upper management were based on national or international wages. I hope that in the future you at least base our wage raises on comperable cities: cities where the cost of living and inflation rates are similar. Maybe you could even use cities in states where there are no right-to-work-for-less laws. The lack of such a law in Colorado helps to keep the average wages in Colorado well above the states around us.
And by the way, we do support better wages for supervisors and middle management as well.
Monday, April 10, 2006
The RTD strike is over.
On April 7, 2006, ATU 1001 Union members voted to return to work. The proposal brought a good raise in contributions for our Health Insurance. It passed by 81%, though there was still considerable disgruntling about the lack of respect.
I was originally going to say that nobody won in the strike, and that is true (as is true of every strike), but perhaps I can put a positive swing on it: everybody won something.
RTD won their $200,000 extra pay for every day we were out. RTD was also able to save face by maintaining their budget: still a $1.80 raise over 3 years. And hopefully they won because they can now improve their dialogue with the union.
Union members won because we helped lower our out-of-pocket Health Insurance contributions, and we did get a higher raise up front. We won because we saw very gracious customers supporting us, and thanking us for returning so soon. We won because the RTD Board members learned that they were kept in the dark during negotiations, and they will insist on better communications in the future. They, after all, are supposed to be the ones running the company. We also got free coffee and doughnuts when we returned to work.
Governor Bill Owens won with the the memorable quote that will secure his place in history: "This union reminds me of the youngster who murders his parents and then throws himself on the mercy of the court because he's now an orphan." Only a lame duck politician could compare 1750 of his constituents to murderers.
The Transit-Riding public won with new appreciation of what the RTD employees do for them. Thank you very much for your support! We hope to never allow you to be put out again.
On April 7, 2006, ATU 1001 Union members voted to return to work. The proposal brought a good raise in contributions for our Health Insurance. It passed by 81%, though there was still considerable disgruntling about the lack of respect.
I was originally going to say that nobody won in the strike, and that is true (as is true of every strike), but perhaps I can put a positive swing on it: everybody won something.
RTD won their $200,000 extra pay for every day we were out. RTD was also able to save face by maintaining their budget: still a $1.80 raise over 3 years. And hopefully they won because they can now improve their dialogue with the union.
Union members won because we helped lower our out-of-pocket Health Insurance contributions, and we did get a higher raise up front. We won because we saw very gracious customers supporting us, and thanking us for returning so soon. We won because the RTD Board members learned that they were kept in the dark during negotiations, and they will insist on better communications in the future. They, after all, are supposed to be the ones running the company. We also got free coffee and doughnuts when we returned to work.
Governor Bill Owens won with the the memorable quote that will secure his place in history: "This union reminds me of the youngster who murders his parents and then throws himself on the mercy of the court because he's now an orphan." Only a lame duck politician could compare 1750 of his constituents to murderers.
The Transit-Riding public won with new appreciation of what the RTD employees do for them. Thank you very much for your support! We hope to never allow you to be put out again.
Saturday, April 08, 2006
How RTD Employees ended up striking
On March 29, 2006, RTD presented a modified proposal to the Union. The terms were somewhat improved, but it was not really much of a movement from the proposal that was rejected by 95% on March 26. To stress the importance of the matter, the Union notified RTD that we would strike on April 3 if there was no contract. The Union Executive Board suggested the members approve this proposal, since nobody wants to go through a strike, and because the Health & Welfare fund was in jeopardy if a prolonged strike would come about.
A Union is the most democratic institution there is. Everything that is done, every decision, every penny spent, has to be approved by the membership. This isn't just a Representative Democracy, it is a true Democracy. The company was aware of this, but they still did not heed the Union's warnings when we asked for more money up front, and more for health insurance. (See my previous posting.) You could say we were pushed. And in fact the Colorado Department of Labor had set up a link for RTD employees to apply for unemployment insurance. They believed we would qualify as being locked out.
The Union members rejected the proposal, though not by a large majority. I believe the members voting against it had simply reached the end of the rope when it came to being abused. Raymond Hogar, a Professor of Management at CSU, says unions seldom strike for just money, they strike out of principle.
RTD set a certain amount they would spend on their union employees, disregarding the tremendous raises they had given to top managers during our wage freeze. They never moved from this amount. Even during the strike, they took out a $500,000 contract to "protect their property." Since RTD's main income is from sales tax revenues, they received an extra net income of $200,000 per day because they did not have to pay us. That is well over 1 million dollars a week, according to RTD spokesman Scott Reed. (Reed's salary had gone up 31% to over $118,000.) The union certainly did not want to strike, only RTD could come out ahead.
That is why we had wanted binding arbitration from the beginning. The people who suffered from the strike were the Riders and the Union Members. And when you consider how many handicapped people, elderly people, poor people, children and just plain commuters it affected, you have to ask: why didn't RTD consider those people?
RTD said that they didn't want binding arbitration because the last time they were forced into it, they had to pay more than what they had budgeted. The Union proposed that any reasonable person looking at the facts would have given us a reasonable contract.
Looking at the Blogs and other comments, it is easy to see who supports Management regardless of the facts (and who supports Labor regardless of the facts, for that matter.) Those who call for privatizing the rest of RTD don't know that RTD already has a lot of trouble hiring enough drivers and mechanics, and as the economy improves they will find themselves facing the same for all the lower-paid employees as well.
The private carriers pay less than RTD (especially considering health insurance), but they don't force their drivers to work hundreds of hours without days off. RTD Manager Cal Marsella says that if they didn't have to force overtime from the bottom, it would work better. But the truth is that, most of the time, ALL the bus drivers who schedule their days off during the week will be forced to do overtime nearly EVERY DAY. That is how you end up with bus drivers who work for long periods without any days off. They have split shifts that force them to be at work for 12 or more hours to get 8 hours of pay.
I think that if RTD treated their employees a little better, encouraging an occasional day off and treating sick people to sick pay, it would go a long ways towards solving any problems they may think they have.
On March 29, 2006, RTD presented a modified proposal to the Union. The terms were somewhat improved, but it was not really much of a movement from the proposal that was rejected by 95% on March 26. To stress the importance of the matter, the Union notified RTD that we would strike on April 3 if there was no contract. The Union Executive Board suggested the members approve this proposal, since nobody wants to go through a strike, and because the Health & Welfare fund was in jeopardy if a prolonged strike would come about.
A Union is the most democratic institution there is. Everything that is done, every decision, every penny spent, has to be approved by the membership. This isn't just a Representative Democracy, it is a true Democracy. The company was aware of this, but they still did not heed the Union's warnings when we asked for more money up front, and more for health insurance. (See my previous posting.) You could say we were pushed. And in fact the Colorado Department of Labor had set up a link for RTD employees to apply for unemployment insurance. They believed we would qualify as being locked out.
The Union members rejected the proposal, though not by a large majority. I believe the members voting against it had simply reached the end of the rope when it came to being abused. Raymond Hogar, a Professor of Management at CSU, says unions seldom strike for just money, they strike out of principle.
RTD set a certain amount they would spend on their union employees, disregarding the tremendous raises they had given to top managers during our wage freeze. They never moved from this amount. Even during the strike, they took out a $500,000 contract to "protect their property." Since RTD's main income is from sales tax revenues, they received an extra net income of $200,000 per day because they did not have to pay us. That is well over 1 million dollars a week, according to RTD spokesman Scott Reed. (Reed's salary had gone up 31% to over $118,000.) The union certainly did not want to strike, only RTD could come out ahead.
That is why we had wanted binding arbitration from the beginning. The people who suffered from the strike were the Riders and the Union Members. And when you consider how many handicapped people, elderly people, poor people, children and just plain commuters it affected, you have to ask: why didn't RTD consider those people?
RTD said that they didn't want binding arbitration because the last time they were forced into it, they had to pay more than what they had budgeted. The Union proposed that any reasonable person looking at the facts would have given us a reasonable contract.
Looking at the Blogs and other comments, it is easy to see who supports Management regardless of the facts (and who supports Labor regardless of the facts, for that matter.) Those who call for privatizing the rest of RTD don't know that RTD already has a lot of trouble hiring enough drivers and mechanics, and as the economy improves they will find themselves facing the same for all the lower-paid employees as well.
The private carriers pay less than RTD (especially considering health insurance), but they don't force their drivers to work hundreds of hours without days off. RTD Manager Cal Marsella says that if they didn't have to force overtime from the bottom, it would work better. But the truth is that, most of the time, ALL the bus drivers who schedule their days off during the week will be forced to do overtime nearly EVERY DAY. That is how you end up with bus drivers who work for long periods without any days off. They have split shifts that force them to be at work for 12 or more hours to get 8 hours of pay.
I think that if RTD treated their employees a little better, encouraging an occasional day off and treating sick people to sick pay, it would go a long ways towards solving any problems they may think they have.
RTD STRIKE, how it started
On March 26, 2006, the Union ATU Local 1001 voted to reject RTD's "Last, Best, and Final Offer."
The following letter to RTD was written on March 28, 2006. It tells the reasons for wanting a better contract. It shows some of the disrespect we received: while managers received raises averaging $9,000.00, we had no raises at all.
We need a raise now.
In 2003 we believed you when you said the company could not afford raises, so we took a wage freeze.
In those 3 years, we have lost nearly 10% of our buying power due to inflation. The inflation rate in 2005 was about 3.4%.
The company has gained by that inflation (and by the improved economy) with increased sales tax revenues.
Your proposal of 15 cents a quarter will just about keep up with inflation in the next 3 years, but does nothing for the problems we have accumulated. Our credit card balances will never recover.
You may think we make a good living, but things have changed. The median income in Colorado is over $40,000 a year (for a single wage-earner family). What cost $1 in 1968 is now $5.
We need affordable health insurance.
Before 2003, we paid $66 a month for health insurance.
Even at the current rate of $190 a month, there are many people in our lower-paid group who cannot afford it.
You know that the rate will rise dramatically this year, and the next years as well. We need to provide our families with health insurance we can afford.
We are dependant on you to maintain our families.
On March 26, 2006, the Union ATU Local 1001 voted to reject RTD's "Last, Best, and Final Offer."
The following letter to RTD was written on March 28, 2006. It tells the reasons for wanting a better contract. It shows some of the disrespect we received: while managers received raises averaging $9,000.00, we had no raises at all.
We need a raise now.
In 2003 we believed you when you said the company could not afford raises, so we took a wage freeze.
In those 3 years, we have lost nearly 10% of our buying power due to inflation. The inflation rate in 2005 was about 3.4%.
The company has gained by that inflation (and by the improved economy) with increased sales tax revenues.
Your proposal of 15 cents a quarter will just about keep up with inflation in the next 3 years, but does nothing for the problems we have accumulated. Our credit card balances will never recover.
You may think we make a good living, but things have changed. The median income in Colorado is over $40,000 a year (for a single wage-earner family). What cost $1 in 1968 is now $5.
We need affordable health insurance.
Before 2003, we paid $66 a month for health insurance.
Even at the current rate of $190 a month, there are many people in our lower-paid group who cannot afford it.
You know that the rate will rise dramatically this year, and the next years as well. We need to provide our families with health insurance we can afford.
We are dependant on you to maintain our families.
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