Here's What Happened at the Meeting on Monday, January 17 2005 

 Meeting opened by president in due order.  Forms were made available for the James P. Hoffa memorial scholarship awards. Anyone interested contact Ron or Rick.

 Members present: R. Etienne, R. Balkowitsch, D. St. John, R. Reams, B. Knowles, T. Jacobs, K. Atwood, R. Reddish, J. McHenry, R. McCartney, D. Beckwith, R. Moore, K. Taylor, E. Taylor.

 Due to no meeting being held in December, the minutes of the November meeting were read.  The floor was opened for discussion and amendments. No amendments made and motion to accept minutes as read by T. Reddish, Seconded by K. Attwood.  Motion passed.

 Financial report made by Sec-Treasurer.  We currently have 111 members and one trainman.  Due to technical difficulties, no bills were paid in November or December.  We will make all these bills up this month.  The GCA as of January 1 is receiving our dues payments and redistributing them to the appropriate bodies.  They have sent us a form to allow them to deposit the monies we are owed directly to our account.  However, the second paragraph also authorizes them to make withdrawals at their discretion.  After discussions with the President, we are going to rewrite the authorization form to subtract this paragraph.  We will then send it in and see how they react.  Be aware, that until they accept, or we are forced to use the second form, we will be receiving no dues monies. Floor was opened for discussion. Motion made by B. Knowles to pay the bills as presented, seconded by E. Taylor. Motion passed.

 Safety report made by B. Knowles. The recent SACP meeting was held in Spokane.  There was a recent spill in the new refueling facility at Hawser. Mr. Jackson hijacked the participants for a walk through the facility. This is a very nice facility but as normal, they went cheap in many areas and are already suffering the results.  There were discussions about making all detectors except those at terminals silent.  This would still allow you to get your axle count but cut down on radio traffic. There were questions on whether they could also be made directions. There was also discussion about changing the rules so you would not have to call out signals inside terminals.  No decision made at this time but will keep you posted.  There have been some instances where crews have been doing their work on cell phones when the radio traffic is high. DON’T DO IT. Not only is it against the rules, but leaves you no backup if something goes wrong.  Still waiting for the WUTC meeting on point protection. It has been cancelled 4 times already. Will attend if it happens and will keep everyone informed.

Lineup Committee report. T. Reddish handed out a synopsis of the report that was recently finished. This study was for six months and the participants gave a 3 hour presentation with discussion to Mr. Jackson and other officers.  They came up with 23 recommended changes that they will look at. We do not know how many be adopted but look for some changes to be made. Whether it will be better or worse we will have to see.   We also have gotten the Gateway division back. Unfortunately they had a bad derailment just afterwards.  A train was lined into a house track with grain cars spotted on it. They hit in the area of 41 mph. Both crew members were injured severely but survived.  Please be careful out there, this should serve as warning to us all.

 Local Chairman. 

 Our Section 6 Notice is out and posted on the web site. BNSF has expressed interest in withdrawing from national handling.  We will see what happens.   

Vacations, all weeks in May are full. Excessive changes will be discouraged. All prime week changes will be by bid.

 Code 2B. BNSF is relying on a recent board award PLB 6171, award 32. The neutral declared that XBD engineers don’t fall under “short turn around” rules. They say they are called for “dog catch service”.  I can’t find any agreement that creates this class of service.  Have sent letter to the GCA for interpretation, but no answer yet.  Currently we are told trip after 25 miles will pay code 2B. Or depart after 8 hours. Or total miles over 100. 

The correct application of code 2B is as follows:

If making multiple short turns, an ADDITIONAL BASIC DAY is entitled if ANY of the following occur:

1. If the FIRST trip is in excess of 25 miles one way, and a second trip is made, regardless of the distance,
2. The total mileage of the MULTIPLE trips exceeds 100 miles.
3. The second trip commences after the expiration of 8 hours on duty.
   • In the first example above, if the first trip is less than 25 miles one way, then the second trip can be made without beginning a new day. If a 3^rd  trip was also less than 25 miles, but a final trip went out 25 miles, there would be no beginning of a second day.
   • This is not a penalty rule, but simply used to determine when to start a new day’s timeslip.

 Primary Recall Agreement Proposal. May help keep LETP graduates in area where training occurred. May take pressure off adjacent zones. Problems are worse in Midwest.  Discussion was opened.

 Held away in Pasco. Currently we are sending reports to carrier almost daily about the Held away problem. Deadheading for held away prime problem. Currently, BNSF has multitude of reasons, none of  them are valid.  We will continue to bombard them with facts and figures, trying to embarrass them into fixing it.

 Studded tires on vans in Pasco.  Current contracts require studs or chains. Read Fay says it’s our responsibility to tell the driver to put chains on.  No one seems to know what the contract with Ratzenburger says about studs. EMPOWER yourself. The carrier is relying on our desire to just go home or to our on duty place to overpower our sense of safety. We seem to be refusing to empower ourselves. Many engineers seem to think the Union should take care of it, not each person.

UPDATE. The carrier has required the transport company to put studs on all their long haul vehicles. The yard vehicles will continue to be without studded tires.

 Proposal for Wishram to get switching limits at Avery. Carrier wants Wishram to be able to go out to Avery to take trains instead of  backing them into the yard.  Division 58 has agreed that if we give them that, they will give us all work trains west of Wishram, regardless of distance to either terminal. This proposal has gone back to BNSF. We are awaiting word back from them.

 Make whole pay.  If you put in for make whole, and don’t get paid, or get paid wrong, be sure to let us know right away.  Payroll has been spanked recently on their lack of make whole abilities.

 Simulator and CBT.  If you are required to do the Simulator, you may only do it on the date they give you.  Watch to be sure they don’t change your date.  If so, you need to do it on the new date.  If only CBT, you can do it any time before the due date.

 They floor was opened for discussion.

 Motion to close meeting by K. Atwood, Seconded by, T. Jacobs .  Motion passed.