Here's What Happened at the Meeting on Monday, May 16 2005 

Meeting opened by the President in due form.  

Members present: Brother's D. St. John, R. Etienne, R. Balkowitsch, S. Barnes, D. Haney, S. Cordes, R. McCartney, K. Atwood, H. Bailey, S. Hill, J. Hill, J. Bennett, T. Reddish, D. Green, J. Johnson, K. Fox, B. Mullane, K. Stockman, E. Taylor, D. Beckwith, R. Reams. 

Minutes of the April meeting were read. Motion to accept as read by Brother D. Green, seconded by Brother Haney. Motion approved.  

Finances:  Presentation of current status made by sec/tres. Current membership is 110 plus one trainman. The current balances of accounts were discussed. Motion to pay the bills by Brother Haney, seconded by Brother Reddish. Motion passed.  

Local Chairman:

The following topics were discussed: 

UTU Strike. Purpose of strike was to get us to cross picket line. President Hahs firm on not crossing lines. This was a prelude to NS A-Card vote. Hearing held in Minneapolis – TRO against Primary Recall Agreement.  BLET filed a motion to intervene and participate in the proceeding last Friday. Neither UTU or BNSF contested that motion.  Pierce attended with BLET represented by Counsel Mike Wolly.  UTU tried very hard to convince the Judge that our Primary Recall agreement was the same as the SF side Ebb and Flow Agreement, and, for that reason required their concurrence.  They based that on the fact that the BLET rule for promotion on the former SF was included in that tripartite ebb and flow agreement and UTU's signature is on it.  Neither BLET nor BNSF agreed with UTU's position.  UTU's signature was required on the SF side agreement only because it also addressed voluntary return or entry to ground service which is a UTU represented craft.  We did not address downward movement or entry into UTU represented crafts in our BLET Primary Recall Agreement. Only addressed promotion or entry to the BLET represented craft of engineer. UTU would not concede that point.  Seems to be an attempt to grab BLET's jurisdiction over Engineer rules and agreements. Ultimately, the Judge ruled that the UTU dispute is a minor dispute under the RLA, and, further, that our Primary Recall agreement will remain in effect.  There will be no TRO against the agreement and UTU cannot strike over the application of our agreement.  The judge did not order arbitration. Instead he simply ruled the dispute to be a minor dispute.  Any further action would require a claim to be progressed through the normal minor dispute channels by UTU if they so desire.  If that happens and that claim involves our agreement, we will certainly request full party status in that proceeding. The true record will show that we did not cross their picket lines even when they struck over our agreement and threatened our jurisdiction by doing so.  Instead we followed the legal avenues available to us to maintain the right to negotiate and represent the engineers' agreement.   

T-6 Lease. T-6 has been offered out for lease. Willbridge will probably follow later in the year. Carrier is offering the Organizations a chance to make changes in crew consist to have 2 man crews. These would be 1 Eng. and one Switchman. Crews would operate conventional until getting to work, then both would get on ground and operate RCO. This follows pattern of KC and Yakima. BLET says no problem. If UTU follows same course, they will not budge. They told carrier they would run the trains from conventional position. Get rid of Engineers. To save money they said. No word on what they have said about T-6 yet, but I don’t expect them to change now. 

Crews on duty over 13 hours. New notice out requiring notifying them after 8 hours. Don’t see much improvement yet. Just keep them informed and ask them what their plans are. Document for us if they say they have no plans. 

Trains parked at Avery. Nothing has been signed allowing Wishram crews to park trains at Avery. If you see any, or get one, get engine # or train ID so we can put in time slips for it. You must be the eyes and ears for the committee. Please document!!!! 

Graffiti. Now that Mr. Cordes is exonerated, they will be looking for someone else. We need to talk it up among each other not to write on walls. Some one will be caught and the whole railroad will fall on him/her. The way to fix the issue is to document aggressive behavior by employee. So far, he is the only one who is documenting anything. It’s not ratting, it’s protecting oneself. Please be careful – I would expect cameras. We have already heard about pencil cameras. 

NS A-Card vote BLET is ramping up for an A-card vote on the NS. This seems to be driven by the general chairmen on the NS. They don’t seem to care about the rest of the nation. Be prepared for bad publicity from the UTU. 

Emergency Application. All EIE or CIE’s are flagged. It’s not a matter of it they see it, but when they see it. Guarantied they will investigate. Be sure to notify road foreman in you dump the train while moving over 10 MPH. Train induced emergencies can be reported too. Protect yourselves. 

Attendance Guidelines Carrier is beyond creative in applying the guidelines to the XBD. They are considering this as a regular assignment. They don’t seem to be allowing “bunching” of days off like the guidelines allow. They claim the 7-3 boards require taking those days off, and they won’t allow working extra one month to take off another. The only recourse is to track your layoffs to stay within the 25%. When changing jobs, we need to keep track of ALL days off taken, even yard days off. All those count. It’s getting ugly. They are trying to get us to take the “new improved” agreement, but that one says if you take 2 days off outside your cycle, you MUST take you whole next cycle. This is forcing us to be out of compliance. We will continue to fight these investigations – if you want. It’s always your choice. Floor opened for discussion. 

FMLA Please use the forms on our web site, or if no access, ask us. Carrier’s forms are invasive, and not mandatory. Our forms are approved by Govt. You may not be refused for taking FML once qualified. You may not be disciplined for taking FML once qualified. You will be required to fulfill requirements of what you applied for. 

Rule books for PDA’s Carrier seems to have put the rule books back up for PDA’s Let’s hope they keep them up. I have been updating them just in case. Anyone wanting on the mailing list let me know. 

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 that they don’t change your date. If so, you need to do it the new date. If only CBT, you can do it any time before the due date. Modules may be done at any time.

 Do not call list.  Regular yard engineers are not covered under this agreement.  This is a glitch in the agreement that we were not aware of. Don’t know what we can do but will look into it. Those in the pool may want to think twice about getting on the list as they may pull someone around you with paper deadheads to go to Pasco.

 Floor opened for discussion and new business.

 Motion to close by Brother Green, seconded by Brother Haney. Motion passed.