Greetings

By the time you read this article the snow storms should be winding down and spring should be in the air. My hope is that the unnecessary discipline letters that the company has been issuing this winter will be winding down as well. As I am writing this letter, district 7 has 44 grievances that are all at different phases in the appeals process. Of those 44 grievances, 38 of them are for unjust discipline letters. These discipline letters have a common theme: an employee makes an honest mistake and receives a letter stating that the employee is careless, negligent, and failing to comply with the safety rules and regulations. Our employees, who are all human beings, do make mistakes; however, these discipline letters go on to say that further violations of this nature will result in further discipline including termination! Our supervisors, managers, directors, employee resources, company attorneys, and all of our VPs make mistakes as well. Why? Because they are also human beings. Unlike our members, however, members of the management are not threatened with termination letters every time they make a mistake, so why are our members? We recently had two arbitration decisions from district 7. One was overturned by the arbitrator and the agent was reinstated. The other was an unjust final letter of warning for job performance, which was removed. Stay tuned as these cases move through the grievance process. On another note, we recently had new representative training in SJC, which was positive and productive. I would like to thank all of my station reps and their alternates who attended from SJC, SFO, BUR, SMF, LAX and LAS.  I would also like to give a special recognition to my Alternate Mike Roach and the Alternate Station Rep (SMF) Jose Landeros for their assistance. Great job everyone! “All that is valuable in human society depends on the opportunity for development accorded the individual.” –Albert Einstein, German-born American Nobel Peace Prize Winning Physicist Work safe, work smart, and continue to look out for one another.

Fraternally,

h.bryant@twu555.org