Aloha Members Ratify Recovery Terms
IAM
Members at Aloha Airlines voted to accept three separate agreements detailing
employee participation in the company’s recovery plan.
Eighty-four percent of the Clerical and Customer Service employees endorsed
their agreement, with eighty percent of Fleet Service employees approving their
accord. District 141 represents both employee groups.
Mechanic and Related employees represented by IAM District 141-M also endorsed
their agreement, with eighty-six percent of the voting membership approving the
new pact.
Approved terms call
for a ten percent reduction of scheduled pay rates for 36 months beginning
January 1, 2003 with rates snapping back on December 31, 2005. Medical and
pension benefits are preserved under the new agreements.
The contract will be amendable on May 1, 2006.
Details can be found
on the District 141 and 141M web sites at
www.iam141.org and
www.iam141m.org.
S&P Should Bar Offshore Runaways
In a
strongly worded letter to the president of Standard and Poor’s, IP Tom
Buffenbarger called for the elimination of expatriate U.S. companies
from the Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 Index.
“I have been deeply disturbed by recent revelations of corporate
misconduct and the resulting damage to our financial markets and
economy,” wrote Buffenbarger. “The increasing practice of U.S.
corporations incorporating outside the country to offshore tax havens,
such as Bermuda, is of particular concern.”
“Not only do these paper relocations to an offshore tax haven threaten a
significant portion of our nation’s tax base, they also weaken important
shareholder rights,” said Buffenbarger. A recent filing with the
Securities and Exchange Commission noted disclosure problems and
difficulties faced by shareholders in offshore firms seeking to protect
their rights and interests.
There are approximately 20 expatriate companies listed on the S&P 500
Index, including Ingersoll-Rand, Cooper Industries, Tyco International,
Nabors Industries and Foster Wheeler Corporation.
For more information on Standard & Poor's:
www.standardandpoors.com
Retirees Face More
Bad News
Retired workers who receive health care benefits from a former employer
can expect their costs to escalate over the next few years, according to
a joint survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Hewitt Associates.
The survey drew from interviews with some of the nation’s largest
employers and focused on their projections for the next three years. The
study found that 82 percent of those companies say they expect to
increase retiree premiums. Too, 85 percent plan to increase prescription
drug co-payments or co-insurance. Even more worrisome, 22 percent say
they will eliminate such health coverage for future retirees.
Thirteen percent say they terminated such benefits over the past two
years.
Sen. Lott Apologizes
for ‘Apology’
Incoming Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-MS, finds the temperature
rising as he struggles to escape the simmering controversy over racially
tinged remarks that ignited a political firestorm. Lott praised Sen.
Strom Thurmond at a birthday gala and said the nation would have fewer
problems had Thurmond won his 1948 White House bid.
Thurmond carried four southern states, including Lott’s Mississippi,
running as a Dixiecrat on a race-baiting segregationist platform.
Lott admitted to a “poor choice of words” and apologized to “anyone who
was offended by my statement.” He later “apologized” for his initial
apology.
Turns out, Lott had made nearly identical remarks concerning Thurmond at
an earlier gala in Mississippi 22 years ago. That revelation added fuel
to the already blistering blaze. Even a scattering of Lott’s GOP
supporters privately cringe at the gaffe. “Lott’s comments could
single-handedly set the party back a decade,” one GOP strategist told
the Washington Post.
Neither President Bush nor any White House official has commented on
the affair.
NFFE Battles ‘Third Wave’ Ploy
The
IAM and its members in the federal sector pledge an all-out battle
against the newest scheme to “privatize, out-source, contract-out or
downsize” federal workers through Army Secretary Tom White’s latest
brainstorm.
White claims his “Third Wave” initiative could impact more than 154,000
civilian workers, as well as 58,000 Army Department slots. Some of those
slots include sensitive positions vital to national defense and
historically immune to such tinkering.
NFFE, which represents the union’s federal workers, crafted a grassroots
plan of their own to “Fight the Wave’, noted Rick Brown, president/DBR
of Federal District 1. “We’re going to energize our members and demand
that Congress look into this backdoor assault on our members and their
jobs,” he said.
Both the Air Force and Navy, the nation’s other major military services,
adopted a hands-off policy towards the initiative, which is based on a
private sector study be the Rand Corp., that would hand major segments
of White’s department over to corporate America.
“That should not be a surprise,” noted IP Tom Buffenbarger. “White
earned his corporate credentials as a senior executive with Enron Corp.”
Southern Territory Mourns George Fedo
George
Fedo, Special Representative for the Southern Territory,
died Monday after a one-year battle with cancer. He was 58 years old.
Brother Fedo joined the Southern Territory Staff on April 1, 2001.
He was a member of Local Lodge 2771 in Wichita Falls, TX. He joined the
Machinists in 1989 when the aircraft mechanics at Sheppard Air Force
base organized into the IAM.
During his career, Brother Fedo held numerous positions such as Local
Lodge President, District 776 Delegate, President of the Wichita Falls
Trades and Labor Council and Vice President of the Texas AFL-CIO,
District 9. He was an IAM Apprentice Organizer before his appointment to
the Southern Territory Staff.
“George was a
very hard working representative who never stopped at the end of an
eight hour day,” said
General Vice
President George Hooper. “He
was a very successful organizer, winning five campaigns his first year
as a Special Representative. George was an honest man with
unquestionable character and high moral standards. I really loved the
guy. He will be greatly missed by all the Southern Territory Staff.”