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NEWS & LETTERS, April 2002
Transport
workers beat fixed election
Brooklyn,
N.Y.--Those dirty New York City Transit management guys told the union chair,
who they control like a puppet, who to vote for in the union election. The
election was rigged for management. I was going to run for depot chair as a bus
driver for 12 years with two years as shop steward. I am a safety liaison and
knowledgeable about compensation issues. It caused too much confusion for the
membership so I stepped down. The
election vice chair told people not to vote for us, stating if we ran against
him, then we all would lose. He said it would be good to have him in office
because the boss likes him and can talk to him. He used personal information
about the other candidates as part of his campaign. This man has not taken any
classes and does not know the rules. The
depot chair has resigned three times but management coached him and had him
reinstated. He was just not up on safety issues, including oil spills. Workers
were getting one or two days on their record when they should have gotten a
warning. People sometimes ended up getting the wrong compensation form. Surprise!
We won the election for depot chair! The vote was two to one for us. When I
threw my support behind our candidate, we really got our campaign moving. It was
difficult because of the attempts to back management-leaning candidates. I'm the
compensation navigator now, and I've handled three cases. The road is going to
be rough ahead, but through our efforts to organize, we are going to make this
thing work for the union. It's
necessary to go back and tell the history of the Transport Workers union. People
have to see how we used to get beat up for fighting for our rights. We can't let
management take our rights away from us by controlling the depot chair. --Shop
Steward, Transport Workers Local 100 |
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