Cowboy75
Well-known member
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2008
- Posts
- 397
Ciabattoni's Open letter (in part, full version on usapawatch.com)
[FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]As many of you are now aware, effective December 23, 2009 I resigned from my position as Executive Vice President of USAPA. It has been an honor to serve this pilot group as an elected Officer and I have endeavored to perform my duties efficiently with honesty and integrity as an advocate for our pilots. I will always be grateful for the trust that my fellow pilots gave me with their vote. On Saturday, January 02, 2010, I mailed formal charges to the USAPA Secretary Treasurer over President Cleary’s and Grievance Chair Tracy Parrella’s recent actions related to an offer of full-time employment to a temporary USAPA staff employee who had resigned for another position. The charges are brought under Article VI, SECTION 1. of the USAPA Constitution and include: #2. Willful violation of this Constitution and Bylaws. #3. Misappropriating money or property of the Association. #5. Any act contrary to the best interests of USAPA as an institution or its membership as a whole. The specific written charges will be under the purview of the Appeals Board per the USAPA Constitution. There will be a review by the Appeal Board of these specific charges followed by a determination. It is my belief that I have a clear obligation to bring these charges forward and notify the membership. It is all of our responsibility to defend and demand compliance with the fundamental rules of our democratic organization. I began my term as EVP in the spring of 2009 looking forward to continuing the vision of our founding volunteers and to providing continuity for our new union. From the beginning of my term, I witnessed grave problems in the behavior of President Mike Cleary, Vice President Randy Mowrey, and Grievance Chair Tracy Parrella as well as a simultaneous lack of mandated oversight by the Board of Pilot Representatives. Since the officer elections, Mike Cleary has worked to undermine, isolate, and exclude his fellow officers that did not run as part of his political slate. For example, at the very first BPR meeting under his agenda, he wasted half of the first day attacking me over my unwillingness to unilaterally concede to his demands, and it was obvious I was a principled obstacle to his will. The goal of the slate was "no witnesses and no oversight." [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]During the first month of my term, President Cleary began his micro managing by giving me orders not to send an update letter that I had drafted to our temporary staff. The letter outlined our association’s current status-this is one of my constitutionally mandated duties. He also forbade me to coordinate with the company on any future trip drop requests after I denied authorization for a pilot who attempted a self-drop at President Cleary’s request but gave no purpose for the drop. An important part of any officer’s duty is oversight of legitimate union resources. Most recently, a committee chair succeeded in dictating hiring policy without constitutional or legal authority simply to retain (at an exorbitant expense to the membership) an "assistant" who would do much of the Committee’s work. Perhaps most discouraging is seeing the Board of Pilot Representatives allowing themselves to be manipulated like pawns in this Machiavellian orchestration by the President. I could no longer grant the tacit approval that my official title would offer or in good conscience remain a part of this administration as it morphed into another ALPA-style "Good Ol' Boys Club." I resisted as best I could, as the President has continually worked to centralize his power in opposition to your union’s Constitution and By-Laws. Communications from this President to those outside his circle of power are nonexistent causing detriment to all members. I knew the seamy side of our previous Collective Bargaining Agent (ALPA) more clearly than most of our pilot group likely ever will. This is why I was so proud of the US Airways pilots when they voted overwhelmingly to remove them and replace them with an in-house Bargaining Agent that could provide honest, transparent, and true democratic representation. I’m very thankful for the USAPA volunteers, past and present, that truly advocate for our Pilots and believe in the principals that brought us this UNION and practice them daily. Unfortunately today, we have a President who: Willfully violates the USAPA Constitution; Replaced the ad hoc committee charged with writing the Union Operating Manual (UOM) for political purposes and destroyed any continuity on this very important document that has yet to be completed after 21 months; Ordered security sweeps of the CLT office on your dime (you have to ask yourself why!); Added electronic locks on the President’s office door which is seldom open or occupied (the good thing about the electronic locks is that there’s a permanent record on how many times the door has been opened by your President); Removed me from my shared office with the vice-president to one of the general cubicles and locked me out of that office; Condones flight pay loss according to ALPA policy (LOA 95) for the privileged few; Was responsible for a botched section 29 termination attempt of East and West Pilots which put our association in peril, and then had the gall to lie about it; Has an in-house attorney who’s not in-house; (Our "in-house" lawyer resides in Atlanta); Cast a tie-breaking vote to support a politically appointed (the V.P.) sexual harassment czar; Hired – at additional expense – a new PR firm to do the work that our communication czar has failed to do (our current web-site was outsourced to Sri Lanka); Kept the loss of TA 8 a secret from the pilots, the BPR, and the two officers not in his [/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]slate; Promotes endless negotiating with ourselves under the guise that’s it’s OK because the company is paying for it; Allows a Grievance committee that works from home with membership paid support staff; Generated priority "self-serving" picketing in our President’s home domicile; and, Represents a collective bargaining agent that has the lowest paid pilots in the industry while paying top dollar for its own staff in stark contrast to the wages, working conditions, and benefits of its members; and all of the above with other people’s money: yours! One of the simplest examples of the perversion of the founding intent of USAPA is the creeping re-ALPA-ization of the union's hotel usage. One of the core tenets of USAPA was based on transparency with fiduciary responsibility for member’s dues dollars. An example of this fundamental belief was articulated by USAPA numerous times stating that those who represented the Pilots on dues dollars should stay in the same hotels as the line Pilots. The current lodging rate for USAPA at the Sterling is $29 with an out the door price of around $34. Across the street at the Sheraton Four Points property where most of our USAPA Officers and representatives stay, the lodging rate is $75 and out the door for $81. If the Sterling is good enough for our Pilots as represented by USAPA, why is it not good enough for our Union representatives? If the BPR is not in agreement with the USAPA Constitution on lodging or any other principle, it is incumbent upon them to proffer a change to the Constitution and take it to the membership for ratification. Instead, we have continued violations of the Constitution under the leadership of President Cleary without oversight by the BPR. At a recent BPR meeting one of our new CLT Representatives stated that he is insulted by the UOM requirement of a monthly pay log for full–time USAPA workers. He stated "if the Pilots want to know what you are doing then they can come to a meeting and see for themselves." Unfortunately our fresh start has been hi-jacked by those who relish the cushy lifestyle of the elite and answer to no one – just like before. Manipulation and excessive spending allow some to coast from home while responsibility for oversight is allowed to atrophy into a go-along-to-get-along mentality; all those things I thought we left behind in Herndon, VA with our former CBA. Your New Union needs to hear from you! We cannot stand by and let the events such as the LOA 93 pay rate expiration go the way of our pension. This Union is supposed to be working for you. Failure to actively confront deceitful and self-serving leadership has personally [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]degraded each of our lives to a level which pilots of past generations could never comprehend. It is the responsibility of any democratically represented group to provide oversight of their elected leadership by continually questioning the direction and motives of those who have been elevated to the esteemed position of representative, and yes, at times, dissent. Obviously, avoiding the uncomfortable discussion of the motives of the leadership is what has gotten our pension-less, underpaid, overworked, and disrespected group to the place we find ourselves – LOA 84, LOA 85, LOA 91, LOA 93, LOA 95 etc. We can never return to the "Can’t we all just get along?" mentality of evading the responsibilities of the electorate. In conclusion, I will stand by my reputation and service to this Pilot group in the face of what I expect to be a continued barrage of retaliatory and baseless accusations for simply saying…The Emperor Has No Clothes! Fraternally, Dave Ciabattoni [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]__________________ [/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]As many of you are now aware, effective December 23, 2009 I resigned from my position as Executive Vice President of USAPA. It has been an honor to serve this pilot group as an elected Officer and I have endeavored to perform my duties efficiently with honesty and integrity as an advocate for our pilots. I will always be grateful for the trust that my fellow pilots gave me with their vote. On Saturday, January 02, 2010, I mailed formal charges to the USAPA Secretary Treasurer over President Cleary’s and Grievance Chair Tracy Parrella’s recent actions related to an offer of full-time employment to a temporary USAPA staff employee who had resigned for another position. The charges are brought under Article VI, SECTION 1. of the USAPA Constitution and include: #2. Willful violation of this Constitution and Bylaws. #3. Misappropriating money or property of the Association. #5. Any act contrary to the best interests of USAPA as an institution or its membership as a whole. The specific written charges will be under the purview of the Appeals Board per the USAPA Constitution. There will be a review by the Appeal Board of these specific charges followed by a determination. It is my belief that I have a clear obligation to bring these charges forward and notify the membership. It is all of our responsibility to defend and demand compliance with the fundamental rules of our democratic organization. I began my term as EVP in the spring of 2009 looking forward to continuing the vision of our founding volunteers and to providing continuity for our new union. From the beginning of my term, I witnessed grave problems in the behavior of President Mike Cleary, Vice President Randy Mowrey, and Grievance Chair Tracy Parrella as well as a simultaneous lack of mandated oversight by the Board of Pilot Representatives. Since the officer elections, Mike Cleary has worked to undermine, isolate, and exclude his fellow officers that did not run as part of his political slate. For example, at the very first BPR meeting under his agenda, he wasted half of the first day attacking me over my unwillingness to unilaterally concede to his demands, and it was obvious I was a principled obstacle to his will. The goal of the slate was "no witnesses and no oversight." [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]During the first month of my term, President Cleary began his micro managing by giving me orders not to send an update letter that I had drafted to our temporary staff. The letter outlined our association’s current status-this is one of my constitutionally mandated duties. He also forbade me to coordinate with the company on any future trip drop requests after I denied authorization for a pilot who attempted a self-drop at President Cleary’s request but gave no purpose for the drop. An important part of any officer’s duty is oversight of legitimate union resources. Most recently, a committee chair succeeded in dictating hiring policy without constitutional or legal authority simply to retain (at an exorbitant expense to the membership) an "assistant" who would do much of the Committee’s work. Perhaps most discouraging is seeing the Board of Pilot Representatives allowing themselves to be manipulated like pawns in this Machiavellian orchestration by the President. I could no longer grant the tacit approval that my official title would offer or in good conscience remain a part of this administration as it morphed into another ALPA-style "Good Ol' Boys Club." I resisted as best I could, as the President has continually worked to centralize his power in opposition to your union’s Constitution and By-Laws. Communications from this President to those outside his circle of power are nonexistent causing detriment to all members. I knew the seamy side of our previous Collective Bargaining Agent (ALPA) more clearly than most of our pilot group likely ever will. This is why I was so proud of the US Airways pilots when they voted overwhelmingly to remove them and replace them with an in-house Bargaining Agent that could provide honest, transparent, and true democratic representation. I’m very thankful for the USAPA volunteers, past and present, that truly advocate for our Pilots and believe in the principals that brought us this UNION and practice them daily. Unfortunately today, we have a President who: Willfully violates the USAPA Constitution; Replaced the ad hoc committee charged with writing the Union Operating Manual (UOM) for political purposes and destroyed any continuity on this very important document that has yet to be completed after 21 months; Ordered security sweeps of the CLT office on your dime (you have to ask yourself why!); Added electronic locks on the President’s office door which is seldom open or occupied (the good thing about the electronic locks is that there’s a permanent record on how many times the door has been opened by your President); Removed me from my shared office with the vice-president to one of the general cubicles and locked me out of that office; Condones flight pay loss according to ALPA policy (LOA 95) for the privileged few; Was responsible for a botched section 29 termination attempt of East and West Pilots which put our association in peril, and then had the gall to lie about it; Has an in-house attorney who’s not in-house; (Our "in-house" lawyer resides in Atlanta); Cast a tie-breaking vote to support a politically appointed (the V.P.) sexual harassment czar; Hired – at additional expense – a new PR firm to do the work that our communication czar has failed to do (our current web-site was outsourced to Sri Lanka); Kept the loss of TA 8 a secret from the pilots, the BPR, and the two officers not in his [/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]slate; Promotes endless negotiating with ourselves under the guise that’s it’s OK because the company is paying for it; Allows a Grievance committee that works from home with membership paid support staff; Generated priority "self-serving" picketing in our President’s home domicile; and, Represents a collective bargaining agent that has the lowest paid pilots in the industry while paying top dollar for its own staff in stark contrast to the wages, working conditions, and benefits of its members; and all of the above with other people’s money: yours! One of the simplest examples of the perversion of the founding intent of USAPA is the creeping re-ALPA-ization of the union's hotel usage. One of the core tenets of USAPA was based on transparency with fiduciary responsibility for member’s dues dollars. An example of this fundamental belief was articulated by USAPA numerous times stating that those who represented the Pilots on dues dollars should stay in the same hotels as the line Pilots. The current lodging rate for USAPA at the Sterling is $29 with an out the door price of around $34. Across the street at the Sheraton Four Points property where most of our USAPA Officers and representatives stay, the lodging rate is $75 and out the door for $81. If the Sterling is good enough for our Pilots as represented by USAPA, why is it not good enough for our Union representatives? If the BPR is not in agreement with the USAPA Constitution on lodging or any other principle, it is incumbent upon them to proffer a change to the Constitution and take it to the membership for ratification. Instead, we have continued violations of the Constitution under the leadership of President Cleary without oversight by the BPR. At a recent BPR meeting one of our new CLT Representatives stated that he is insulted by the UOM requirement of a monthly pay log for full–time USAPA workers. He stated "if the Pilots want to know what you are doing then they can come to a meeting and see for themselves." Unfortunately our fresh start has been hi-jacked by those who relish the cushy lifestyle of the elite and answer to no one – just like before. Manipulation and excessive spending allow some to coast from home while responsibility for oversight is allowed to atrophy into a go-along-to-get-along mentality; all those things I thought we left behind in Herndon, VA with our former CBA. Your New Union needs to hear from you! We cannot stand by and let the events such as the LOA 93 pay rate expiration go the way of our pension. This Union is supposed to be working for you. Failure to actively confront deceitful and self-serving leadership has personally [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Verdana,Verdana][FONT=Verdana,Verdana]degraded each of our lives to a level which pilots of past generations could never comprehend. It is the responsibility of any democratically represented group to provide oversight of their elected leadership by continually questioning the direction and motives of those who have been elevated to the esteemed position of representative, and yes, at times, dissent. Obviously, avoiding the uncomfortable discussion of the motives of the leadership is what has gotten our pension-less, underpaid, overworked, and disrespected group to the place we find ourselves – LOA 84, LOA 85, LOA 91, LOA 93, LOA 95 etc. We can never return to the "Can’t we all just get along?" mentality of evading the responsibilities of the electorate. In conclusion, I will stand by my reputation and service to this Pilot group in the face of what I expect to be a continued barrage of retaliatory and baseless accusations for simply saying…The Emperor Has No Clothes! Fraternally, Dave Ciabattoni [/FONT][/FONT]
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