usapa-vote authorized-''thestreet'' -2/20/08

[MK82Man]

RedDog -- if this was about a unified group of US Airways pilots wanting to get rid of ALPA for some reason, that would be one thing. But that isn't the case. It is about 2200 East guys upset about a Federal Binding Arbitration Award and according to the East Chairman's vow "to never let the NIC award see the light of day." Please understand this isn't about the new US Airways looking for a new direction, this is about 60% of the group looking for an advantage over 40% of the group, the America West pilots. So "go for it" does not go over well with 1800 pilots at America West.

For al the ALPA members who are complaining about wasted time and money, you got that right. You will never get a full accounting of the millions of dollars the East pilots are wasting in your dues money. The FPL, the hotel and meal bills, etc, is must just be a staggering sum. Could have been spent on something much more important. What a waste. No USAPA.

 

[MCDU]

Last count East has over 3600 pilots on their list. Most junior is 3600 plus based on latest award. So it is double the size the AWA. Sorry, ALPA is on its way out. The numbers the East have are way too big. Bottom E190 Capt. is sen 3155 per last award. This is with zero growth in the last 3 years.
Anyone know how many 190 are on the property?
Marty

33 % AWA 66% AAA
According to elig. pilots there will be a little over 5200 pilots that will get to vote.

 

[Green]

USAPA's whole purpose as a union is to utilize the numbers of the majority to screw the minority. What a noble cause....lol...You guys/gals are pathetic. This is nothing more than a seniority grab and the saddest part is that you are willing to undercut the profession to try and get Parker to agree to letting you steal AWA seniority. Apparently honor, integrity, duty are not guiding principles for at least 3200 East pilots. You all should be ashamed of yourselves.



Subject: Overturning Nicolau Award
Author: XXXXX XXXXXXXX
Date: 12 Feb 2008 01:28 PM

As many of you know, we have been promising for some time to overturn the Nicolau Award. Our law firm has from the very beginning of this process assured us that this would be “highly, highly, likely” Through a more thorough review of the legal landscape and court precedences we have to come to realize that overturning the award has a slim chance of success.

I know that this will be disheartening news to many of you, particularly when we are so close to the NMB vote allowing us to control our future. Take heart. Our plan to protect your career has now shifted from completely overturning the award, to an approach which would essentially make an end-run around the list. This list will still be out there, however our intention is to make it very hard to ever implement it. This is an approach which really is “highly, highly likely.”

Some of you may be questioning our change in focus with respect to the Nicolau award. We have had a titanic shift in thinking with regard to our herculean effort to get you the protections you are rightly justified in having concerns. Let me take the time to explain our plan moving forward.

Once we become the bargaining agent for all US Airways pilots, we will take over contract negotiations. As we have reported to you (and supported by past court cases) your seniority does not “belong” to you. Rakestraw v. United demonstrated this (see PHL Roadshow videos). Seniority is a negotiable item, and is only good until the next barganing cycle. ALPA has set this legal precedent itself. In the United case ALPA paid United $200 million to correct the seniority of the pilots that honored the picket lines. Moving the 539 scabs behind the 570 pilots that honored the strike set the standard for the cost associated with renegotiating seniority. $200million divided by 539 pilots comes out to approximately $371,058 per pilot. With approximately 1800 America West pilots, we’ll need about $668 Million to re-order the seniority list. While this may seem like an unrealistic amount of money, please realize that you won’t have to pay for ANY of it.

Doug Parker has shown time and time again that this merger was simply about finances. Well, two can play at that game. You may recall his cost-neutral stance when his negotiators were last at the barganing table. Our plan is simple: give Doug what he wants, and we get what we want. A cost neutral contract will easily save the company $668 million. All that we ask for in return is to order the seniority list on a date of hire basis, with reasonable adjustments made for time of service. True, this will cause SOME reordering of our own seniority list, but I think we can all agree that those of us that loose a little will benefit from the fact that most of us will gain 1800 numbers of furlough protection.

To close out this post, and to further demostrate to you how different USAPA is from ALPA I want to share with you several court summaries that we received from one of our pilot volunteers. I think they demostrate that we really pay attention to input from our pilot group, that we are not so set in our ways that we can’t change direction, and that we truly are a transparent union. Some of the language is not at polished as we strive for in our communications, but I wanted you to see the unfiltered emotion which drives our great movement. When reading these summaries ask yourself this question: “Would ALPA allow information that is critical of itself to be widely distributed?” I think we all know the answer to that question, and that is why we were able to submit over 3000 cards to the NMB. Remember: USAPA is about giving US Airways pilots the right to make a choice!

 

[Bringupthebird]

Last count East has over 3600 pilots on their list. Most junior is 3600 plus based on latest award. So it is double the size the AWA. Sorry, ALPA is on its way out. The numbers the East have are way too big. Bottom E190 Capt. is sen 3155 per last award. This is with zero growth in the last 3 years.

I hope they enjoy their "spoils". I have a feeling they will recall these as the good old days.

 

[ALGFLYR]

Green posted this supposed "letter" in another thread.

Again, this letter was NOT put out by USAPA. My bet it was put out by ALPA and they are trying to pass it off as USAPA...

 

[CEO silly sap]

I'm seeing the USAPA tags and bright yellow things on most all of the Airways guys in CLT.

It will be interesting to see what comes of this. It will be devastating to ALPA and raise dues for everyone I imagine. Guess the Airway guys are ready to see someone else take it up the ass for a change. Can't say I blame them. It's gonna hurt though.

I expected more from the PSA pilots, you would think an independent Union would be the last thing they want...Barkley is turning in his grave and Russell Ray is probably doing the same.

 

[Propsync]

I wonder how much more services like aeromedical will cost an experienced pilot group. And insurance (short-term, loss of license, etc.). I wonder if it will take 3-4 percent to get just the same level of service?

I don't think it will cost ALPA much. Less expenditures as a result of them not being in ALPA, and a revenue stream for services they (USAPA) will not be able to provide.

The unity will be the most costly. This is just one more step back for your profession. Every time one is added, just makes it that much tougher to climb back up. Good luck.

 

[Tejas-Jet]

I wonder how much more services like aeromedical will cost an experienced pilot group. And insurance (short-term, loss of license, etc.). I wonder if it will take 3-4 percent to get just the same level of service?--->Not really...it will cost the same as it does the SWAPA pilots, the APA pilots and other independent pilot groups...

I don't think it will cost ALPA much. --->As it doesn't cost APA, nor SWAPA much either. Don't make this more complicated than it has to be.

The unity will be the most costly.--->They've got nowhere to go but up...the "unity" at the combined US Airways isn't there anyway, regardless if the pilots are represented by ALPA or USAPA. The sad part is...management already knows that This is just one more step back for your profession.--->If it wasn't a step back for the profession when the AA pilots left ALPA, or when the SWA pilots decided on an "in house" union...it won't be in this case either.

 

[Andy]

You love to hate ALPA Nat'l over age 60. If ALPA national didn't exist... how would age 60 have gone down?

Likely, it wouldn't have 'gone down.' And ALPA national pushed extremely hard to ensure that 2 over 60s could fly domestically. That surely wouldn't have gone down had it not been for ALPA.

The best thing that could happen from all of this is that USAirways pilots cede from ALPA. ALPA has outlived it's usefulness and has become increasingly corrupt. They're making Jimmy Hoffa's Teamsters look like choir boys.
ALPA's become a part of the problem, not the solution. It either needs to get it's house in order QUICKLY or may very well die. And I see the death of ALPA, as it currently exists, as a very good thing for all pilots. They're a bunch of snake oil salesmen that push personal agendas in the name of unity.

As for the dues issue, ALPA charges 1.95%. My understanding is that APA and SWAPA charge 1%. I don't see any additional 'value' for double the dues.

So while ALPA blowhards sit there and sing the praises of ALPA, they ignore the growing complaints from the masses. I'm tired of hearing 'let them eat cake' from Herndon. Perhaps prater and the rest of national need to be introduced to Dr Antoine Louis' device.

 

[ferlo]

USAPA's whole purpose as a union is to utilize the numbers of the majority to screw the minority. What a noble cause....lol...You guys/gals are pathetic. This is nothing more than a seniority grab and the saddest part is that you are willing to undercut the profession to try and get Parker to agree to letting you steal AWA seniority. Apparently honor, integrity, duty are not guiding principles for at least 3200 East pilots. You all should be ashamed of yourselves.



Subject: Overturning Nicolau Award
Author: XXXXX XXXXXXXX
Date: 12 Feb 2008 01:28 PM

As many of you know, we have been promising for some time to overturn the Nicolau Award. Our law firm has from the very beginning of this process assured us that this would be “highly, highly, likely” Through a more thorough review of the legal landscape and court precedences we have to come to realize that overturning the award has a slim chance of success.

I know that this will be disheartening news to many of you, particularly when we are so close to the NMB vote allowing us to control our future. Take heart. Our plan to protect your career has now shifted from completely overturning the award, to an approach which would essentially make an end-run around the list. This list will still be out there, however our intention is to make it very hard to ever implement it. This is an approach which really is “highly, highly likely.”

Some of you may be questioning our change in focus with respect to the Nicolau award. We have had a titanic shift in thinking with regard to our herculean effort to get you the protections you are rightly justified in having concerns. Let me take the time to explain our plan moving forward.

Once we become the bargaining agent for all US Airways pilots, we will take over contract negotiations. As we have reported to you (and supported by past court cases) your seniority does not “belong” to you. Rakestraw v. United demonstrated this (see PHL Roadshow videos). Seniority is a negotiable item, and is only good until the next barganing cycle. ALPA has set this legal precedent itself. In the United case ALPA paid United $200 million to correct the seniority of the pilots that honored the picket lines. Moving the 539 scabs behind the 570 pilots that honored the strike set the standard for the cost associated with renegotiating seniority. $200million divided by 539 pilots comes out to approximately $371,058 per pilot. With approximately 1800 America West pilots, we’ll need about $668 Million to re-order the seniority list. While this may seem like an unrealistic amount of money, please realize that you won’t have to pay for ANY of it.

Doug Parker has shown time and time again that this merger was simply about finances. Well, two can play at that game. You may recall his cost-neutral stance when his negotiators were last at the barganing table. Our plan is simple: give Doug what he wants, and we get what we want. A cost neutral contract will easily save the company $668 million. All that we ask for in return is to order the seniority list on a date of hire basis, with reasonable adjustments made for time of service. True, this will cause SOME reordering of our own seniority list, but I think we can all agree that those of us that loose a little will benefit from the fact that most of us will gain 1800 numbers of furlough protection.

To close out this post, and to further demostrate to you how different USAPA is from ALPA I want to share with you several court summaries that we received from one of our pilot volunteers. I think they demostrate that we really pay attention to input from our pilot group, that we are not so set in our ways that we can’t change direction, and that we truly are a transparent union. Some of the language is not at polished as we strive for in our communications, but I wanted you to see the unfiltered emotion which drives our great movement. When reading these summaries ask yourself this question: “Would ALPA allow information that is critical of itself to be widely distributed?” I think we all know the answer to that question, and that is why we were able to submit over 3000 cards to the NMB. Remember: USAPA is about giving US Airways pilots the right to make a choice!

This is precisely why USAPA is nothing but a SCAB organization. They want to "buy" their fantasy seniority list for 700 million dollars. That's intentionally working for sub-union wages. That in turn, MAKES ALL USAPA SUPPORTERS/VOTERS SCABS

 

[MCDU]

You idiot. That was not written by USAPA. This is ALPA supporters at their worst, trying to make sh!t up.

 

[ferlo]

You idiot. That was not written by USAPA. This is ALPA supporters at their worst, trying to make sh!t up.

The funny/tragic thing is this: It will all fail. UScabAPA will create a self consuming monster.

That letter, legit or not, doesn't matter. The fact is, the east will do anything to bury the careers of the West pilots. They and you, are SCABS.

 

[SaturnPilot]

Likely, it wouldn't have 'gone down.' And ALPA national pushed extremely hard to ensure that 2 over 60s could fly domestically. That surely wouldn't have gone down had it not been for ALPA.

no, it was going to "go down" regardless of what ALPA said about it. Language had already been passed in the house and senate changing the age, but it was vetoed by bush because it was attached to other spending bills, etc, that bush didn't like. They were simply just going to throw that language on another bill regardless. This language appeared before alpa changed its stance.

ALPA has outlived it's usefulness and has become increasingly corrupt.

in what way is ALPA actually corrupt? In your answer, please state specific facts. I don't see how ALPA is all of a sudden not useful. Didn't they make east guys the highest paid pilots in the industry less than 10 years ago?

They're making Jimmy Hoffa's Teamsters look like choir boys.

cause they're breaking knee caps? Seriously...

ALPA's become a part of the problem, not the solution. It either needs to get it's house in order QUICKLY or may very well die.

nice fear mongering, but ALPA certainly isn't dying quickly...and what do you propose to "get alpa's house in order"??

And I see the death of ALPA, as it currently exists, as a very good thing for all pilots.

a good thing for pilots??? are you kidding? you want to imagine what this industry would look like if ALPA had never been? pick up Flying the Line and find out what being an airline pilot really could be like without alpa around. If alpa goes away, who's going to talk to congress about cabotage, open skies, etc? USAPA-PAC??

They're a bunch of snake oil salesmen that push personal agendas in the name of unity.

What possibly could be the "personal agenda" of an ALPA rep that he so bad wants to push on you?

No offense sir, but this entire post is extremely innaccurate. You seem to have many problems with ALPA, but I'm willing to place a large bet that you have NEVER gone to a LEC meeting bringing a resolution to fix what you deem to be the problems, or ran for elected office to "clean ALPA's house". I could be wrong and if I am, I apologize, but the reality is that most people would rather spend their time complaining about ALPA on this website then becoming part of the solution. ALPA is not a telepathic entity.

 

[PCL_128]

Andy, I know you're upset about how Prater handled Age-60, but are you really dumb enough to let a single issue dictate your thinking? I always figured you for a much smarter guy. Prater's time will pass. He'll likely only serve a single term. That means only another 2 years and 10 months until this guy is gone. His mishandling of the Age-60 issue has cost us a lot, but throwing out the entire union because of Prater's mishandling of Age-60 is absurd.

 

[TWA Dude]

My understanding is that APA and SWAPA charge 1%. I don't see any additional 'value' for double the dues.

To be completely accurate, the APA raises it dues to 1.5% during Section 6, which of course takes years.

So while ALPA blowhards sit there and sing the praises of ALPA, they ignore the growing complaints from the masses.

No need for me to sing any praises for ALPA but unlike USAPA they don't exist solely to screw another pilot group.

 

[Andy]

Andy, I know you're upset about how Prater handled Age-60, but are you really dumb enough to let a single issue dictate your thinking? I always figured you for a much smarter guy. Prater's time will pass. He'll likely only serve a single term. That means only another 2 years and 10 months until this guy is gone. His mishandling of the Age-60 issue has cost us a lot, but throwing out the entire union because of Prater's mishandling of Age-60 is absurd.

PCL, it was not merely prater who pushed age 65; it was almost the entirety of ALPA national. What was the vote among the MEC reps? A couple of dissenting votes? This wasn't entirely prater; there is plenty of blame to go around alpa national.
IIRC, you were at national at the time. You should be embarassed for the push poll and abuse of the system.

But for you to act like this is the only time that alpa has been involved in underhanded dealings. Do I need mention how alpa was busy trying to recruit American's pilots while 'representing' TWA? And how about alpa going out and recruiting all of the regional carriers and then representing both the main carrier and the regional partner, in spite of competing interests? Need I go on?

 

[Andy]

No need for me to sing any praises for ALPA but unlike USAPA they don't exist solely to screw another pilot group.

I won't argue that this is trading one group of organized thugs for another group. However, alpa has a long and distinguished history of favoring one group of pilots to screw another group of pilots, including its own membership.

 

[TWA Dude]

I won't argue that this is trading one group of organized thugs for another group. However, alpa has a long and distinguished history of favoring one group of pilots to screw another group of pilots, including its own membership.

At least screwing another pilot group isn't in ALPA's charter. The law is against USAPA's aims.

 

[Andy]

no, it was going to "go down" regardless of what ALPA said about it. Language had already been passed in the house and senate changing the age, but it was vetoed by bush because it was attached to other spending bills, etc, that bush didn't like. They were simply just going to throw that language on another bill regardless. This language appeared before alpa changed its stance.

The standalone bills to change to age 65 were destined to die in subcommittee until alpa stepped in got the committee chairs to release the bills from committee. There are a LOT Of bills written. Most die in subcommittee. The age change was no different.

in what way is ALPA actually corrupt? In your answer, please state specific facts. I don't see how ALPA is all of a sudden not useful. Didn't they make east guys the highest paid pilots in the industry less than 10 years ago?

In recent history? Failing to properly represent the TWA pilots during the American merger because they were trying to get American back in alpa? How about how alpa represented Air Wisconsin pilots when Air Wisconsin was bought by United? Or how alpa helped kill Frontier Airlines back in the 80s? alpa has a long and distinguished history of underhanded dealings.

a good thing for pilots??? are you kidding? you want to imagine what this industry would look like if ALPA had never been? pick up Flying the Line and find out what being an airline pilot really could be like without alpa around. If alpa goes away, who's going to talk to congress about cabotage, open skies, etc? USAPA-PAC??

Nice fear mongering for alpa. Tell me, what would the industry be like if alpa didn't exist? You seem to have the answers. Are you telling me that big bad management would abuse their workers? alpa's done plenty to create friction between employees and management, but is that really in the pilots' best interests? Yes, some employers will abuse their employers. But it's not universal. And there are far more areas where it would be mutually beneficial to work with employers rather than fight them over everything.
So what exactly is alpa going to do on cabotage, open skies, etc? They'll roll over and tell the membership that it was going to 'go down' regardless of their efforts. alpa's already rolled on Open Skies several times.


I think that you need to step back for a moment and check out alpa's history. It's not as snow white as you make it out to be.

 

[PCL_128]

PCL, it was not merely prater who pushed age 65; it was almost the entirety of ALPA national. What was the vote among the MEC reps? A couple of dissenting votes? This wasn't entirely prater; there is plenty of blame to go around alpa national.

Trust me, Andy, this was Prater's baby. He pushed and pushed and pushed until everyone went along with him. He distorted the issue, rigged the BRP in his favor to create a push poll to present to the EC and EB, etc... Do I think that more members of the EC and EB should have fought harder on this? Absolutely. Many of them fought pretty damned hard, though. There were numerous shouting matches that happened behind closed doors at the EC meeting, and the single dissenting voter wasn't the only one that was pissed off. He was just the only one that stood strong all the way to the end. The others fought pretty hard, but eventually gave in. They deserve some blame for that, but the truth is, the blame for this debacle rests solely with Prater, because it never would have happened in the first place if Prater wasn't in office. Place your blame where it belongs.

IIRC, you were at national at the time. You should be embarassed for the push poll and abuse of the system.

I did plenty of work for National, and spent time in the Herndon and DC offices, but I was not a member of the EB or EC. But yes, I am certainly ashamed of Prater and his push polling and abuse of the system. But I don't blame the entire organization when the blame should really be directed at Prater himself. Neither should you.

Do I need mention how alpa was busy trying to recruit American's pilots while 'representing' TWA?

You've been listening to too many conspiracy theories. That simply never happened. The judge will soon throw out that lawsuit, and it will rest on the ash bin of anti-ALPA history just as the failed RJDC lawsuit now does.

And how about alpa going out and recruiting all of the regional carriers and then representing both the main carrier and the regional partner, in spite of competing interests? Need I go on?

Faulty premise. There are no competing interests in representing both the regionals and the majors. Sounds like you've been reading too much RJDC propaganda also.