Convention Thoughts
Well another National Convention has come and gone. This one was held in the city of Detroit with approximately 6000 letter carriers in attendance.
I must admit that I was a little taken back by how the convention went. There was very little discussion about what is happening on in the workroom floor.
The daily harassment that carriers encounter from management was not even addressed in any of the discussions that I heard. The added work that letter carriers do on a daily basis was not discussed. Management’s abusive nature towards the employees – not discussed. I have attended 16 National Conventions in my career; every convention since 1988 in Portland Oregon. I remember discussions regarding important workroom issues and problems being a regular occurrence during the ensuing years at the conventions. For the past 3-4 conventions it seems that the only thing that matters is the political end of our business.
President Rolando spent a major part of his opening on what is happening in Washington and how it affects us. He went into the issues at hand in pointed remarks to the delegates. He reminded us of the pitfalls to having an administration in place that wants to destroy and privatize the USPS. He discussed the possible Federal budget that will gut many of our benefits. He also discussed the need to get pro-USPS people elected to positions that would assist us in our continuing battles with Congress. He reiterated the need for every letter carrier to donate to the Letter Carrier Political Fund (LCPF). The Letter Carrier Political Fund (LCPF) is the fund that our union created to educate our members on how the political machine impacts Letter Carriers as well as to lobby politicians to support letter carriers issues. There is absolutely no reason why every single member should fail to donate a couple of dollars a pay period to this fund. It is our fund used to help maintain our benefits and secure our jobs. This is all important and absolutely the truth.
That being said; I have tired of hearing that “if we lose our jobs we won’t have any need for our benefits”. While this line could be true, it is not the only issue we deal with every day. This never-ending political argument has consumed the NALC for years now. To me we seem to be losing sight of the workroom floor issues that carriers face each and every day.
The environment on the workroom floor seems to have become an afterthought and that should never happen. What we do every day and how we are treated every day is just as important as what goes on in Washington. Many in the NALC seem to use the political issues as a diversion from the constant abuses by management. I have had numerous discussions with varying officers of the NALC over the past few years and am quite concerned about the directions we are headed. President Fred Rolando has done a phenomenal job as our leader. He is accessible and easy to speak with. He is upfront and does his best to keep us moving forward. I am not so certain of some of the other board members. There have been numerous decisions and side agreements made during the past few years that make me scratch my head and wonder what they are doing. Management violates the National Agreement on a daily basis. We win the grievances and they continue to violate those same issues. It is a merry-go-round that never stops. When you speak to a National Officer about this they just say keep filing grievances. Why? When is the National going to start taking these repeated violations to the Labor Board and file Unfair Labor charges against the USPS? Let’s do something to change the narrative on these repeated abuses by management. Just telling the Branches to continue filing grievances’ on the same issues seems to be a cop-out answer by those in the know.
One of those issues that personally stuck in my craw is the PET program that management rolled out a couple of years ago. This program took the information in DOIS and cut out a number of the fixed office times. In other words, today’s office time under DOIS may be 2 hours. Tomorrow, with the same volumes and same conditions as yesterday, that same office time may say 1:20 hours. This is all done by design to harass the carriers to meet some artificial office time. In the least, it is a violation of the M-39 and Article 19. When I brought this up to our City Delivery director, all he would say is to keep grieving the issue. I say why? Why do we have to continue to file grievance after grievance at the local level when management continues to violate our rights on the same issues? It seems that we are fighting our own organization as much as we are fighting management. That should not be!
There are many issues going on that need to be addressed. The CCA’s are being abused, forced to work hours that at times are inhumane. The regulars are being treated like criminals through the use of GPS. You stop for 5 minutes and the word seems to come to an end. CCA’s here on the island are being forced to travel out to Montauk Point to deliver parcels on a daily basis. It is bullshit and should be stopped. We try and do our best but without added help and direction from the National, nothing is done. We get plenty of lip service but that seems to be the going rate now; Talk and pass the buck, no action. At some point the NALC will have to sharpen their blades and get ready for battle. I’d rather we fight and die for a just cause than sit back and hope for some possible change in Washington politics.
Oh well, and how was your summer?
