Category Archives: UWUA Local 304 News

Your union has adopted guidelines for charitable donations from our union to other outside individuals and organizations.

 Currently we have standing donations for the Salvation Army Angel Tree Program, The Ned Johnson Memorial Scholarship, and our late Brother Don Ganoe’s Hogs For Dogs Ride.

In the past we have elected, on an individual basis, to donate and support members in need, as well as those community activities our members may take part in, but it was felt that we, as a union, needed to have some kind of guidance for such contributions.

These guidelines are meant as a reference to delineate and define how we contribute. They are also available under the UWUA Local 304 Resources page.

Of course, the MEMBERS (in good standing) run this union, and always have the power of the VOTE in these decisions.

   YOU ARE THE UNION!

Thanks to the UWUA Local 304 members, your union has made the union hall our own. Your union officers have been busily sorting and filing almost 15 years of records concerning bargaining, NLRB charges, grievances, and other accumulated correspondence that is a part of the work of serving and protecting our membership.

15 years is not a typo, though our union wasn’t certified until 2010, there is also of years of records from the switch from Allegheny to First Energy, as well as all the files from our organizing drive. Having a union hall of our own allows us to do this, as a benefit to the membership, but, the hall itself is YOURS.

If you are a member in good standing, you can use the union hall for your own activities. Whether it’s a birthday, anniversary, a dinner, a business meeting, or other instances in which an office or meeting setting is needed. Your hall has Wi-Fi, a printer and FAX machine, tables, chairs, a kitchen, all at your disposal.

All you have to do is contact an Executive Board Officer to schedule the use of the hall. As long as your request doesn’t conflict with your union’s business needs on the date of your event, an Officer or Trustee who are key holders, will make sure you have access to the hall.

The only restriction is common sense in assuring that your use of the hall is for wholesome activities that do not conflict with the Union’s and Labor’s primary missions of representing workers, or are in conflict with the U.S. Constitution, the Constitution of the Utility Workers Union Of America, AFL-CIO, and/or UWUA Local 304’s By-Laws and collective bargaining agreement.

Anyone using the hall will be responsible to leave it clean and well-ordered upon completion of their use and that any member using the hall will be responsible for any damages caused by them or their guests.

At January’s Regular Meeting, we got our first glimpse of the process we have to follow to offer our membership healthcare through our union. The CEO, Mr. Elliot Dinkin, from Cowden Health and Welfare Consulting Services gave a presentation of what we can expect as we navigate through the process of being able to offer the membership a more affordable choice in their healthcare plans.

Senior Consultant, Jessica Grande, was also there to answer members questions, which there were some very good ones asked,

Cowden administers the healthcare plan for our brothers and sisters in UWUA System Local 102, and have for the last three (3) years. Even before Harrison went with the UWUA in 2010, we have always envied the healthcare plans available to 102 members as compared to what the company offered, and wondered why we didn’t have the coverage and options that 102 members enjoyed.

 UWUA System Local 102 President Travis Beck has been very welcoming and helpful to Local 304 as we begin this journey, and we will owe 102 many more thanks before we are done.

The process itself is all about participation. You will be receiving a questionnaire from Cowden to fill out and submit so that they have the data to shop the multitude of healthcare providers for a quote and options for the membership.

It DOES NOT matter if you are a dues paying member in good standing or not, or if you opt out of our current FE coverage for that which is available to your spouse through their employer (such as PEIA). It is vitally important that you fill out the questions and submit them so that we can have an honest snapshot of our membership and their family’s healthcare needs and to offer you, as a UWUA member, a competitive choice.

What is important is that we get an accurate quote for whatever plans available to our membership.

Those who have opted out of their union dues obligations will not have a vote in this, when the time comes to decide if this is what we want to do, but will still have the benefit of whatever plans are offered and that they choose to enroll in.

We have said it all along that being UNION is all about participation and at no time has YOUR individual participation been so important. If you want something better, you have to take ownership of whatever things you CAN control instead of just riding along.

Talk to one of the members who were at the meeting, and take action to help yourself and your Brothers and Sisters.

Click the above highlighted links for more information.

It’s easy to sit back and complain and ask what your union dues actually do for you. The answer is even easier; your status as a union member gives you protected legal status under federal law.

Here is a brief rundown of some of the main laws that enshrine your rights as a union member:

1932 Norris–LaGuardia Act

• Stated that workers had a legal right to organize
• Made it more difficult to get injunctions against peaceful union activities

Before this act, union organizers, ,supporters, and sympathizers were labelled “Reds”, “agitators”, and were often harassed, beaten, and even killed for attempting to organize a union.

1935 National Labor Relations Act (or Wagner Act)

• Made it illegal for employers to discriminate based on union membership
• Established the National Labor Relations Board to investigate unfair labor practices
• Established a voting procedure for workers to certify a union as their bargaining agent
• Required employers to recognize certified unions and bargain with them in good faith 1938 FLSA
•   Banned many types of child labor
•    Established the first federal minimum wage (25 cents per hour)
• Established a standard 40-hour workweek
• Required that hourly workers receive overtime pay when they work in excess of 40 hours per week

This is the Act that gave unions the “teeth” to protect their members by providing a legal framework to address grievances and a legal remedy that hold employers accountable to he membership.

1947 Labor–Management Relations (Taft-Hartley) Act

• Identified unfair labor practices by unions and declared them illegal
• Allowed employers to speak against unions during organizing campaigns
• Allowed union members to decertify their union, removing its right to represent them
• Established provisions for dealing with emergency strikes that threatened the nation’s health or security

This Act hold unions responsible to the membership, as well as America’s union workers responsibility to national security in times and national crisis. This is because many of this nations most important industries rely on skilled union labor. This Act was considered anti-union at the time and is still controversial.

1959 Labor–Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (or Landrum–Griffin Act)

• Guaranteed rank and file union members the right to participate in union meetings
• Required regularly scheduled secret ballot elections of union officers
• Required unions to file annual financial reports
• Prohibited convicted felons and Communist Party members from holding union office

In the shadow of McCarthyism, this Act settled, once and for all, that workplace democracy is NOT socialism or communism, as many anti-union profiteers had long accused them of being. 

Unions are often criticized as being “political”, but it’s in the political arena that union rights are kept and maintained. Many of these Acts were passed under President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Administration, under his New Deal policies.

FDR ascended from American aristocracy, yet his New Deal programs made many wealthy and powerful men to accuse FDR and being a traitor to his class. There even many serious plots to depose FDR and replace him with a fascist, or puppet regime. These plots were heavily financed and well laid out by the powerful industrialists of the day (for more information, read Sally Denton’s The Plots Against The President).

All these laws have been under attack ever since, except those who wish to destroy organized labor learned lessons from union organizers and began multiple campaigns to control and manipulate information, fear, traditionalism, and righteous outrage of YOU, the individual worker and voter, to vote away your protections and rights.

As a union member, it is your duty, to yourself, your family, your union, and your country to be on guard against those who would spread “fake news”, lies, and conspiracies that may lead you astray.

Union members, as well as all Americans, know how to fight, and once committed to a fight, they are passionate, relentless, and strong in united voices. It’s important that we rally around the right things, based on solid facts, and act in solidarity by realizing the things that unite us far outweigh the the issues that our enemies use to try and divide us.

Working for a multi-billion dollar corporation puts you at an extreme disadvantage if, somewhere along the line, you and the company should have a disagreement. After all, the company employs a whole department of legal professionals in every legal area in which they presently or may operate. This vast network also has all the consultants, advisors, paralegals, and clerical staff to make sure he company is protected from any kind of malfeasance, negligence, or responsibility in the things it does to do business in the manner they see fit. This means externally, with customers, regulators, municipalities, and state and federal government officials; as well as internally, like dealing with unions, contracts, and employees.

In furtherance of the latter, the company’s legal teams weave a web, or “matrix”, of company policies, programs, and guidelines that you, as an employee, must follow when doing your job. Each one of these rules and regulations form a gauntlet you have to run each day as an employee, and are usually cloaked with religious fervor under the word and term, “SAFETY.”

Trouble is, almost NO HUMAN can know, adhere, and navigate this “matrix” and get any job done. The company knows this because they designed the system to ensnare you if something should happen while you are at work. No matter how conscientious, responsible, or cautious you may be, it only takes one slip to start a chain of actions that, in the end, will ALWAYS find YOU at fault.

If there is one and only one reason why it’s so important to have a union, this is it!

 Without a union, you can sue the company. In the end you’ll end up terminated, usually for no cause, and then spend the next decade fighting them in court until any settlement you reach will be a zero sum gain after the lawyers and creditors you couldn’t pay while fighting come looking to collect. This happens all the time, and especially so among large corporations.

A union will bring all the resources, local, national, and even international that they have in coming to your defense, and, if not successful, protect your job and assist the private counsel if you decide to fight on your own.

Take the time to study your Personal Safety Manual, and read up on the tenants of Human Performance and behavior based safety. After you get done with that, pull up the company’s Corporate Policy Letters, and take a closer look at the “safety” programs they have published for all employees too see.

The company is betting you won’t bother, which is why one of the first statements to employees is that ignorance of this material is no excuse for violating any of them.

Think about this the next time you tag something out, or put a wrench on a bolt, or have to fill out a form for line breaking or hot work. Confined spaces  and equipment operating procedures are perfect examples of signatures being more important than safety. How many liquid transfer papers do operators fill out for lime, urea, acid, oil, hydrogen, and other bulk deliveries.

Each one is a potential grenade that could go off in the hand of the person holding it.

Division has infiltrated almost everything in our lives. Much of the fuel that fires those passions that causes such splits are being carefully manipulated and fanned into a white hot inferno that destroys families, friendships, churches, as well as erosion to all three branches of our democracy.

The same forces have also had an effect on American Organized Labor. All unions derive their power from the cohesive solidarity of its membership. This is why corporations spend millions to fight unions and even more to lobby for “right-to-work” laws to weaken and destroy unions.

On a national level, you can take your pick among a multitude of topics from abortion to xenophobia, and anything in between. Social media has opened up avenues of communication that weren’t previously unavailable, or even imagined Whatever platform you subscribe to allows you international exposure to air whatever grievance, opinion, or idea that may occur to you. You would think with the increase in interactions that it would lead to a more well informed society.

Well,… so much for that.

All these options have only served as avenues for misinformation, bigotry, misogyny, and plain old stupidity to spread, infect, and flourish.  This isn’t meant to offend anyone reading this, but if it does, then that’s too bad. An apology is not forthcoming.

The facts are that our power plant is ripe to be bought or sold. Still, UWUA Local 304 is actively shopping for better healthcare coverage for our members, are constantly pursuing our members grievances, and working to protect our members. We have fought against policies and rules aimed at negating your sick time and time off. We’ve fought to keep your personal medical information private and YOURS. We’ve fought when overtime was lost or not properly paid. We’ve fought to allow our members the right to transfer to other departments instead of being “silo’ed” into a “Career Path”. It serves no purpose for your union to boast it’s accomplishments, but they are covered in our regular meetings.

We have, in our union, members who were long time members in other unions who are now dropping dues, thanks to the law that conveys NO RIGHTS, nor creates ANY WORK. We have other members who grew up in union families and it was union wages that paid for everything that sustained those families. They are basi

cally cutting the throats of of their fellow coworkers, and handing leverage over to the company at a time when there are only TWO plants left.

There are plenty of excuses. Some cite personality clashes with various union officers, some accuse the union of reckless spending in securing a union hall for the union to do business out of, some point out a specific minor point like not announcing vote counts or complaining about work schedules. On the other side are those who claimed they would’ve come to meetings if we weren’t having them in a ‘bar” atmosphere. The excuses don’t matter; either you’re UNION or not.

Most of these people are the very same ones that you NEVER see at a union meeting, they offer nothing for the good and welfare of the local or membership, refuse to serve as an officer or on a committee, and won’t even defend the union among their own coworkers. Yet they are quick to spew about everything that’s WRONG with 304, yet they have no participation or ideas to further a cause that is in EVERYBODY’S best interest.

Unions are not perfect. They are the purest form of democracy, which is in itself imperfect. Your union is the only organization that is on your side if something catastrophic happens at work that threatens your ability to support yourself and your family. There in nobody else, as imperfect as 304 may be, who will bring all the available resources to your defense.

UWUA Local 304 was organized and certified because of a lack of trust employees had in the unknown entity that was First Energy. Over the past decade, the employees have changed throughout the plant, as well as the company, but, nothing has happened to prove those initial organizers conclusions wrong; quite the opposite, if you pay attention to the news.

There are things that can only be done by the union that cannot be effectively done by an individual employee on their own. Whether it’s testifying before Congress, as our first President did, or before the State Public Service Commission, or other public and private entities. Don’t believe it? Call the National Labor Relations Board and tell them you want to file a complaint against your employer. The first question that they will ask you is, “are you represented by a union…”

Yet, there are those among willing to sell their souls to the devil and place their full faith and trust in those who would sacrifice them on the altar of position and power without a second thought. One of organized labor’s favorite axioms is, “the boss is not your friend.”

While we cannot discriminate against those who opt out, but neither do we have to treat them as friends. Letting someone politely know you disapprove of their choice to not pay dues is fine, if you can do so in a non-confrontational manner.

The cruel fact of Right-To-Work is that it acts as an escape hatch for those who are all about themselves despite the cost to anybody else. That’s why the excuses don’t matter. Our dues are dirt cheap  when compared to those paid by union members in the trade unions. That’s because belonging to the Utility Workers of America, and Local 304, isn’t about the money. It’s about the dignity and respect for those who do the work and collective action to improve those lives that we have the honor of representing.

There are departments at our plant who are recognizing the full benefits of being union. Through solidarity and trust in each other, these departments have built a true brotherhood in their areas. They trust each other, look out for each other, and stick together when any one of them are threatened. The ironic thing is that some of those work centers were true and faithful pockets of anti-union influence in previous union drives.

The cure to inoculate yourself from peer pressure and a charm campaign of a supervisor is to take the time and read your Collective Bargaining Agreement, and if there is even ONE thing in there you wouldn’t want to lose, you may want to re-examine your allegiances and actions at work and in your union.

We, as a union, could have the same conditions throughout the plant, and make UWUA Local 304 unassailable by any local or corporate management. The choice has always been with the membership because members run this union.

It seems odd, with all the “support our troops” rhetoric, and with the reputation and the well deserved respect our military veterans have garnered, that it would be hard to believe that any veteran would have trouble transitioning into civilian jobs.
Many of America’s most successful companies got where they are at with the talent and skills of their veteran employees. So much, that hiring such people used to be considered a ‘no brainer’.
So why must veterans need advocacy groups and tax credits to be considered for hiring? Why would a company need to be bribed with tax advantages to hire veterans?
Could it be as simple as this: employers look for and enjoy hiring people who are easy to dominate and intimidate?
Veterans have proven leadership skills (it’s almost unavoidable). They have agile and trainable minds, They often have skills that translate either specifically or generally into the civilian job market. They understand the importance of structure and a defined chain of command. They are disciplined, professional. and driven individuals who not only push themselves, but inspire others around them by their example.
It would seem that all these qualities would make them an excellent candidate for whatever career they choose.
Many excuses have been offered as to why veterans aren’t successful applicants. Non-verifiable resumes, a lack of work experience outside their military service, the possibility of hiring someone who may be a PTSD liability, non-compatible skill-sets between their military vocation and the position they are seeking, and a host of other things that sound plausible.
   What no one is talking about is how the current climate in labor correlates to the average veteran.
The current trends in labor are full of incidents of wage theft, union-busting, and worker intimidation. The workplace themselves have seen a decrease in the skilled crafts and work being fragmented into smaller and smaller tasks so as to be completed by lower wage and lower skilled workers, some of which may not even be in or from this country.

The average candidate who is not a veteran has already been exposed to these conditions and accepted them as facts.
A candidate who has served in the military is much more likely to have a more mature and fully developed sense of what is right and wrong. They are also more likely to voice their dissatisfaction over such things and not accept them as business as usual. They are more likely to know and exercise their rights.
It’s hard to scare someone who’s seen war. It’s hard to get a veteran to accept a manager or supervisor who’s a “paper tiger” when they’ve been exposed to real leadership. It’s hard to apply “divide and conquer” strategies against someone who’s very life depended on the solidarity and trust in his fellow soldiers, sailors, airmen, or Marines.
   Most of all, it’s hard to get a veteran to give up the very rights that they fought to preserve. Even the right to form and support a union.
The best way to “support our troops” is by making sure they are coming home to the America they fought for, being the type of American that they are, and then make sure they are not marginalized,  discriminated against, or overlooked when they offer themselves and their talents as prospective candidates for jobs in the civilian sector.

For some, the thought of filing a grievance is intimidating.

Some of the things members fear are:

1. Appearing disloyal or ungrateful for their job.

2. Painting themselves as a target for retrobution by management.

3. Alienating their immediated supervisor.

4. Unsure of the grievance process.

5. Not sure of how their issue relates to the language in the CBA (contract).

What is a grievance?

A grievance is any any dispute that reasonably concerns the application, interpretation, or violation of a collective bargaining agreement, past practice, company rules, or statutory law.

What is grievable?

Answer: anything that happens at work- whether it is in the contract or not- is fair game for a grievance. If it affects your pay, working conditions, seniority, or any other mandatory subjects of bargaining that are in the contract, as well as any local, state, or federal laws; it is probably a grievable offense.

Why are grievances important?

Grievances protects, enforces, and defines the collective bargaining agreement you work under. Grievances are the way a union holds an employer to their obligations and responsibility to their worker, as agreed across the bargaining table.

You could have the strongest and best defined union contract in the world, but it is not worth anything if the membership is unwilling to hold the employer to their word.

Inversely, a CBA that may fall short in some important areas to the membership can be further defined and enforced to the satisfaction of the membership through the grievance and arbitration procedure.

Collective Bargaining Agreements are negotiated every 3-4 years. In the meantime, it is the the grievance and arbitration  process that gives any CBA it’s value.

Who should I talk to if I think I have a grievance?

Your Shop Steward has recieved special training concerning the CBA, latest talks between your union and the company on various subjects, and specifically on processing and handling grievances.