Making The Case-Pleasants Power Station
Pleasants Power Station is set to be closed down in less than 6 months. The economic effects have been thoroughly examined and discussed, quite eloquently by the letter from Craig Straight sent to the West Virginia Public Service Commission (click to read) on the behalf of all Pleasants employees. but what no one is talking about is the broader, and more important issue of national energy security involved in the removal of Pleasant’s 1,300 mega-watts from the grid.
All of us in the electrical generation industry are well aware of the weather extremes we deal with to keep the power flowing. From oppressive heat waves to sub-zero polar vertexes, the dedicated men and women that operate and maintain coal fired power plants manage to keep the plants online.
Make no mistake, the constant and consistent supply of electricity is a foundational issue for our state and country.
This electricity saves lives by powering homes, businesses, and infrastructure that makes our way of life possible. Without this vital lifeline, life is reduced to basic sustenance, and for some of our most vulnerable citizens life is not sustainable.
The power generation business is changing more that it has over the past century. New technologies, shifts in public perception of fossil fuels, and the deployment of renewables on a utility scale has added volitivity into an industry that, by it very nature, is structured to resist and repel such influences.
This is an issue that has been made political by forces at work who wish to transition the nation’s power supply to a carbon-free source. Unless you are actually in the power generation business, it’s difficult to fully impart to others that the technology needed to fulfill this goal is not evolved to the point that we can simply pull the plug on fossil fuels.
We have been promised an “all the above” energy policy from our political masters, yet they actively work against fossil generation and allow widespread, and in our opinion irresponsible, closing of plants that have served this country reliably for decades. They do this by subsidizing sources of power that are barely past the experimental stage, by passing onerous environmental standards, and denying fossil plants any help to upgrade and maintain their plants.
Hatfields Ferry Power Station in Masontown, PA, is a prime example of this. After almost a billion dollars is environmental upgrades that included brand new scrubbers, this 1,700 mega-watt coal plant was unceremoniously shuttered in 2013 after over four decades of service.
The need for baseload power is well documented and fleshed out in many articles, such as the excellent article, How Important is Baseload Generation Capacity to U.S. Power Grids’ Reliability?, by John Miller, as it appears on Energy Centrals‘ website. One of our own members sounded the alarm in a 2013 article submitted to West Virginia’s own The State Journal that states plainly that, “Nothing Can Replace Coal For Baseload Power Needs.“
The Utility Workers Union of America, Local 304, stand in solidarity with our Brothers and Sisters of other trade unions such as the Boilermakers, Pipefitters, Ironworkers, the IBEW, and many others, in saving Pleasants Power Station. Lest you think otherwise, the Pleasants Power Station is not a union station, but it was built and requires the skills and professionalism of a vast amount of union workers to operate safely and reliably.
This is not a union/non-union, Republican/Democrat, conservative/liberal thing it’s just plain common horse sense. We are not insensitive to our Brothers and Sisters at the W.H. Sammis Plant that is also slated for closure.
There will be a day when the technology catches up with the desire to power our nation in a carbon-free environment, but that day is still awaiting for those sources to evolve to the point of being as reliable as what it replaces.
In the meantime, coal is being burned cleaner and more efficiently as ever before in history. Fossil fuels have set a high bar for anything offered as a viable alternative in terms of affordability and durability.
The bottom line is this; if a coal fire power plant with all the proven and scalable pollution controls installed can’t operate when sited in one of the most coal rich states in our country, then it’s just a matter of time before all these plants disappear.
NOTE: Your union does our best to research and draw information from proven and reliable sources. IF YOU ARE NOT CLICKING THE ABOVE HIGHLIGHTED LINKS YOU ARE NOT GETTING THE WHOLE STORY
Physician’s Statement/Release
All,
It has come to the attention of the executive board that the company is using a form, X-4559 (Physician Statement/Release), to gather information about your recent illness/medical procedure with your help. The form itself is not the question, but rather two portions of the form have come into question.
Most times, the form has been given to our member by their supervisor. The top portion is to be filled out by management and they ask that you simply “sign and date” the form and return it to either them or the station nurse.
The issue brought to our attention is two portions of the form. Please see the attached form and notice the highlighted portions. Asking for “Diagnostic Code” and “to release medical records regarding this absence to Medical Services” is information we believe to be privileged between you and your healthcare provider and not required to be provided by you.
We brought the issues of the form to the attention of management late last week, where at that time, involved two of our members in separate matters, requesting those members to sign and return the form. At the conclusion of that meeting, the company “agreed” to accept the form of the above two mentioned matters, with those portions of the form scratched out (Line drawn through) until station management has time to discuss legality with corporate.
In the meantime, if you receive one of these forms from supervision and question any information requested that you provide, please reach out to a member of the executive board for the latest information in regard to this form.
Thanks, Stewart Whitehair, President, UWUA Local 304, Mobile: 304-203-8301, president@uwualocal304.org
NEW Collective Bargaining Agreement Online!
Our NEW 2022- 2026 Collective Bargaining Agreement is now available at 304 Resources!
UWUA Local 304 Adopts Guidelines for Charitable Donations
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!
Your Union Hall is YOURS!
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.
Being a Union Is All About Making Things Better
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.
Union Members Legal Recognition
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.
You Against “The MATRIX”!
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.
Don’t Take What You Have For Granted!
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.
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.
Biggest Coal Polluter Isn’t Power Plants
Coal has been around forever, and thanks to new technology, better metering, and better scientific and engineering practices, it’s cleaner to burn than ever in our human history.
There is one coal user that is totally unregulated and free to burn without ANY of the safegaurds and processes used in the power industry and it’s the Earth!
There is a coal fire that has burned underground in Brennender Berg, Germany for over 300 years! The story starts in the year 1688, when a shepherd started a fire in a tree stump that burned to the roots, igniting a coal seam. The translation for the name of the town is, “Burning Mountain.”
Smoking Hills, Canada, is located close to the Artic Ocean, near Franklin Bay. John Franklin first explored the area in 1826, noting a haze that seemed to be hanging in the air. That haze was actually smoke from a chemical reaction between the lignite, sulphur, and oil shales in the area that caused spontaneous combustion.
On the other side of the world is Burning Mountain, Australia, or Mount Wingen. Scientist speculate that this underground coal seam fire, that’s 2 meters thick, has been burning between 5.000-15,000 years.
Closer to home is Centralia, PA, which lies outside of Wilkes-Barre, PA. The town decided to burn down it’s garbage dump in the early 1960’s. Little did they know that there was an exposed coal seam on one side of the piles of refuse. To make a long story short, the seam caught fire, the fire spread underground, and the town had to be abandoned in the mid 1980’s for the sake of public safety. The fire still burns today, over 50 years later.
On almost every continent on Earth, there are underground coal fires raging, unchecked, under the often serene and picturesque landscapes. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, between 10 and 200 million metric tons of coal is consumed annually by underground coal fires. The U.S. Department of the Interior Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement spends a billion dollars a year on remediation efforts related to coal fires in our country’s 15 coal producing states.
The real problem is that there is not one specific way to effectively fight underground coal fires. The best scientist can hope for is to identify where the fires are and then try to seal any vents to the surface they can find. They do this with ground penetrating radar and via heat seeking satellites.
Underground coal fires represent a significant hazard to any life that lives above them. In St. Louis, there is an underground coal fire that is moving towards a nuclear waste dump. The nuclear material is the waste byproducts of America’s Manhattan Project from WWII. A lady in St. Louis developed alopecea, an auto-immune disease sometimes referred to as spot-baldness, claiming it was from the emmissions from the underground coal seam fire where she lives.
In Glenwood, Colorado, an underground coal seam fire that has been burning for nearly a century reared it’s ugly head in 2002, setting thousands of acres of forest afire.
Here locally, many locals can identify places that occasionally flare up from underground fires. One recently popped up beside Rt. 250, in White Hall. There’s another just over the hill from the power plant, just before the bridge at Gypsy, behind the log church. More sites can be found on the WV DEP’s website, under Office of Abandoned Mines Land and Reclamation.
The really puzzling thing is that there has been very little study as to the long term health effects and environmental impact of these fires by any agency, nor any patented and effective approaches to extinguishing these types of fires.
It is kind of hypocritical for the EPA and environmentalists to be so aggressive towards coal users and producers, when there are coal fires out there raging unchecked. It would seem to be common sense that a responsible and vibrant coal industry would be the best vangaurd for monitoring and understanding underground coal seam fires.
With all the hostility against coal powered generation, it makes you wonder if the objections raised by environmentalists are genuine concerns or just an avenue for revenue for those who claim to be against coal.
Afterall, the reclamation of mines and the extinguishing of such fires would accomplish removing tons of carbon pollution from the air, employ people in doing that work, and make such lands available for develpment. All of this would act to boost the economy and clean up the environment.