January 20, 2012
Dear Council 7 Pilots,

When we ran for the office as status representatives for Blocks 1 and 4 we committed to giving you an honest and thorough evaluation of our union leadership and our opinion as to what improvements should be implemented. We believe it is high time that you get that promised report.

We have serious misgivings about where our union is headed and how it is being currently managed. You may have heard that there were discussions about leadership issues in the last MEC meeting. While much of the wild-eyed rumors on APC were false, it is true that our leadership issues were discussed. To clear the record, there was no recall resolution submitted at that meeting and no vote was taken.

The way we see it, there are multiple issues concerning our MEC leadership that are unsatisfactory. It is our belief that if we do not do something to fix our ongoing leadership issues, we will have seen the high-water mark of the FedEx pilots’ careers vis-à-vis future collective bargaining agreements. It is, however, not ours to call in a vacuum. You must weigh in. Most of what we see is not obvious to the line pilot, so it is not surprising that there is not more of a concern out on the line. Our job is to inform you of the conditions as we see them.

The key issues come down to this—management of your money, the ability to get a new and improved contract, pilot involvement, and the preservation of our democratic structure. We will take a look at each of these.

Management of your money
Both of us are former secretary-treasurers. We are appalled at what we have seen concerning the guardianship of your dues money. Let us start with the easiest to describe. Union officers are paid for one extra month when they leave office so that they can conduct a transition with the incoming officers. The pay that they receive is not free money. It is designed to pay them for work performed. Under the current leadership, outgoing officers were paid tens of thousands of dollars for nothing. When challenged on this practice, the response given was that there was no clear definition as to what constitutes a transition; therefore, they felt that costing the union nearly $29,000 (in one instance alone) for an officer no longer in office to sit at home with his family in case anyone called was an adequate way to spend your money. We strongly disagree.

The current flight pay loss practice is to allow committee workers to be trip-removed on holidays even though they perform no work on those days. We have always felt that being a union worker does not constitute super seniority. We feel our pilots expect our union workers to live under the same rules as a line pilot under our contract. If a line pilot cannot drop a workday on Thanksgiving or Christmas, neither should a union worker be allowed to do so, especially at your expense. Imagine if you are the pilot who has an R day on Thanksgiving and you get called in to fly away from your family because a trip is left in open time. Then you find out that the reason you were away from your family was because someone junior to you got a super deal from our MEC officers to drop his Thanksgiving day trip, so he could stay at home with his family. We don’t think that would pass the crew room smell test. We now have had union workers off for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Christmas Eve, New Year’s Day, and New Year’s Eve, in just this last year alone. Someone had to fly those trips.

It is not our desire to vilify our hardworking committee folks. The environment that has allowed this to develop is not of their making. It is our belief that this type of behavior is a result of poor leadership and the setting of flawed policies by our MEC chairman. Most of our current committee workers came in after our MEC chairman took office and don’t know any different. They think this is the normal way to do business. Most were not part of past leadership teams and have no reference to the ethical standards practiced in the past by multiple leaders.

In addition, the budgeting process is seriously flawed. The last two quarterly reports given to the MEC had flaws that prevented us from properly evaluating how your money was spent. When committees went significantly over budget, no corrective action was taken or reported to us. The $7.3 million 2012 budget was approved via teleconference with only five days’ prior notice (two of which were over a weekend) and the data provided for evaluation was incomplete. We were not given any details on fund use by committee. We had no way to tell if spending was planned for trip pay loss, subcontractors, living expenses, or other items. Furthermore, it was presented as a “hybrid” budget, which meant that it was partly meant to cover us if we were in Section 6 negotiations, and partly meant to cover us if we extended the contract. So, in our view, no matter what we did, it could not be an accurate depiction of how our money would be spent. When we combine a flawed budget with error-filled quarterly reports, we wind up with no way to properly keep track of your money. We feel it is our job to oversee how your money is spent. Right now, that is nearly impossible.

Ability to negotiate contractual improvements
This is probably the biggest issue of all. Isn’t this why you pay dues? Contract negotiations is an art, not a science, and no one can give you guarantees. We can only view past history on our property and within our industry to learn our lessons and make judgments. When negotiating a contract we believe in a professional, businesslike approach. The RLA describes the roles of the participants. It can be much like a criminal trial, with a defense attorney and a prosecutor as opponents. The opponents are free to aggressively pursue their own objectives during the trial, but afterward can still hold mutual respect and appreciation. During the trial, however, the prosecutor doesn’t feel the need to try and help the defense with its case or vice versa.

Our MEC leadership has given us no indication that they have the stomach to stand up and face management in serious negotiations. You have seen that when management put out the concept that fuel costs were high, our leadership publicly agreed that profits would be hurt. When management said they could not negotiate under the shadow of the NPRM, our leadership again publicly agreed. Note that during this period three other ALPA carriers reached contract agreements. As far as we know, we were the only pilot group to halt negotiations for the NPRM. Of course, the result was we were cut out of the NPRM anyway! So after all that, our rules didn’t even change. During the time that the NPRM was nearing release, our leadership published a Positive Rate that said they thought FedEx had nothing to do with a cargo cut-out. Now we have many indications that, in fact, they were involved. Our leadership did a poor job of sticking to our objectives and not importing the problems of management. We see no evidence that they have learned from these past mistakes and will not repeat them.

Pilot involvement
We must be unashamed to request the improvements that you, the line pilot, tell us you want. But our only leverage comes from you. We have seen time and again the unwillingness of our current MEC leadership to involve you in a meaningful way. Simply look at the way this extension was negotiated a year ago without you even knowing that it was occurring until it was done. Look at the fact that we are totally unprepared to go into Section 6 negotiations today. It is the officers’ job, along with their support committees, to involve the pilots in preparation for and participation in contract negotiations. After almost two and a half years they have not done so. Ask yourself—were you prepared to enter negotiations by our leadership prior to this last extension? Instead, you were gently nudged by the Negotiating Committee during the poll to favor the direction that had already been picked out. We disagree with that style of leadership. You should have been given both sides of the argument, you should have been prepared to go in either direction should that be the vote of your MEC.

Preservation of our democratic process
We are now in the very unfortunate situation of having politicized our committee workers and chairmen. This is a disaster if allowed to continue. In the past, committee workers were kept out of the political arena. This was done for the very simple reason that they needed to work for and respect anyone you elected. Today, some of the same folks who get trip removal for Christmas and New Years are actively engaged in influencing block representative elections. Not surprisingly, they support candidates that are most favorable to the MEC chairman who grants them their trip removal. Why is this so important? Imagine that when a block rep confronts the MEC chairman with some criticism, he is then anonymously attacked on APC. This then is followed up with a recall of that block rep. Imagine then that union committees begin to use their organization to create a determined telephone campaign to influence an election.

Sadly, these are not imaginings, these things have already happened. And it seems to be getting worse. When it reaches its final conclusion, a line pilot would not be able to run for election unless he had the committee machine on his side. To get that, he must be accepted by the MEC chairman. Any block rep with the temerity to offer criticism could then be easily dispatched through recall by the same machine.

Our evaluation of where we are now is not pleasant. We think you deserve better. If you want to effect a change in your union’s future, help by getting more involved and voice your concern. The next local council meetings will take place February 15, 2012, at the Germantown Centre beginning at 1000. The MEC meeting will be from February 13–16, 2012. Plan to attend if you can. Either we fix our union now or begin the slow decline in contracts that our brothers and sisters at other properties have suffered. The choice is ours.

In Unity,

Chris Baker Tony Hauserman
LC7 Chairman, Block 1 LC7 Vice Chairman, Block 4