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Yesterday’s (4/25/2012) LEC 171 meeting lasting from 1000-1420 was attended by approximately 80-100 pilots. There were some L-UAL pilots there at the beginning of the meeting as well as some L-CAL pilots from other LEC’s. A Council 171 vote was taken on allowing all pilots present to attend the entire meeting including the L-UAL pilots and passed unanimously. Some points of interest.

1. Jay P was there briefly but left on a 3 day trip to accompany his wife to a company awards banquet for her company in the Cayman Islands. Jay P worked the office yesterday morning before he left and has a working day scheduled for Saturday when he returns.

2. The agenda was reordered during the meeting to take Jay P off the speakers list and give more time to Lee Moak.

3. There was one heckler over this trip Jay P was taking by a well-known 83-85 hire that no one would sit next to, one pilot who voiced he was “not sure” about Jay P during the course of the meeting. Other than that there were no negative comments and several positive comments about Jay P’s performance. Certainly there was no discussion of a recall nor were there any resolutions introduced.

4. Lee Moak gave a very informative power point presentation of the state of the world wide airline industry including a very detailed plan of how he intended for ALPA to represent the ALPA pilots’ best interest.

5. Lee commented on our JCBA negotiations and said we (the JNC) and UCH had not yet reached an area of reasonableness that would allow a TA or conditions that would warrant asking for release. Lee expressed UCH had to up their offer and we had to come down on our expectations. Lee had a slide depicting the $400 million more per year the DAL pilots make in 2012 than the UCH pilots. Lee spoke at length about how the AA pilots’ proposals were so unrealistic over the years that they never reached a TA with AA. He spoke in very realist financial terms of what is achievable in a single contract. Not sure the audience liked what he had to say but Lee was very realistic in discussing what we might expect in total dollars.

6. After Lee’s presentation there was a presentation by the new ALPA governmental affairs individual that was very informative.

7. Following that the LEC/MEC officers commented on the events of last week concerning the JH letter to seek release and the PBS issue.

8. The LEC 171 officers take on the JH letter discussing release was (paraphrased) contact [email protected] we have no idea what he is thinking nor has he bothered to tell us, the last we heard was UCH, L-CAL MEC and L-UAL MEC along with the NMB had agreed to try and finish negotiations by June 15. The L-UAL members of the JNC were not informed in advance of JH letter on release by the NMB.

9. There are some informal discussions between the L-CAL and L-UAL LEC officers in which the 171 officers are participating. Ben gave an estimate of 12 officers on both sides talking. The 171 officers are trying unsuccessfully to be read in on the JH plan but neither JH nor the L-UAL MEC seems interested in talking to the L-CAL MEC. There was some discussion about proceeding with an LOA-19 by the L-CAL MEC at this time and the overwhelming sentiment of the pilots in LEC 171 seemed to be no way right now. Ben S gave and explanation of the LOA-19 process that occurred during the NWA/DAL merger. Lee Moak noted during his presentation that the L-CAL/L-UAL pilots get along fine but their elected leadership has some room for improvement.