To all UCH Pilots,

I generally hate going tit-for-tat with management's spin machine. Today, I can't help but respond to the latest message put out by Fred Abbott and Howard Attarian.

Absent any recognition of our rightful frustration over the length of time our joint negotiations have taken, and without accepting any responsibility for the grossly extended timeline, management instead claims to have negotiated in good faith and characterizes our request for release as "premature" and "counterproductive".

What a bunch of bloviated bovine manure. The CAL CBA is 3 years, 4 months and 14 days past it's amendable date. The UAL contract is one year less. We have been negotiating the scheduling sections for 15 months. Pardon me, but if management thinks we are acting prematurely with our request to take these negotiations to their next logical step, I can't help but ask what they think the proper gestation period for a JCBA should be?

Last July, management decided to negotiate in public using their website. Their opening salvo that day was to publish what they portrayed as a summary of their opening position. Of course, they left out significant details of their proposal. Pilots from both L-CAL and L-UAL were righteously outraged, and demonstrated this by writing "NO" on the alleged proposal summary and giving them to their CPO.

To quote Ronald Reagan, "Well, there you go again". On the same website, you will find this letter from management. It's long past time that management gets the message: It is time to get a contract NOW. With that in mind, I suggest that you take a similar action as you did last year. Find a copy of the letter, write NOW on it, and return it to your CPO. Pass it on. Maybe - just maybe - management will get the message.

One Union, One Voice.

CAL MEC Chairman