We'll form USAPA, we'll go to Phoenix and tell the pilots about the tyranny of the majority. Now, they find themselves in the minority, they don't want AA giving them a taste of their own medicine.
Source:
S Fenske
"The two pilots groups have been so far apart on the issue that they hired a mediator to help them talk then serve as an impartial arbiter when mediation failed.George Nicolau, who's worked for both the airline industry and Major League Baseball, was suggested by the East pilots. When the West pilots acquiesced, both sides agreed that his verdict would be final and binding.
For 18 days, Nicolau listened to testimony from both sets of pilots. It soon became clear, West pilots say, that the East-based pilots were unwilling to negotiate. It was date-of-hire or nothing.
"Mann, who assisted the West pilots during previous merger talks and during the seniority negotiations, was stunned by the East pilots' attitude. "I've done a lot of these," he says. "And this was just the most extreme intransigence I've ever seen."
In May 2007, Nicolau issued his decree on how seniority should be handled. Suffice it to say, it wasn't based strictly on date-of-hire; he'd crafted a compromise that weighed a host of factors.
That should have been it; the two parties had agreed at the beginning that the Nicolau award was to be binding, final, and all those words that mean it can't be challenged or changed or compromised.
The East pilots, though, had other plans.
Screw the "binding" bit. Surely, it applied only to the union that had agreed to arbitration.
What if they were to start a new union? Then, surely, Nicolau wouldn't count.
Then they could start from scratch.
The West guys say they, too, had their complaints about Nicolau's award. "Nobody on our side was happy with it," says Braid, a pilot who came up through the America West system. "They're calling him 'St. Nick,' like he gave us a gift." Not so, Braid says it's more that the West pilots understood the process had been fair, that no one was going to get everything they wanted. Unlike the East guys, they'd come in knowing that they'd have to compromise.
Plus, there was the principle of the thing.
"We knew whatever [Nicolau] came out with, we had to live with," says fellow West pilot Szmal. "We took that chance."
Unfortunately for the West pilots, though, they'd be forced to join the new union whether they wanted to or not.
And because there were twice as many East pilots, as long as they stood united, they didn't really need a single West pilot's support to break away and require the West guys to pay dues to an organization that had been formed, in essence, to screw them over.
The East guys selling the new union made just one trip to Phoenix to discuss their plans an effort they quickly abandoned under intense questioning from West pilots. The meeting is enshrined in a series of 15 YouTube videos, titled "Can't Take the Heat." (Some of the videos have been viewed more than 4,000 times.)
Already, West pilots were convinced they were getting the shaft. Several made it clear that they would not pay dues, or participate, in the new union.
"I believe [forming a new union] is the quickest way to a new contract and, eventually, unity," one of the East pilots told the assembled pilots.
"Never!" the West pilots cried. "No way!"
"Now," the East pilot continued, "Many of you have told us that you prefer anarchy, and you will not pay dues to us, and you'll undermine us."
"You're undermining ALPA," one West pilot angrily retorted.
"You're fundamentally undermining us!" another shouted.
Toward the end of the meeting, a West pilot asked what would happen if the West pilots refuse to pay dues to the new union. Sure, technically, they could get fired. But, the pilot asked, "Would you think that [US Airways CEO] Doug Parker would just fire 1,800 pilots? Would they lay us off?"
"They could," the would-be union leader replied.
The union organizers had originally planned to stay until 4 p.m., but the meeting grew so toxic, they left more than two hours early.
"What about a closing statement?" one West pilot called as they prepared to go. "Tell us why I need to vote for you."
"Are you guys going to walk out?" another West pilot shouted.
"Sorry, guys," the East pilot said.
"It's not four o'clock yet!" a West pilot shouted."
The clock has struck midnight. It's time for USAPA to exit the stage and a real union come to the plate.
