2015 Pilot Discussion.

[luvthe9]

Glad to have you scabs back on board!!

 

[luvthe9]

Wow, I guess Mitch has really lost his polite disposition , Isn't Mark an Air Force academy graduate? Same as one of our VIce Presidents, no value system? Oh we forgot Mitch is an attorney! MM

Pretend attorney, and not a very good one either.

 

[Claxon]

Pretend attorney, and not a very good one either.

Mitch was 3rd in his class at a make believe law school. Big deal. The street smart and older members of the profession warned the make believe attorney with one (1) yr. of seniority he better pay attention to the reality........
Mitch Vasin is simply a greedy little opportunist looking to leap a pilot with 17 years un furloughed service. He and the rest got exactly what they deserved.



UTurn: Why Wye River Didn't Save Dave?
If the Wright brothers were alive today Wilbur would have to fire Orville to reduce costs. Herb Kelleher, Southwest Airlines, USA Today, 8 June 1994.

Last February at Wye River, Rice and Prater told both MECs that the NIC would never be implemented. The East pilots had the votes to stop it. Thats why ALPA spent so much time and money trying to get us to compromise. The failure of Wye River pretty much ended ALPA on the property and ALPA knew it.

The real victims of Wye River are the 175 West pilots getting furloughed. We can thank our MEC for that. The Pro-ALPA East MEC offered a compromise they thought would save ALPA and get a cram-down contract vote out before the final USAPA election. According to our sources who were there, the East offer had fences that protected their retirement attrition and prevented East pilots from bidding into PHX/LAS and pushing down West pilots down. Furloughs would be based on length of service. We hear that came out of an old Empire Airlines furlough model.

The East MEC offer would have put Dave ODell ahead of approximately 400 east pilots (not a typo four hundred). The East MECs offer was furloughs based on longevity, months of active mainline service.

Thats right, guys. They were desperate to save ALPA and their cushy union jobs. The polling must have told them their plan would save ALPA. For sure their proposal would SAVE DAVE from furlough.

Just like in the B-757 IOU, the E-190 arbitration IOU and unbalanced East-West flying, our MEC ended up getting 175 West pilots furloughed, because they refused to negotiate and THEY TURNED DOWN THE OFFER!

From what weve been told, Jeff Freund left the Wye River conference out of frustration over our MECs refusal to negotiate a compromise. Our MEC says they held the line. If failure to negotiate, causing 175 furloughs, is holding the line, great job, guys. The East MEC made an offer that would have prevented Dave ODell from being furloughed. You turned it down.


So, if you still think our MEC were heroes at Wye River, tell that to our bottom 175 pilots. All we can say is when you update your resume, just remember who didnt SAVE DAVE.

If the former West MEC goes after us on the facts, well have to put out more details, including actual statements from those who were there on both sides. But thats the former MECs call.

(Go ahead, former MEC members. Deny the truth. Look every pilot facing furlough in the eye and tell them about holding the line at Wye River. Want to talk? Well give you our forum to explain yourselves.)

 

[Claxon]

REALITY: PHX REP UPDATE
This decade-long delay wouldnt be such an issue if the Phoenix base had been allowed to share in the gains of these mergers, but the company seems hell-bent on keeping PHX on the island that USAPA created. Management's announced plans will prolong this unfair situation that deprives PHX pilots of opportunities found everywhere else throughout the system by turning a blind eye toward the obvious, and remaining deaf to our many complaints while continuing to reward behavior that is detrimental to the company as a whole. To our knowledge, management still has no plans to bring new pilots or equipment to PHX in the interim, so we should expect things to only get worse in PHX (and for longer) before anything improves.

This is what your bottom feeder legal team produced. Mitchell Vasin is referenced as an MEC member of awa
In the above letter.

 

[Claxon]

First Officer Vasin, a Boeing 737 pilot, joined the MEC as its vice chairman in December 2006. Prior to being elected to this position, First Officer Vasin served as the chairman of the Grievance Committee, which enforces the pilots’ collective bargaining agreement. He also served as a status representative on the MEC and as the chairman of the Grievance Committee at his former ALPA carrier.

Mitch Vasin brought his "experience" from Eagle. VASIN was on the MEC that ignored Jeff Freund. west pilots will continue to wither on the vine in PHX because of advice from the bottom tier attorney.

 

[EastUS1]

Like I said in my earlier post, I really don't care what alternative universe you choose to live in.

 
Umm...Just so long as we don't magically morph into "knights" or "dire wolves",  and not intrude on your "Army" in "Sparta", or ever even attend Hogwarts, one must suppose? 😉

 

[snapthis]

Well said Mitch, give the Pickleballers some grief....


Steve-

You are so completely clueless I'm not sure there are enough hours in the day to "help" you, and moreover, I don't think you want "help" as your world simply wouldn't make any sense without the facts you've manufactured to supplant reality. Here are just a few inaccuracies from your first sentence:

1) His name is Eric Ferguson. You spelled his name incorrectly. Sorry, spell check doesn't help with last names.

2) Eric was hired in 2003. I was hired in 2004, along with several 1989 US Air hires who were on furlough (again) from US Airways and happy to have a job.

3) I am a licensed attorney in Arizona. Eric is not an attorney and has never been to law school.

4) I attended an IN-PERSON law school that is fully accredited by the American Bar Association. I graduated 3rd in my class out of 122 students while flying a full schedule, serving as a managing editor of the law review, doing an internship at the Arizona Supreme Court, and working for two years as a law clerk for a large national law firm doing federal litigation. Please feel free to discuss your education, accomplishments, and professional licenses outside aviation.

5) I had no part of forming Leonidas LLC, nor have I ever been a member, principle, or agent of the organization. I have been a financial supporter of theirs from the outset, but that is my only tie.

6) Leonidas LLC is not "for-profit" but, like all litigation funding mechanisms, does not need to go through the expense of becoming an official "non-profit" entity to avoid tax consequences. USAPA is essentially now a litigation funding mechanism, certainly not organized as a non-profit under North Carolina law.

Like I said in my earlier post, I really don't care what alternative universe you choose to live in. This process is going to continue unabated by your ignorance, and there is really not a whole lot you and your buddies can do about it except ####, whine, and make a bunch of background noise.

Also, I stand by my earlier comment about Mark King, and I think "low life" was even pretty generous. I believe you, Mark King, and other similarly minded folks have no value system, as evidenced by the constant contradictory arguments, and DECADES of stabbing each other in the back (in ALPA and even WORSE under USAPA). When the ends justify the means, there are no longer limits to behavior. Moreover, the majority of your actions of the past decade are rooted in greed, ego, anger, and spite; you're incapable of taking any responsibility for your own behavior, and when circumstances aren't to your liking, it is ALWAYS somebody else's fault. When USAPA was formed, you believed we were a bunch of inexperienced, uneducated 25-year-old RJ pilots who could NEVER hold together under the campaign of terror you had in store for us. That was a GRAVE mistake on your part. I know FOR A FACT that there were celebrations at USAPA HQ the day the RICO lawsuit was filed, with Lee Seham proudly professing that the RICO suit would put a definitive end to our legal campaign. Six weeks later the RICO lawsuit was dismissed, paid for, and shortly thereafter we brought suit against USAPA. We've had absolutely NO problem funding litigation over the past several years, and will continue to do so for as long as necessary. I firmly believe that there could NEVER be such a campaign on the East; you couldn't even hold it together after forming your own union designed to screw us and using dues monies to do it. I laugh when I think about you guys trying to fundraise for a lawsuit. There would be so many factions and splinter groups your whole effort would fall apart.

If you want to convince yourself that this is about me and a couple of hundred FOs wanting a quick upgrade, think again. If that were the case, our legal campaign would have ended before it ever began, and we would not have the uniformity of support throughout our seniority list. We enjoy that unity here because your despicable actions have offended every single pilot here to the absolute core. We believe you and many of your coworkers are underhanded, filthy, disgusting excuses for human beings, you behavior is inexcusable and reprehensible, and therefore we are prepared to do WHATEVER is necessary to end that era of tyranny. And I also have to say that we could not have done it without loudmouth half-brains like you reminding us what we are up against.

Have a nice day 🙂

 
Hit the nail on the head, Mitch.
 

 

[Claxon]

 
Umm...Just so long as we don't magically morph into "knights" or "dire wolves",  and not intrude on your "Army" in "Sparta", or ever even attend Hogwarts, one must suppose? 😉

"Filthy, despicable human beings..." Is Mitchell's terminology.
He got exactly what he deserved. Young Mitch had no idea what he got into, all legal. He was simply out maneuvered. And now he uses gutter language to cover for his legal short comings. Typical shyster "attorney"
How many times does he have to be told why he never got his Nic.
Scott KIRBY got it, and he isn't even a lawyer.



"In the US Airways America West case, it went to binding arbitration but there was a requirement as part of that that the two unions negotiate a joint contract with the company, which wasnt done yet.

And because it wasnt done yet, the side that didnt like it could prevent a joint contract from getting done. And because of that, the seniority integration never happened."

Scott Kirby

 

[EastCheats]

First Officer Vasin, a Boeing 737 pilot, joined the MEC as its vice chairman in December 2006. Prior to being elected to this position, First Officer Vasin served as the chairman of the Grievance Committee, which enforces the pilots collective bargaining agreement. He also served as a status representative on the MEC and as the chairman of the Grievance Committee at his former ALPA carrier.
Mitch Vasin brought his "experience" from Eagle. VASIN was on the MEC that ignored Jeff Freund. west pilots will continue to wither on the vine in PHX because of advice from the bottom tier attorney.

View attachment 10704

 

[Claxon]

 
"The Plaintiff’s {USAPA} Amended Complaint raises
serious allegations against the Defendants; {america west pilots} it alleges acts of intimidation, harassment, and other threatening behavior against the Plaintiff and its members. {East Pilots} While the Court has concluded that such actions do not come within the purview of RICO, it may well be that a Court of appropriate jurisdiction will conclude that such actions do constitute violations of state law and that injunctive relief is warranted to prevent this type of conduct
from continuing. Because the Court has concluded that subject matter
jurisdiction does not lie, however, the Court need not reach the issue of
whether injunctive relief would be appropriate based on the facts presented
in this case."

Legal findings the west pilots do not want you to know about.  The court found that it was not a RICO matter, though close, they did not investigate the wests actions.
 
It was truly a Pyrrhic victory for the west. No dicta intended.
 
http://leonidas.cactuspilots.us/Rico/Rico%20District/1%20Original%20Complaint.pdf
 
http://leonidas.cactuspilots.us/Rico/Rico%20District/97%20Order.pdf

 

[snapthis]

West Merger Committee Update 4/9/2015
 
Fellow pilots,

Your West Merger Committee has been busy at work over the past several weeks working diligently on the following tasks:

1. Procuring employment and seniority data. Pursuant to the terms of the Protocol Agreement, once the West Merger Committee was officially granted party status by the Preliminary Arbitration panel, we were entitled to all seniority data that the company had provided the other committees, as well as all of the seniority data that the other committees have exchanged between themselves to date. The other parties have made the required disclosures, and the amount of information was quite voluminous.
2. Producing a certified seniority list. Each committee is required to produce a “certified seniority list” of the pilots it represents, and each certified list will serve as the basis of that committee’s seniority integration proposal. The Protocol Agreement requires that “[t]he certified seniority lists will reflect the status quo of the three seniority lists in effect at the carriers on December 9, 2013 (i.e., American, US Airways (East), US Airways (West)); provided, that this will be without prejudice to any Merger Committee’s position on the appropriate ‘snapshot’ or ‘constructive notice’ date.” What this means, simply, is that the parties have agreed upon a baseline date for the seniority data for purposes of uniformity, but that baseline date in no way requires or foreshadows any particular sort of integration methodology. Seniority list certification involves manually comparing the various sets of employment data, both past and present, to ensure its accuracy. At the time of this update, the list certification process is nearly completed, and it is anticipated that the parties will be able to exchange certified lists shortly.
3. Preparing for arbitration. Our legal team has been busy with a number of tasks related to preparing for the seniority integration arbitration commencing June 29, including: developing and refining strategy, working with the other committees’ attorneys and the arbitrators to finalize procedural ground rules for the hearings, and working closely with the committee to procure and prepare evidence and witnesses. Additionally, we have procured various experts to assist with analysis and potentially testify in the arbitration. Most notably, we have retained airline economist Dan Aikens. As many of you already know, Dan was a critical component of our America West Merger Committee under ALPA, and the Nicolau Award was substantially influenced by his analysis (the PEM “Pilot Earnings Model”). Dan has subsequently worked with Jeff Freund and his legal team in both the Delta / Northwest and the United / Continental seniority integrations. We are pleased to have Dan working on behalf of the America West pilots again.

NEXT STEPS

Just over twelve weeks remain until the seniority integration arbitration hearings begin. During that time, the three merger committees will exchange certified lists, lodge appropriate objections to each list, if necessary, as well as discuss and resolve as many issues as possible prior to the arbitration date. In addition to integration methodology, the committees will also discuss and attempt to reach agreement upon a number of other issues, including: constructive notice date, “snapshot” date, methodology for determining “longevity,” and methodology for determining the actual number of pilots from the two airlines for each category and status (e.g. 757 Captain, A320 First Officer, etc.). The merger committees will attempt to reach consensus on as many issues as possible in the next few months, so as to minimize the number of issues that will ultimately be presented to the arbitration panel for resolution. We will keep you apprised of the status of these discussions.

THE LMRDA LAWSUIT

As you are aware, three West pilots recently filed a lawsuit in federal court in North Carolina against several USAPA principals. Click here to read the recent Leonidas LLC update announcing and explaining the lawsuit. The lawsuit is extremely relevant and important to your Merger Committee.

USAPA, during its tenure as lawful bargaining agent, collected dues as a condition of employment from all East and West pilots, and also initiated a merger assessment that required all US Airways pilots, East and West, to contribute additional monies to a fund to be used solely for the purposes of seniority integration. Of course, since that time, USAPA lost its status as bargaining agent, and has also lost its ability to represent West pilots in the seniority integration process. Despite this, USAPA apparently believes that it is still entitled to use pilot dues and assessment dollars – including dues and assessments collected from West pilots - to fund its merger committee, instead of properly returning those unspent dollars to the pilots individually. While we believe the USAPA principals are aware of this legal and ethical duty, as is usually the case, they simply will not comply with those legal obligations without a court order requiring them to do so.

The grounds available to the plaintiffs in that case are substantially different than what has been available to West pilots previously. This lawsuit is brought under a federal law (the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959 or “LMRDA”) that was enacted to prevent union officers from spending union money improperly – particularly when doing so advances those union officers’ personal interests. The law on that subject is not as deferential to union officers’ decisions as is the case with the Duty of Fair Representation claims. In fact, as it pertains to the use of union dues and assessments, the LMRDA provides that union principals can be held personally liable for misuse of union funds, and gives federal judges broad discretion to award attorneys’ fees against them.

In sum, the LMRDA lawsuit seeks to recover YOUR merger fund from those who would like to retain it for purpose of using it against you. We encourage you to provide this lawsuit your attention, as well as moral and financial support.

As always, we encourage you to contact us with your questions and feedback. We look forward to communicating with you again in the very near future.

Sincerely,

The West Pilot Merger Committee
 

 

[Claxon]

The west pilots stool, sli and legal strategy, has only two legs out of the three required.  It has finally reached it's tipping point.
 
http://leonidas.cactuspilots.us/DFR_1_Filings/Doc053-1_Hemenway_Declaration.pdf

 

[EastCheats]

The west pilots stool, sli and legal strategy, has only two legs out of the three required.  It has finally reached it's tipping point.
 
http://leonidas.cactuspilots.us/DFR_1_Filings/Doc053-1_Hemenway_Declaration.pdf

Where is the Pickleball Committee update?

 

[luvthe9]

Well it seems west donations are dwindling done quite a bit after the the latest PHX Update, no surprise, why keep throwing away money for a lost cause, also hearing a lot of westies want to join in with the esst merger committee as the west has nothing to offer.

 

[luvthe9]

Where is the Pickleball Committee update?

Where is the Pickleball Committee update?

Where is the Pickleball Committee update?

We prefer to keep our plans quiet. Still glad to see westies are getting the big picture, it only took ten year.

AOL is coming to an end west pilot careers has been devastated by this group of AFO's they will never recover from the damage done by AOL.


Many more hot summers to come in PHX with no growth.