I am one of the lucky people who were able to move on to a better job with great security and higher pay.
I'm very happy to hear this!
Can't believe it's been 7 years already... Can't say I miss the Vance security goons, though... Nothing like being harrassed & having your picture taken by people allegedly hired to "protect" you...
Couple of questions, concerning your strike, that I've always wondered about.
Did the NW mechanics and AMFA not know about the training school, out west, that NW was stocking with scabs, when you decided to strike ? From what I understand, they had ads in all the trade outlets, recruiting peeps, in preparation for your strike !
And if so, why not a work slow-down, instead of walking out?
Also, were you stabbed in the back, by the IAM, whom I'm sure was pissed that you ditched them, in favor of AMFA?
Not trying to be a smartass, just would like to hear it from someone who was actually involved !
South--
I'm sure GQ will weigh in, but in the interim I can tell you a few things.
First, I'm pretty sure the scab school wasn't a secret, or if it was, it was a sort of mass produced secret that a lot of people knew about.
As for a slow-down, this is just my opinion based on being in an MTX station at the time, but I think the AMT's were trying extremely hard to show the value they brought to the company, even as it became increasingly apparent that the company couldn't care less. In fact, in my station, they had to fight to get their "normal" volume of work back; the company had stopped sending work packages in fear that they wouldn't do them. At one point (I want to say about 3 weeks prior to the strike?), we had an engine change, and the company went ahead and contracted another firm to do it. The AMT's had to fight to get that work back, too.
As for the IAMAW: You can find many places on this board where I've posted that DePace's actions set (all) labor back 10 years. He refused to see the bigger picture, and figured he'd get some more work secured for the IAM (the work materialized, the jobs not so much). IMO, it certainly backfired; not just for the obvious reasons, but also amongst the IAM membership itself. The idea of our PDGC cozying up to Steenland was as bad as anything else. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, and all that... make no mistake; there was no love lost between the IAM and AMFA, but at a station level, I think there was much more support for the striking AMT's than gets reported. As for work performed, please see below...
The old NW board is obviously now merged with the DL one. If you have time, there's some old threads on here from that era. Lots of good info/perspectives.
I've been wondering on the same but every time I ask the questions 700UW says the IAM didn't scab and that pushbacks and deicing, etc were part of IAM scope. Seems many on the AA forum believe the IAM scabbed AMFA but I can't get a straight explanation either. Hopefully someone can weigh in with facts.
Josh
It's a bit hard to convey clearly in an electronic forum, but the short version is that 700 is right about the CBA language.
Here's the longer version:
There were 2 IAM CBA's. One covered ramp & stores, and one covered gate agents, res., and several other groups.
AMFA's CBA covered AMT's, Plant maintenance (GSE equipment) cabin cleaners, and janitors.
The ramp CBA had explicit language covering pushbacks, airstarts, and cleaning (towing/taxi language came only after the AMFA terms imposed on them). It also had language covering what were called "4 hour rule" stations. In these stations, agents were covered under the gate agent cba, but were cross utilized to work both in and outside. For those stations, the scope language from our (ramp) cba applied.
AMFA's CBA specifically listed what stations were to be staffed, and in those stations work was to be covered by AMT's and/or cleaners. Some cities had both, and some (like mine at the time) had only AMT's. In our case, AMT's performed what was covered under their CBA, and we performed the rest.
Still with me?
So now you have some cities with AMT's, some with both, and a LOT (~ 70ish) with neither. For those in the latter category, it was business as usual come 8/20.
Our CBA also had language protecting people who refused to cross a "legal" picket line. Seems easy enough, right? Well, the problem was two-fold. First and foremost, DePace agreed with the company that AMFA wasn't "legally" on strike, and so the refused to enforce the language. Second, was that in a lot of cases, where the AMT's were picketing wasn't necessarily where people reported to work. IOW, there wasn't a "physical" line to cross. In our case, we all parked/clocked in at our air freight facility. We asked the AMFA grievance chair to set a line up there. If they had, we all would have simply turned around and went home. This *would* have been protected under Same with many of the truck drivers (this happened to an extent in SEA, by the way). It might not have been as visible to the public, but it certainly would've impacted the operation. They chose instead to picket at the terminal (understandable),but were only granted permits for some very out-of-the-way spots. Certainly their decision to make, but one that I think was ultimately incorrect.
So now you had an IAM workgroup divided into a few categories:
- The business as usual crowd.
- The group that wanted to support the effort, but were concerned about DL143's refusal to support the contract language.
- The group that remembered the animosity between both unions, and said "f'em" (in my opinion, the ones deserving of scorn)
- A (sub) group of people that were enamored with the idea of pushing back/towing planes, and were willing to overlook the rest of the issue. Why people get off on this so much is beyond me, but here we are.
- The group that refused to perform struck work, and figured out work arounds to the IAM's stance on crossing legal picket lines. I was in this latter group, and as I've said before, it was a very easy decision to make.
The company knew this, and (IMO) used it to their advantage...