Corruption Charges Expose Mob Control Of ILA Locals In New York, Newark
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/36556659.html
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Posted on Mon, Dec. 22, 2008
In court case, a view of N.J. mob
Documents suggest a hit man and boss who ran the waterfront while hiding in plain sight.
By George Anastasia
Inquirer Staff Writer
He's the quintessential New Jersey gangster, part Sonny Corleone, part Tony Soprano.
A suspect in two gangland murders, one dating to the 1970s, he spent more than 10 years on the run before being arrested on Manhattan's Upper West Side last year.
And all the while, federal authorities now say, he oversaw a mob crew that controlled the port of Newark, N.J., generating hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Genovese crime family.
The case against suspected hit man Michael Coppola, laid out in documents filed this month in federal court in Brooklyn, is a snapshot of how organized crime controls the 45,000-member International Longshoremen's Association and, by extension, the ports of New Jersey and New York, authorities say.
Fleshed out with transcripts from wiretapped conversations and the testimony of mob informants, it's On the Waterfront revisited.

1/12 SF IBT ILWU ILA Labor Rally Against Bailouts
http://www.sflaborcouncil.org/Page/1.2.1
Join Teamsters to Rally Against Corporate Greed
January 12, 2009 at 12:00 PM
TransAmerica Building
700 Montgomery Street, San Francisco
Transamerica's parent company applied for a U.S. taxpayer funded balout. That is after being accused of looting the Dutch dockworkers' pension fund and getting a bailout from the Dutch government. Join us to rally against this corporate greed. For more information download the flier!
http://www.sflaborcouncil.org/ViewUpload/384
Transamerica’s parent company applied for a
U.S. taxpayer funded bailout. That is after
being accused of looting the Dutch
dockworkers’ pension fund and getting a $3.9 billion
bailout from the Dutch government. Leaders of the
Dutch Longshore union are coming to San Francisco
to protest.
Let’s show them some
American Labor Solidarity!
Rally Against Corporate Greed
TransAmerica Bldg.
700 Montgomery Street
San Francisco
January 12th • 12 Noon
No Bailouts
for Robber Barons
ITF Condemns Aegon Company For It's Management of Dutch FNV Docker's Pension Funds-Company Steals Union Pension Funds

New York’s Transit Local Recovers Dues Check-off, Accepts Strike Prohibition
http://labornotes.org/node/2021
New York’s Transit Local Recovers Dues Check-off, Accepts Strike Prohibition
— Steve Downs
The union representing New York City’s bus and subway workers recovered their right to dues check-off after 17 months of punishment for an illegal strike in December 2005.
The court also fined each striker, slapped Transport Workers Union Local 100 with millions in fines, and jailed local President Roger Toussaint for four days over the 60-hour strike.
In November, a judge ordered check-off to be restored, but only after Toussaint bowed to Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s demand, submitting that:
“[T]he Union does not assert the right to strike against any government, to assist or participate in any such strike, or to impose an obligation to conduct, assist, or participate in such a strike, and that the Union has no intention, now or in the future, of conducting, assisting, participating, or imposing an obligation to conduct, assist or participate in any such strike, or threatening to do so, against the plaintiffs or any governmental employer.”
CONTRACT DEADLINE LOOMS

5,000 Canadian ILWU B.C. Port Workers Set To Walk
http://www.bclocalnews.com/surrey_area/surreyleader/business/37098334.html
SURREY NORTH DELTA LEADER
Port foremen in strike position
By Jeff Nagel - Surrey North Delta Leader
Published: January 05, 2009 11:00 AM
Weekend negotiations aimed at averting a port strike ended with no deal but the two sides are expected to meet again later this week.
Any strike by more than 450 ship and dock foremen at B.C. ports is expected to lead to another 5,000 port workers walking off the job, halting container and other cargo shipments by water and triggering a chain reaction of impacts and disruptions for other businesses.
The port foremen have been without a contract since March of 2007 and are represented by local 514 of the international Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU).
Federally mediated talks ended at 2 a.m. Sunday morning with negotiators for the B.C. Maritime Employers' Association (BCMEA) promising a response to the union's latest proposal as early as Wednesday but no later than Friday.
Neither the union nor the employer has issued 72-hour strike or lockout notice yet, but either can now do so because a cooling-off period expired on Dec. 30.

Workers Today
amjad@workerstoday.com
January 4, 2009 5:52:38 PM PST
An open letter to all labor federations and unions in the world
Support the International Labor Conference in Erbil - Iraq
Brothers and sisters
Greetings from the port workers in Basra
We have determined to confront the challenges that stand before us. We have been struggling for our most basic needs in one hand, standing fearlessly against all forms of sectarianism and religious agenda that attempted to break the workers unity as well as confronting the occupation economic and political agenda on the other hand.
Today we appeal to all organizations, labor federations and unions in the world to bridge the gap between us as workers and declare that our struggle is one and we share a common destiny. Let us build a solid front against the war and crises that would create more devastation to the working class.
Holding the International Labor Conference in Erbil is a step forward to strengthen labor solidarity and to find a common vision for our present and future of generations to come. We invite you to participate in this conference and to provide all forms of support.
Holding such conference in Iraq and in such circumstances is extremely significant to the workers in Iraq and the world.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/dec2008/pitt-d17.shtml
Concessions imposed on Pittsburgh, Penn. bus drivers
By Samuel Davidson
17 December 2008
The Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) international office and leaders from the AFL-CIO have intervened in negotiations between the Allegheny County Port Authority and its 2,500 public transportation workers to impose a concessions contract demanded by local Democratic Party officials.
The Port Authority of Allegheny County, which includes the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is the 15th largest public transportation system in the country, serving 250,000 people daily. The bus and trolley drivers had been working without a contract since June 30, when their previous contract expired.
Under the terms of the new contact, bus drivers and light rail drivers, along with maintenance personnel and staff workers, will begin paying 10 percent of health care premiums. Health care deductibles will also increase. Employees will have to pay $250 for individuals and $500 for families in the agency’s PPO (preferred provider organization) health plan, and have even higher co-pays if enrolled in the HMO (health maintenance organization) plan. Prescription co-pays will go up to $45 per prescription for everyone.

http://www.workdayminnesota.org/index.php?news_6_3890
Monday 29th December 2008 10:20 PM
Defending worker rights at Delta Airlines
29 December 2008
BLOOMINGTON - Members of Machinists Local 1833 are sending a message to Delta Airlines management not to interfere in workers' decision to choose their own representatives in the workplace.
The union, which represents ticket agents, reservations staff, baggage handlers and other ground crew at the former Northwest Airlines, says Delta Airlines management is interfering with the rights of workers to have union representation at the newly merged carrier.
Delta management is preventing union workers from communicating with non-union workers and establishing company-dominated committees on issues such as seniority, the union said.
"They want to shut us down," said Local 1833 member Kip Hedges. "If we have a level playing field, we win."
Julie Blaha, vice president of Anoka-Hennepin Education Minnesota, joined Machinists Local 1833 President Ken Hooker in informational picketing at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
Local 1833 members are contacting their non-union counterparts at Delta as part of an organizing drive to win representation for all ground workers.

ILWU 10 Calls Off Picketing At Oakland Pier 7 For Talks On Dispute Over Work
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/29/BAM71507OA.DTL
Talks today on dispute over unloading ship
Demian Bulwa, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, December 29, 2008
(12-28) 17:00 PST --
State transportation officials and the contractor hired to build the Bay Bridge's new eastern span called a meeting for this morning with picketing longshore workers, hoping to resolve a tense standoff over a Chinese cargo ship full of steel parts for the bridge.
The ship, the Zhen Hua, sat idle Sunday at Pier 7 at the Port of Oakland, two days after it docked and was thrust into a union turf war over who should unload it. The longshore workers said they had a right to the job and that two other unions should not have been hired.
The impasse has stalled a key phase of the $1.4 billion construction of a single-tower suspension span and may set back the timetable for completion of a project already dogged by controversy, delays and cost hikes.
Oakland officials, including Acting City Administrator Dan Lindheim and representatives of Mayor Ron Dellums, spoke informally Sunday to the parties in the dispute in an effort to make sure that it did not spark confrontations or disrupt other operations at the West Coast's third-busiest seaport.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123050697093538155.html
BUSINESSDECEMBER 29, 2008
Airlines Work to Minimize Safety-Lapse Penalties
Southwest and American Revise Maintenance Procedures, but Question Whether Possible FAA Fines Are Too Big
Article
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By ANDY PASZTOR and PAULO PRADA
Southwest Airlines and American Airlines have overhauled maintenance practices after a string of safety lapses disclosed earlier this year, but the carriers are now sparring with regulators over how much they should be fined for those mistakes.
The moves underscore the complicated relationship that has emerged with the Federal Aviation Administration as the carriers seek to put the safety issues that emerged last spring and summer behind them. Both Southwest Airlines Co. and AMR Corp.'s American Airlines are paying closer attention to government safety mandates. At the same time, they are also trying to minimize their exposure to financial damages.
Getty Images
American Airlines is telling its mechanics they must now follow 'verbatim' the language in FAA directives.
Southwest sparked a federal enforcement crackdown when it acknowledged flying tens of thousands of passengers in 2007 on some four dozen jets that hadn't received mandatory checks for potential fuselage cracks. Those lapses led to massive flight cancellations, congressional criticism and erosion of public confidence in the FAA.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/28/BALQ14VVRU.DTL
Dispute idles ship carrying Bay Bridge supplies
Deborah Gage,Robert Selna, Chronicle Staff Writers
Sunday, December 28, 2008
A cargo ship from China sat idle Saturday at the Port of Oakland after a labor dispute halted the unloading of steel structures destined for construction of the eastern span of the Bay Bridge.
About 50 members of the longshore workers' union protested at Pier 7, saying they are being denied the right to unload the ship. The protests began Friday, when the ship, the Zhen Hua, docked at a staging area set up by Caltrans to offload shipped material that would be used in the retrofit of the bridge.
The work of unloading the ship has been assigned to two other unions - the Iron Workers and the Operating Engineers, which unload barges coming in to the pier loaded with cement and other materials from the Port of Sacramento. It was not clear Saturday who was responsible for the decision.
The longshore union says its rules specify that its members should unload ships.
"This is our jurisdiction," said Melvin Mackay, president of Local 10 of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union. "Once (a ship) is tied up to the dock, it belongs to the longshoremen."

UTU1741 SF Rally Against First Student
Rally Against First Student - December 4, 2008
Boisterous Bus Drivers Picket First Student
The members had gathered to protest the recent firings of 4 drivers in the recent months. First Student, which bought out Laidlaw Transit last year to become the largest operator of school buses in North America, took on the UTU 1741 contract as part of their contract with the San Francisco Unified School District. As the school year began, First Student, elevating their Company Handbook above the legally negotiated, signed and ratified UTU contract, unilaterally declared that any driver involved in a rear end accident would be fired. The UTU contract has a clear and coherent policy of progressive discipline that has been followed by companies who have held the bussing contract in the past. Workers outrage grew as drivers began to be fired. The most egregious firing concerned Robert Newcomer (click here for more). Newcomer began driving a school bus in 1974. He had a perfect driving record going back 24 years! After a minor rear end accident, he was fired. The Union took his case to mediation, and won--but First Student refused to follow the mediator's recommendation to rehire Mr. Newcomer, and is taking the case to arbitration.

Jackson, Floriday ILA 1408 Female longshoremen benefited from struggles
http://www.jacksonville.com/opinion/columnists/tonyaa_weathersbee/2008-12-22/female_longshoremen_benefited_from_struggles
Female longshoremen benefited from struggles
BY TONYAA WEATHERSBEESTORY UPDATED AT 5:22 AM ON MONDAY, DEC. 22, 2008
EMAILPRINTBLOG THISCOMMENT
Buzz up!
It's tough trying to make a living and break barriers at the same time.
No one knows that better than the women who work the docks of Jacksonville's port.
For decades, women dockworkers haven't struggled with moving cars and crates off ships. They have, however, struggled to move their male co-workers to treat them with dignity and respect.
Back in 1999, they were finally forced to take that struggle to court.
Two women, Vonceil Harold and Traveine Howard, filed what became a class action lawsuit against the International Longshoreman's Association and its Jacksonville chapter, Deep Sea Local 1408, for sexual discrimination and harassment.
The men left them no other choice.
During that time, showing up at the docks meant weaving through a web of horrors designed to ensnare and discourage.
It meant enduring laughs, often laced with lewd comments, directed at them when they sought work.

http://ottawa.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20081211/OTT_Opinion_081211/20081211/?hub=OttawaHome
Transit union, city battle to get their message out
Updated: Sat Dec. 13 2008 13:44:48
ctvottawa.ca
As motorists battle traffic gridlock in the capital, the transit union and the city are waging a war for public support.
"To me, the union leader needs to be changed. That is definitely not a professional guy. My 12-year-old daughter can answer better questions," said car salesman Stefan Polacek.
Others think the strike is designed to hurt the public: "I feel sorry for the bus drivers and I don't like the unions manipulating everybody because it's not worth it. Nobody wins in a strike," said commuter Dana Clark.
Public sentiment means Amalgamated Transit Union President André Cornellier has a hard pitch to sell in a public relations battle that's impacting commuters and hurting an already crumbling economy.
"Inconveniencing people, what's wrong with that?" Cornellier told CTV Ottawa on Wednesday.
Watch interviews from both sides of the dispute
While some might perceive his comments unnecessary, those who know Cornellier say he's just passionate about what he believes in.

YouTube - First Student UTU 1741 SF School Bus Drivers Picket
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdNA7fKMmVY&feature=channel_page
First Student, the largest school bus company in the world based in Aberdeen, Scotland has taken over Laidlaw Bus company and is engaged in a massive union busting drive against unionized school bus workers. It is ignoring union contracts and illegally firing drivers and then ignoring arbitration decisions. San Francisco school bus drivers who are members of UTU 1741 marched and protested on December 4, 2008 at the company yard against these illegal tactics. They are calling for support from all First Student Workers and the rest of the labor movement.
http://sfschoolbus.com/
Labor Video Project produces a labor tv show programmed in San Francisco, St. Louis and Philadelphia and produces documentaries on labor and working people in the US and around the world.
Labor Video Project
P.O.Box 720027
San Francisco,CA 94172 Phone (415)282-1908
lvpsf [at] labornet.org www.laborvideo.org

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2U1xZAM7VI&feature=related
RMT Annual General Meeting 2008

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-metrolink12-2008dec12,0,4551895.story
From the Los Angeles Times
Chatsworth crash's roots lie 20 years in Metrolink's past
The commuter line's founders gambled that the line could operate without an automatic braking system, interviews with safety experts and documents show.
By Ted Rohrlich
December 12, 2008
The roots of the worst passenger rail disaster in modern California history go far deeper than whether a Metrolink engineer ran through a red stop light and into the path of a Union Pacific freight train.
Interviews with safety experts and former Metrolink officials and a review of thousands of pages of government documents show that the commuter line's founders made decisions two decades ago that -- knowingly or not -- gambled with passenger safety in the way they agreed to share tracks with two giant freight lines.
Their successors on the governing board extended the gamble, making no move to alter the basic operating arrangement, even as Metrolink became America's deadliest railroad.
The biggest gamble was to operate without a form of automatic braking that federal safety officials first recommended 70 years before Metrolink began. In 1922, the agency in charge of rail safety declared: "Disastrous collisions will continue to occur until automatic train-control devices are installed to protect against human failure."

http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=1056604
Nathan VanderKlippe, Financial Post
Published: Wednesday, December 10, 2008
More On This Story
Pulp backlog clogs B.C. port
St. Lawrence Seaway, union deal averts strike
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Courtesty of PRINCE RUPERT PORT AUTHORITYPort of Prince Rupert Fairview terminal.
The movement of goods through Canada's West Coast ports could slam to a halt in the New Year if a festering labour dispute is not resolved soon.
Workers at British Columbia ports in the Lower Mainland, Vancouver Island and Prince Rupert will be in a position to strike beginning Jan. 2. Port officials say imports and exports of all commodities – save grain, whose shipments are protected by law – will immediately halt if that happens.
"Nothing could move," said one executive close to the talks. "It would affect the entire coast."
Negotiators for the British Columbia Maritime Employers Association and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union have spent the past 60 days working with a pair of conciliators. Those talks were expected to halt Tuesday night, which was set as a pre-established conciliation deadline, but will resume Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. in hopes the two sides can find some resolution.

Vote for Jack Heyman
ILWU Local 10 Caucus Delegate E66
A MILITANT LONGSHORE PROGRAM
Program Of ILWU Local 10 Longshoreman Jack Heyman For Coast Caucus Delegate To Convention
1. Strengthen the Union and the Hiring Hall
As the economic crisis worsens and shipping slows, there will be fewer jobs. It’s looking like the depression in the ‘30’s when a few “star gang” men favored by the employers had steady work and most longshoremen got the crumbs. The Big Strike in ’34 ended favoritism in hiring. Workers took job dispatching out of the maritime bosses’ hands and put it under union control with the hiring hall and union dispatchers elected by the rank and file rotated. Two years and out for dispatchers! All jobs, including supplemental walking boss jobs, should be dispatched out of the hall. Eliminate the steady man system. Share the work by rotation. Enforce the “order of dispatch” on the job. No more doubling and tripling means a stronger union and safer conditions.
2. Oppose Concessionary Contracts – Fight for More Jobs
Local 10 voted 49% against this last 6 year concessionary contract. Yet, for the first time ever the Caucus voted unanimously to recommend ratification of the contract. We should fight PMA for more jobs not each other for fewer jobs. Four shifts of 6 hours each at no loss in pay makes more jobs. The wage gap between skill and hold and dock jobs continues to widen. That weakens our union’s ability to stand united against PMA which now has “expedited” arbitrations. The unfair grievance procedure favors PMA: “Work now, grieve later.” Our strength is in job actions – which PMA cites as “illegal” – to fight for more jobs, safe working conditions and unified coastwide manning.

A DAY OF RALLYING
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2008
4:00 P.M. MEET UP
In front of Governor Patterson’s NYC Offices
633 3rd Avenue at 41st Street
PARTICIPATE IN A SHOW OF SUPPORT
AGAINST
TUITION HIKES
 A 600 annual CNY tuition hike has been proposed. This is a 15%
increase which could go into effect in either Spring of Fall 2009
 CUNY and SUNY’s Board of Trustees seek the power to
deregulate tuition - to make future tuition increases at will and
without the approval of the state legislature.
BUDGET CUTS
 In August, $50.6 million dollars was slashed from CUNY’s annual
budget. Governor Paterson has announced plans to cut an
additional $348 million from CUNY and SUNY budgets.
 In response, Spring ‘09 classes are being cut with deeper cuts
anticipated in the fall. This means larger class sections and a
greater hit to ethnic and gender studies courses, which are pri-
marily taught by adjuncts (see below).
LAYOFFS
 Over half of CUNY’s teaching faculty are adjuncts. Adjunct posi-
tions will be the most severely impacted by the budget cuts and
layoffs are already taking place.
5:00 P.M. MARCH ON
To the MTA Headquarters

Charges Dropped Against Two ILWU Local 10 Members
Dear Sisters and Brothers:
Although there was no quorum at the Local 10 Executive Board, President Melvin Mackay informed us that a settlement has been reached in the Ruffin/Harrison case. The two brothers will not have to plead guilty or no contest and will have no record. In exchange they will do two hours of paperwork. Ultimately the decision was theirs. It took us by surprise as we were organizing for a mass rally December 15th at the Woodland Courthouse. That rally has now been cancelled. We'd like to thank all unions and organizations for participating in our previous rallies. We especially want to thank Bill Camp, Executive Secretary of the Sacramento Central Labor Council, and his Mobilization Coordinator Zak Ford and Karen Bernal for helping to organize community groups in the West Sac area. There's no question that this would have been the largest rally so far. We can consider this a limited victory since the charges against them were dismissed. Racial profiling of African Americans and Mexican Americans has been going on for some time in Yolo County. The way to put a stop to it is organizing the kind of rallies we've been doing for the last year. Thanks again for all your support and please pass the word on to others who would were planning to participate at the rally on Monday.