As a result of the current national emergency, the two Army Reserve railroad battalions are stepping up efforts to recruit experienced railroaders in the areas of train operations, maintenance of way and railway equipment repair. The two units are: 757th Transportation Battalion (Railway) with units located in the Chicago, St Louis, and Milwaukee metro areas, and the 1205th Transportation Railway Operating Battalion with units located in Massachusetts, Connecticut and North Carolina.

There are also options available for those who do not live near these units. The Army Reserve is especially seeking individuals with prior military service but all those with rail experience and a desire to aid their country are encouraged to contact the Reserve.

Anyone who is interested in finding out how they can put their railroad skills to good use serving their nation in this time of need, can contact the Army Reserve in the following ways:

For general information, please contact:

Major Martin Piech, phone toll free 877-519-8533 or E-mail: martin.piech@us.army.mil.

For 757th information, please contact:

Staff Sergeant Steve Willis, phone toll free 877-399-6595; Website: http://www.usarc.army.mil/88thrsc/units/online/336_tc/757_tc/

For 1205th information, please contact:

Phone toll free 877-519-8533 or E-mail: martin.piech@us.army.mil; Website: www.1205thtrob.com

BLE Members Reject Merger With UTU

On Dec. 12, 2001 the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers reported that on the question of merging their ranks with those of the United Transportation Union, the membership voted "NO" by a vote of 17,251 to 7,425. The UTU vote was previously certified by the American Arbitration Association on Oct. 29 — 23,368 in favor and 4,146 opposed.

Although the final date for receipt of both unions’ ballots was Sept. 17, the final count of UTU ballots was delayed by a court action brought by three BLE officers, challenging the process by which the BLE polled its own members. The lawsuit was subsequently withdrawn and the BLE sent new ballots to its members, which were counted by the AAA on Dec. 10.

For more details about the four-year "on-again, off-again merger talks" between the BLE and UTU, see the September-October issue of the BMWE JOURNAL.

Congress Fails to Help Laid-Off Workers

President Bush’s and congressional Republicans’ insistence on massive corporate tax breaks and their refusal to include needed health care assistance and adequate income help for working families scuttled any chance for an economic stimulus bill before Congress left for the holidays.

On Dec. 20 the House narrowly passed a Republican stimulus bill that would provide big corporate tax breaks but extend unemployment benefits for just some workers and give some laid-off workers a small tax credit to buy private health insurance but no immediate help to pay premiums for their families.

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) called the House bill "wrong on all counts" and asked the Senate for unanimous consent to extend unemployment benefits for laid-off workers, but the move was blocked by Republican leader Trent Lott. Many laid-off workers face the imminent end to their unemployment benefits in the coming weeks and months.

"The reality that the Republican leadership in the House, Senate and White House would allow an economic stimulus bill to fail because of a family-friendly provision on health care for unemployed workers signals a disturbing oblivion about life for working people during a recession," said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney.

President’s Panel Calls for Social Security Benefit Cuts

On Dec. 11 President Bush’s Commission to privatize Social Security officially endorsed a radical plan to dismantle Social Security. The drastic recommendations adopted by the 16-member Commission "will bankrupt our nation’s most effective family income protection program and jeopardize the future of the federal budget," said AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney.

The Commission’s final report "is rich with irony," Sweeney said. "President Bush’s Privatization Commission recommends that Congress cover the high price of private accounts with trillions of dollars from general government revenue — on a ‘temporary’ basis that literally would last decades. At the same time, Republicans in the House and Senate refuse to spend the modest amounts of money needed to improve conditions for unemployed workers at the front line of our recession, or to use general revenue to strengthen Social Security without radically restructuring."

"The President and this Commission worked hard in the spring to convince working Americans that Social Security was in such bad financial shape that it had to be dismantled. During those same spring months, President Bush and Congress had a real opportunity to do the right thing by using part of the federal budget surpluses to strengthen Social Security. The President and Congress squandered that opportunity by using the entire projected surplus for his $1.6 trillion millionaire tax cut. The non-partisan Center for Budget and Policy Priorities found that if only half of the money spent on the President’s $1.6 trillion tax cut was dedicated to Social Security, the program would be financially solvent for the next 75 years."

Election Reform

On election day, November 2000, countless citizens in Florida and throughout the country were denied their Constitutional right to vote by flawed voting equipment, erroneous voter registration records and confusing ballots. While many lawfully registered voters were disenfranchised outright, others cast votes that ultimately were not counted.

In order to help correct these problems, Senator Christopher Dodd (D-CT) and Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) introduced the Equal Protection of Voting Rights Act (S 565 / HR 1170), legislation that would require all states and localities to meet three new minimum standards. These important standards would ensure that: 1) voting systems are accessible to individuals with disabilities and language minorities and notify all voters whether they have voted for too many or too few candidates; 2) registered voters whose names do not appear on voter registration rolls can cast provisional ballots; and 3) registered voters receive sample ballots and voting instructions before election day. This election reform bill had the support of 51 senators and 166 representatives in early December.

The House Administration Committee, however, reported out an election reform bill in November (HR 3295) introduced by Reps. Robert Ney (R-OH) and Steny Hoyer (D-MD) that does not include the minimum standards necessary to protect the right to vote of every individual in every state. In particular, this legislation would fail to ensure that states and localities use voting machines that are accessible to individuals with disabilities and language minorities and inform voters whether they have voted for too many or too few candidates. It would also fail to ensure that all registered voters can cast provisional ballots and receive sample ballots, voting instructions and a summary of their voting rights.

Court Rules Bush Wrong on PLAs

A federal judge overturned one of President Bush’s first anti-union executive orders — a ban on project labor agreements on federally funded construction projects. In a Nov. 6 ruling, the judge said Bush "lacked the requisite authority" to issue the order and the order "in its entirety is pre-empted by the National Labor Relations Act." Project labor agreements generally set wages and establish work rules and methods of settling grievances on large construction projects. For more than 70 years, project labor agreements have benefited communities, employers and workers by ensuring fair wages and benefits and on-time completion of projects. When Bush issued the order in February 2001, the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department filed suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. "We are pleased that the court ruled in favor of working families," said BCTD President Edward C. Sullivan.

Workers’ Rights Denied by Senate

Senate Republicans denied the nation’s emergency service workers collective bargaining rights Nov. 6, 2001. With 60 votes needed for passage, Republican leaders blocked a motion — on a 56-44 vote — to add an amendment to the Labor, Health and Human Services appropriations bill that would have guaranteed collective bargaining rights to all the nation’s emergency service professionals. Currently, 18 states do not allow public safety workers to organize and others limit their bargaining authority. The action came a little less than two months after the tragic deaths of hundreds of firefighters, emergency medical technicians and police officers in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, followed by their counterparts’ heroic rescue and recovery efforts. "Firefighters have been denied justice," said Fire Fighters President Harold A. Schaitberger. "But we will be back — with a vengeance."

Victory for Highway Safety

Teamsters President James P. Hoffa said a Nov. 28, 2001 agreement to hold Mexican trucks to the same stringent safety standards as U.S. rigs is a "victory for the American traveling public." The deal was a compromise between the White House, which had called for unfettered access to U.S. highways for Mexican trucks as part of NAFTA; the House of Representatives, which passed legislation restricting the trucks to the current area of operations in a narrow strip of the U.S. Mexican border; and the Senate, which approved a bill setting out stringent safety requirements for Mexican trucks before allowing them on U.S. highways. Along with holding the Mexican trucks to the standards, the agreement calls for building new border inspection stations, training U.S. Department of Transportation inspectors and creating a data system to determine whether Mexican trucks and drivers meet U.S. standards.

In July the House passed an amendment to the Transportation Appropriations bill to stop the U.S. Department of Transportation from moving forward with the Bush administration’s announced plans to open the border to Mexican trucks and buses on January 1, 2002. The amendment offered by Rep. Martin Sabo (D-MN) was enacted by a 285 to 143 vote. It was a bipartisan victory, with 201 Democrats, 82 Republicans and two independents voting to put safety ahead of corporate profits.

The Senate also approved a transportation spending bill containing tough measures to ensure safe transportation at the U.S. - Mexico border. Senators Patty Murry (D-WA) and Richard Shelby (R-AL) successfully wrote into the bill tough requirements that Mexican motor carriers meet strict safety standards before being allowed access to American highways.

WTO Talks " Extremely Disappointing"

Although the World Trade Organization made important progress on access to life-saving medicines for developing countries, its decision in November 2001 to launch a new round of global trade negotiations that ignore workers’ rights "is extremely disappointing ... and falls far short in areas of key concern to America’s working families," AFL-CIO President Sweeney said. He blasted the Bush administration for allowing the new round of talks to include discussions on U.S. anti-dumping trade laws. Such a move makes it even more clear that the administration should not be granted Fast Track trade authority, he said.

Clearly shaken by the massive mobilization of union, environmental and human rights activists during world trade meetings in Seattle, Washington, DC and Prague, the WTO leaders scheduled their November meeting in the tiny, Middle Eastern country of Qatar. One possible reason: the Gulf kingdom prohibits all political protests. "Arbitrary detention in security cases and restrictions on the freedoms of speech, press, assembly, association, religion and on workers’ rights continue to be problems," says a recent U.S. State Department report on human rights in Qatar.

"It’s fitting that a group that negotiates behind closed doors should meet in a place where protest is forbidden," says Jeff Crosby, president of the North Shore (Mass.) Labor Council. He notes the WTO sets trade rules that often encourage nations to ignore workers’ rights and environmental standards. "This move makes it clear that our job is to bring these negotiations to light," adds Crosby, who is helping mobilize unionists to go to Quebec in April, when leaders of Western Hemisphere nations will meet to discuss expanding the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas.

Union-Industries Show Salutes America’s Heroes

The theme of the 2002 AFL-CIO Union-Industries Show being held in Minneapolis, Minnesota from April 5 to 8 will be A Salute to America’s Heroes: The Working Families of the AFL-CIO. "We feel this theme will recognize those American heroes who have made the ultimate sacrifice without overlooking those who have made, and will continue to make, America the greatest country on earth: the workers who produce the best products and services on earth — the working families of the AFL-CIO," said Union Label & Service Trades President Charles E. Mercer.