Another Union Finds Itself Representing Replacement Workers

Over at LaborUnionReport.com is the strange and pathetic phenomenon of unions going out on strike, then ending up representing replacement workers:

On Thursday, theInternational Association of Machinists ended a seven-month strike against a Wisconsin employer, apparently opting to represent the replacement workers than to remain on strike.

A seven-and-a-half month strike has ended at a factory in Merrill. But according to the union president, the strikers won’t go back to work right away.

Norma Schroeder says the Merrill Manufacturing Corporation will keep the replacement maintenance workers it hired. And the union members who walked out in late March will be put on a recall list as the replacements leave.

Thirty-two of the 58 local members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers initiated the strike, saying they wanted fair wages. The company said it suffered significant losses, and it needed to cut employee wages-and-benefits to survive. In July, the union sought federal mediation. It was provided, and it helped reach a settlement.

If ever there were such a thing as malpractice for union bosses, America’s union members should have ample grounds for a class action.

Read more here. 

IBEW Encouraging Union Salts

Some info on the IBEW encouraging union salting over at LaborUnionReport.com's blog:

As the hallucinogenically-named Employee Free Choice Act has befallen hard times, President Obama's unilateral recess appointment of union radical Craig Becker (aka "the human card-check") to the National Labor Relations Board makes this post by IBEW, Local 363 particularly relevant:

[Posted in its entirety, should the delete button accidentally be hit over at the IBEW hall.] 

MONDAY, APRIL 5, 2010

Update On West Point Salting Possibilities

Thank you to all of our members who contacted Tradesource in response to our posting about them hiring for West Point. Please keep yourself current with them for any other upcoming work in our area. However, we have information that says they will NOT be hiring for West Point.

Professional Electric - the Norwood, Massachusetts contractor that has the West Point Prep School and the West Point Motor Pool Facility seems to be now hiring DIRECT.

We are asking our members to apply directly to Professional Electric. The following is their contact information:

Professional Electric
100 Access Road
Norwood, Massachusetts 02062
Tel: (888)732-3532 or (781)769-7767

Website: www.pecofct.com We have found that this site is currently temporarily out of service but you can check back on it periodically to see if you can apply online

For now -apply via telephone call - Ask if you can email or fax your resume or information, Ask if they have an application that they can provide to you by email or regular mail.

As always, please keep the union hall updated on your efforts to be hired with this company. If you feel that you have a chance to get hired or move further into the hiring process after you have called - please call Organizer John Sager at (845) 216-7021.

More here.

You can also learn about union moles here.

Unions & the Mob...

Labor Racketeering defined: the infiltration, domination, and/or use of a union or employee benefit plan for personal benefit by illegal, violent, or fraudulent means. [Source: US Dept. of Labor]

All-too-often, the question is asked: Aren't unions controlled by the mob?

The answer is 'No. Not usually.'

But then a headline like this comes along from the U.S. Justice Department:

Indictment Unsealed Charging Colombo Family Administration Member Theodore Persico and Seven Other Defendants

Along with details [with emphasis throughout] like this:

An eight-count indictment was unsealed this morning in Brooklyn federal court charging eight defendants – Theodore Persico, Jr., Michael Persico, Thomas Petrizzo, Edward Garofalo, Jr.,James Bombino, Louis Romeo, Alicia Dimichelle, and Mike LNU variously with racketeering conspiracy, wire fraud conspiracy, extortion, and embezzlement of union benefit funds. The defendants, who were arrested earlier today, are scheduled to be arraigned this afternoon before U.S. Magistrate Judge James M. Orenstein, at the U.S. Courthouse, 225 Cadman Plaza East, Brooklyn, N.Y. The case has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Sandra L. Townes.

[snip]

The indictment also charges Colombo associate Garofalo and his wife, Alicia Dimichelle, with embezzlement from the welfare benefit plan and pension benefit plan funds operated on behalf of union laborers of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 282. As described in the detention memorandum, Garofalo and Dimichelle engaged in a double-breasting scheme in which they used Colombo-controlled non-union shell companies, including DM Equipment, Big R Trucking, T&E Leasing, and Roman Sand and Stone, to circumvent Local 282 collective bargaining agreement union benefit contribution requirements.

The indictment is the latest in the U.S. Attorney Office's on-going efforts to dismantle the Colombo family. Those efforts have led in recent years to indictments and convictions of numerous members of the highest echelons of the crime family, including the 2007 conviction of former Colombo acting boss Alphonse Persico, Jr. and former Colombo administration member John DeRoss on murder in-aid-of racketeering and witness tampering charges, the 2008 conviction of Colombo captain Joseph Baudanza and others on stock fraud charges, and the 2009 indictment of former Colombo street boss Thomas Gioeli and other Colombo captains, soldiers, and associates on numerous racketeering-related murder charges and other crimes of violence.

"La Cosa Nostra continues to profit illegally in numerous sectors of our economy, allegedly including the World Trade Center construction site," stated U.S. Attorney Campbell. "Our Office is dedicated to eliminating these crime families, which take a significant economic toll." U.S. Attorney Campbell praised the outstanding investigative efforts by Special Agents of the FBI and DOL/OIG.

FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Demarest stated, "This case illustrates yet again that the mob's aim is to make money, and the means is almost always violence or the threat of violence. Historically, the FBI referred to the economic impact of mob schemes as 'the mob tax.' Our goal continues to be elimination of the mob tax." 

DOL/OIG Special Agent-in-Charge Franzman stated, "Today's RICO indictment represents a significant milestone in our efforts to eliminate the far reaching extortionate control of demolition trucking companies in New York City by the Colomboorganized crime family. Through their actions, two of the defendants allegedly caused the theft of International Brotherhood of Teamsters LU 282 employee benefit plan assets, directly impacting the welfare and retirement benefits of many union members. We are committed to working with our law enforcement partners to combat this type of labor racketeering."

Aren't unions controlled by the mob?  Well, sometimes...maybe.

SEIU Sends Investigators to another SoCal local

The Purple People Eating union, otherwise known as the Service Employee International Union, after suffering a crushing defeat last week at the hands of the NUHW (a new union formed by disgruntled SEIU activists), has sent investigators to investigate one of its locals in San Diego.

From the San Diego Union-Tribune:

International leaders of the union representing thousands of county government workers have arrived in San Diego to help sort out a dispute over management of the local group.


Andrew Stern, the international president of Service Employees International Union, appointed two personal representatives to investigate whether the local chapter wrongly paid former president Sharon-Frances Moore a six-figure severance and hired her as a consultant.


Local union officials said they welcome the investigation and help finding a new president. Moore cited personal reasons in resigning this month as president of SEIU Local 221.


Last week, the local’s executive board named three members to manage the union on a day-to-day basis until a successor can be named, but some union members complained that the action violated the organization’s rules.


In a Jan. 22 letter to local union officials from his Washington, D.C., headquarters, Stern said he was looking into the complaints and advised them to withhold any payments to Moore.


“I have directed my representatives to report to me within 30 days on the situation in Local 221,” he wrote. “In the meantime, I counsel the Local 221 officers and executive board not to execute or implement the challenged payments or contract at this time.”


Local 221 spokeswoman Melinda Battenberg said decisions regarding the severance and consulting agreement are internal union business that she cannot discuss publicly.


Specifically, rank-and-file members complained about a $107,000 severance package awarded to Moore and objected that she will keep working for the union as a consultant. Several people wrote to Stern to demand an investigation.

Read the rest here:

For more on the SEIU, go here, here, here and here.

We're pre-emptively tagging this for the Union Corruption Corner (just in case).

Another Union Boss Charged With Having Sticky Fingers

Sid Mannetti, former president of AFGE Local 1170 stole about $50,000, according to the Feds.

Federal prosecutors have charged a former Seattle union official with one count of embezzlement.

They say Sid Mannetti took more than $50,000 while he was president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 1170 from 2006 to 2008. The union represents about 140 workers at Pacific Medical Centers in the Seattle area.

Charging papers filed in U.S. District Court on Monday say he used the union's credit card and bank account to pay for personal expenses.

Neither the local nor Mannetti's attorney, Dennis Carroll, immediately returned calls seeking comment.

For more on union indictments go here.

The Largest Union Theft in History

In yet another story for the Union Corruption Corner, the NYC Sandhogs, members of the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA) are missing $42 million from their union pensions.  Yet, the mainstream media (MSM) has barely covered this story and its side story of how vulnerable union pensions are to corruption.

As reported on David Horowtiz's NewsReal:

While the mainstream media swarmed all over Bernie Madoff, AIG and corporate billionaires, the gentlemen of the press, who are so proud of fighting for the Little Guy, were mostly out to an expense-account lunch when Melissa King allegedly made off with $42 million rightfully belonging to members of the Laborers International Union of North American (LIUNA).

In what is being called the largest union embezzlement in American history, the LIUNA Local 147 (New York) office administration was apparently unsatisfied with her meager $500,000 a year paycheck.

While the claim of queen-sized Ms. King's alleged theft of $42 million is debatable (how much did mob bosses get in "loans" from union bosses?), we'll go with it.

Rated 'M' (for Mature Audiences Only): The Teamsters, a Tart & a Pocketful of Meth...

This sordid story is rated 'M' (for mature audiences only):

A longtime Teamsters union member who drives a vehicle on the "Lost" television production here pleaded guilty last week to a felony drug possession offense as well as to a misdemeanor charge of soliciting sex from an undercover police officer.

Unfortunately, it only gets better from there...

Reynold Kamekona, 53, was arrested the evening of Oct. 21 on Kukui Street after he offered to pay the female officer $50 for oral sex, according to police reports. A plastic bag of crystal methamphetamine was found in his pocket.


He pleaded guilty to third-degree possession of a dangerous drug and the soliciting charge before Circuit Judge Richard Pollack, who set sentencing for March 17.

Two hours after Kamekona entered his plea, Teamsters film and television driver Philip Asiata, who has worked for the "Lost" series part time, appeared before Circuit Judge Dexter Del Rosario to answer drug charges pending against him.

Asiata, who has a criminal record of more than 125 arrests and 52 convictions, pleaded not guilty.

What a racket...

Teamsters drivers hired for film, television and commercial productions are well-paid, earning as much as $3,000 a week. They are hired based on an internal union seniority grouping system that gives producers little say in employment matters.Men with felony records have been working as movie and television drivers in Hawai'i since the 1960s, when the Teamsters "production unit" was first formed by labor patriarch Arthur Rutledge.

Rutledge defended the employment of felons in the unit, saying he was helping the men rehabilitate themselves.

In the Asiata case, Circuit Judge Dexter Del Rosario found Asiata mentally incompetent for trial and sent him to Hawai'i State Hospital for treatment and evaluation.

An expert who examined Asiata, Dr. Martin Blinder, said in a report to Pollack that Asiata is unfit for trial due to "polysubstance abuse" and an organic brain injury suffered in 1995.

Blinder said Asiata told him that "before the accident, I was a heroin addict and used crack, but I don't do drugs any more. I'm a Teamster."

No, you really just can't make this stuff up.

Several men identified by law enforcement here as organized-crime figures have worked as drivers for film productions in the past, most notably confessed professional hit man Ronald K. Ching, who was a driver on the "Magnum P.I." television series while simultaneously feeding a $1,000-a-day heroin habit, according to court records.

Read the rest here.

SEIU's 2009 Bloopers

LaborUnionReport has posted a compilation of SEIU bloopers from 2009, originally posted in two-parts by Stern Burger with Fries (a blog written by former SEIU members).

It's well worth the read, especially if you're familiar with the SEIU's Civil War with its own members.

Read the compiled list of SEIU Top 10 Bloopers here.

Union Boss Steals Money, Wins Lottery...Then Goes to Jail

A union boss steals money from his union, wins the lottery, then goes to jail...

A federal judge in Cedar Rapids has handed down a 21-month prison sentence to a man who embezzled more than $52,000 from a labor union and later won $30,000 in the Iowa State Lottery.

In passing sentence Friday U.S. District Court Chief Judge Linda Reade also ordered 40-year-old Thomas Jon Witham of Mason City to reimburse the union.

Witham pleaded guilty in September to one count of embezzlement from a labor union.

Prosecutors say the embezzlement occurred between 2002 and 2008, and noted that Witham did not attempt to repay any of the money even after he won the lottery.

Tough luck, Tom, you've made it to the Union Corruption Corner

Another Union Boss Busted for Embezzlement

According to the Associated Press, another union boss has been busted for embezzling from his union.

The former head of a union representing mailroom employees of New York-based newspapers has been charged with embezzling more than $200,000.

Wayne Mitchell was expected to surrender Friday to federal authorities in Manhattan.

Court papers accused Mitchell of embezzling the money from the Communication Workers of America Union, otherwise known as New York Mailers Union No. 6, from 2004 to 2008. The union represents mailroom employees of The New York Times, the New York Post and the Daily News, among others.

The New York Post adds:

In the complaint against Mitchell, authorities said the union boss admitted to Department of Labor investigators that he received $250,000 in unauthorized payroll checks between Oct. 1, 2004, and May 30, 2008, and that he "embezzled additional union monies by falsely claiming personal expenses as union-related bills."

Another case for the Union Corruption Corner.

UNION CORRUPTION CORNER

The following is from the blog at LaborUnionReport:

Union Corruption Corner:

• Sticky-Fingered Steelworker gets one year for swiping $48k.
• Where'd the Money Go? AFSCME Local 1324 is searching for $13k of its members' money…Apparently it just walked away.
• $13K Will Get You Six Months…If you happen to be former CWA
  President Belinda Woods.
• Machinists' Money Pit? And 27 months in federal prison was the sentence for former pension manager Harvey Keil for stealing $341,000.
• How Do You Plead? Apparently former SEIU boss Alejandro Stephens is set to plead guilty on two counts of mail fraud and one count of filing a false tax return.
• Just the usual: Union fraud in Detroit (even Kwame is involved)

For more, go here.

NJ Union Boss Gets Sentenced for Stealing $2 Million...

Union boss Carmelo Sito seems to have done okay for himself. In fact, according to press accounts, Mr. Sito helped himself to about $2 million to help pay for a boat, a house in Mountainside, NJ and a condo on the posh resort island of Martha's Vinyard.

The problem is, it wasn't his money--it was money that was belonged to the members of the Hudson County District Council of Laborers consists of Locals 21, 31, 202 and 325 of the Laborers International Union of North America.

According to NJ.com:

Carmelo J. Sita, 66, spent 22 years as executive manager of benefit funds for the Hudson County District Council of Laborers. He pleaded guilty in 2004, saying he took the money from funds belonging to union members.

“I do believe that Mr. Sita, for whatever reason, thought the union was his own little bank,” U.S. District Judge Dennis M. Cavanaugh said.

Sita, who was arrested in 2001, took the money between 1995 and 1999.

For stealing about $500,000 a year for four years, Mr. Sita was sentenced to one year, nine months.

BECK: OBAMA, SEIU & ACORN "GLOVE IN HAND"

An interesting exchange between Fox's Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck on the SEIU in the White House, ACORN, and the press.

DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP: DEMOCRAT DODGES OBAMA QUESTION

Democrat Creigh Deeds avoids aligning himself with President Obama...

OH! LOOK WHO JUST BECAME HEAD OF THE AFL-CIO

A brilliant piece put together by the Workforce Fairness Institute, especially as new AFL-CIO boss Richard Trumka pled the Fifth Amendment before Congress a decade ago.

EATING THEIR OWN: Union elections are not pretty...

An election for the leadership of Teamsters Local 237 is getting ugly, according to the New York Daily News.

On one side of the ring is incumbant Greg Floyd and, on the other side, challenger Eunice Rodriguez, a member of the group Members for Change.

Of course, whenever there is a battle over power and control, things can get a bit testy, as seems to be the case here.

[Jakwan] Rivers, a former union business agent, said Floyd and the current union leaders "don't have the best interests of members at heart."

He pointed to Teresa Roberts, a 43-year-old Housing Authority worker who was assaulted on the job.

He said the union has failed to take her problem seriously.

Workers who have tried to campaign on behalf of Members for Change said they have been harassed by Floyd loyalists, and they described some thuggish behavior.

Randy Thorne, a 48-year-old Housing Authority worker, said he was trying to hand out campaign information to workers at the Seth Low Houses on July 29 when he had a confrontation with Local 237 Business Agent Curtis Scott.

"He was distributing Greg Floyd information and I started handing out my information," said Thorne.

"He started snatching my paperwork, ripping it up and cursing. He called me stupid," Thorne added.

Union bosses degrading and fighting members who are trying to change their union? Wow! Now that's a new one....NOT!

TEAMSTERS BOSSES TAKE OVER CHICAGO LOCAL

The Chicago Sun Times is reporting Teamsters El Jefe, Jimmy Hoffa has put Chicago Teamsters Local 726 into trusteeship--which means kicking the elected leaders out while the big boss' appointees move in.

According to the charges, Local 726 leaders are charged with:

• Taking $125,000 out of local pension funds and moving it into local union coffers without pension fund approval or any documentation noting interest rates and repayment terms.
• Breach of fiduciary duties by the three union leaders who also serve as pension fund trustees. They are accused of skipping at least 12 months of mandatory payments to the pension fund and failing to maintain pension fund records.
• Told by an accountant that it was a no-no to transfer money from the pension
  fund to the local, the officers took steps to pay the money back. When Local 726 could not cover the payment, the three officers allegedly made $112,000 in personal loans to the local, a violation of the Teamsters constitution.
• Misled the international union on at least two occasions about financial iabilities and steps being taken to improve those conditions.
• Waiving one year’s worth of membership dues for 27 different members without approval.
  

Hmmm. Teamster leaders? Corruption? It seems these two have danced this playlist before.

Coincidentally, it would appear that this is the same Teamsters local that rejected Chicago Mayor Daley's cost cutting measures, which resulted in layoffs that which was posted on 1-888-NO-UNION.COM's blog (here).

We wonder: Were the union's actions based purely on corruption? Or, were there some old-fashioned, Chicago-style politics at play as well?

TRUCK RAMS TEAMSTERS HALL LOOKING FOR CASH BUT THE MONEY WAS GONE!

According to the Grand Forks Herald, a red stolen pick up truck smashed into a Teamsters hall looking for loot. Unfortunately, according to Teamsters boss Dean Cypher, the cash registers had been emptied earlier.

Teamsters President Dean Cypher said whoever did it was looking for money, but didn't get any. He said cash registers inside the building were smashed, but they had been empty.

Cypher said the red pickup was sticking out of the building when he got there after being called by police.

He said, "all the registers are toast, but we do have the guy on video," because security video got a shot of the suspect.

Ok. Here's the question: Why would a union hall have cash registers?...Except, perhaps, to make change for workers when they go to the union hall to pay their union dues.

Since the union caught the perpetrator of this almost-heist on tape, perhaps we'll learn more soon. Afterall, as the saying goes: It takes a thief to catch an almost thief.

And You Paid Dues for THAT?!? Teamsters & AFSCME Cost 431 Members Their Jobs

When it comes to causing people to lose jobs, there's no singular, man-made force that does it better than today's unions.

Yesterday, Chicago's Mayor Rchard Daley laid off 431 union workers who, were it not for their unions, could have kept their jobs.

"At the close of business today, the city will be forced, under labor agreements and labor law, to take the unfortunate step of laying off 431 employees represented by these two unions," Daley said.

While 41 of the city's 43 unions agreed to reducing their work year a total of 24 days over the next two years, the Teamsters and AFSCME refused the furloughs.

Loss of the 24 days, according to WBBM Radio is a "tough pill to swallow."

But many workers say they see it as the lesser of two evils, and they wish their union would just go along with the mayor's plan to save their jobs. [Emphasis added.]

Of the 431 workers that will be laid off, 141 workers of the 2,000 Teamsters will be laid off and 290 layoffs will come from the 4,500 workers that make up the AFSCME union.

Wow!

These two unions could have saved 431 jobs. Instead, they cost the city workers their jobs.

With union representation like that, why have a union?

Card Check Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them

From the Truth About EFCA blog:

OK, that title was borrowed from the book by now-Senator Al Franken. But it’s a good title to kick off what is a sadly continuing discussion on just how far proponents of card check (in the form of the Employee Free Choice Act) will push the bounds of honesty. So far, it appears they will seek or surpass those bounds with vigor.

The latest salvo comes from the Service Employees International Union, which is demanding Nebraska television stations stop airing an anti-EFCA group’s educational advertisement. The union’s lawyers say claims that EFCA will effectively end secret ballots — which it effectively does — are ” demonstrably false.”

Hmm. That’s pretty strong language. That would require, we imagine, a pretty strong factual case and, most likely, a finding by a court. Funny thing, then, is that history shows us courts have specifically found these claims are not false.

So SEIU’s claims of “demonstrably false” claims are themselves "demonstrably false.”

Then there’s the AFL-CIO’s Stuart Acuff going on television and misleading viewers when he said EFCA’s effective destruction of the secret ballot is untrue and that “The Wall Street Journal has said that that is a lie.” Again, “demonstrably false” as the SEIU, which had again stretched the truth. In fact, the newspaper took the rather extraordinary step of writing another editorial just to correct the union and those following its misrepresentations:

These guys must really be desperate. As we’ve written many times, “card check” effectively ends secret-ballot elections because it would allow labor organizers to automatically organize a work site if more than 50% of workers sign an authorization card. Thus our words: “dead letter.”

Obviously, EFCA is crucial to a handful of top union officials, who see billions of dollars in potential revenue by denying employees a private ballot to vote on whether they want to join a union. But we’d think they’d be a little more careful when throwing around loaded terms — because like a grenade with the pin pulled, the explosion can hurt the one throwing the bomb.
We’d be happier if everyone stuck to the truth. Of course, that’s an advantage for opponents of EFCA since the truth about EFCA is pretty powerful.