Business Managers Report
November 20, 2011
Ed Starr, Esq.
Business Manager
The IBEW & CWA bargaining teams from the New York/New England and Mid-Atlantic regions will resume bargaining after the Thanksgiving Holiday weekend. Over the past few weeks, the unions broke into smaller subcommittees with the Verizon bargaining representatives with the hopes of beginning to come up with solutions which could be used as the framework for an agreement. Other than discussions, there has been no movement. We are committed to continue to work the issues and come up with the best deals we can considering that all of Verizon's major concessions are still on the table.
As soon as any information develops, we will pass that information on to the membership.
Just a reminder, we are still awaiting word from Verizon's General Counsel on the fate of the suspended members in our local and throughout the region. There are over 100 cases that the company has investigated on alleged strike misconduct from Massachusetts to Washington, DC. This has been a convoluted process in which local Verizon management has targeted individuals and Verizon Security did an appalling job investigating and embellishing details in the false allegations. We advocated for our members based on the Security report findings and the sham investigation and allegations. Nonetheless, we are waiting for the investigatory process to finish out before we take the next steps legally in defending our members and exonerating these members. Thank you for your overwhelming support for these members and the local union as we have been very busy with negotiations and in adjudicating the rights of our suspended members.