Joe's Union Review: Open Letter to New Jersey School Bus and Transit Workers at First Student

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Open Letter to New Jersey School Bus and Transit Workers at First Student

Unite as Teamsters with your First Student Coworkers in New Jersey

Dear Fellow First Student Employees:

We are your coworkers at First Student in New Jersey. We are proud to inform you that we recently united at our yards and became Teamster members! We are reaching out to other New Jersey First Student workers to build enough strength to make important changes in our pay, benefits, respect on the job, safety for our kids and more.

You may already know that more than 5,700 private school bus workers nationwide have joined the Teamsters since 2006. But did you know that since this past May, more than 1,100 First Student drivers, monitors, mechanics and other school bus workers have joined the Teamsters—in NEW JERSEY ALONE! This is at First Student yards in Lafayette, Lawnside, Monmouth Junction, Piscataway, Trenton and Willingboro. Currently, workers at other yards are also in the process of forming a union with the Teamsters.

Nationwide, there are more than 15,000 FirstGroup employees who are Teamsters. We are rapidly gaining a strong voice for school bus drivers, monitors and mechanics. We have negotiated labor contracts with First Student that have improved our pay, provided for affordable health care, procedures to fairly settle problems at work, fair route distribution and more.

It’s time for all First Student workers to join the Teamsters and join us in a fight to raise our work standards. It’s time to join us and unite!

Sincerely,
School Bus Workers United – New Jersey

(An organization of school bus drivers, monitors and mechanics working to improve industry standards)

For more information, please Sean O'Neill at 202-437-5228:

Other articles of interest:
Some 240 School Bus Drivers in Lawnside, NJ Join Teamsters

School Bus Drivers In Maine Vote in Teamsters Local 340

School Bus Company Hired Internal Monitor to Watch over Unionization Process ... But Does Not Consult With Organizing Union!

The Teamsters Drive in More School Bus Drivers

Help Spread the Word for School Bus Workers in the US

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0 comments:

I"m As Mad As Hell #1 - "The Part That Big Media Left Out !!!"

10/27/07

Why is it that when someone who becomes a hero, the fact that he is a proud union member is not mentioned in the mainstream media? Could it be that the media on a whole is quite a bit anti-union?

I'm not just talking about the likes of Rupert Murdoch, I am talking about the main 6 companies that own almost everything you see and read, the six that have to bargain directly with unions and would like nothing more than for people to believe that the working mans plight is hopeless and we must bargain from the scraps left for us. And yes my friends, they want total control of the internet . Well I've gone a bit off point, the point is that when Wesley Autrey, a member and shop steward of LIUNA Local 79, became New Yorks subway hero on Jan. 3rd. 2007, by putting his life at risk to save another, there was absolutely no mention that he was a union member in any of the big media outlets. I only came to learn that through my diligence in serching out news on the internet. And that my friends is a total shame .

NYPost "Autrey, 50, a construction worker who achieved nationwide fame for his death-defying rescue of a Boston man who had fallen off the subway platform" NYTimes "Mr. Autrey, a 50-year-old construction worker, said he knew something was different when he showed up for work later on Tuesday. His boss, he said, bought him lunch — a ham-and-cheese hero — and later told him to take yesterday off." USAToday "I just tried to do the right thing," said the 50-year-old Harlem construction worker." NBC "Wesley Autrey, a Navy veteran and construction worker, was standing nearby on the platform with his children when he saw Hollowpeter fall. Autrey jumped down to the track area and lay on top of Hollowpeter as a train passed about "2 inches" from his head."

What comes to mind that is if this was me, the first thing i would say if asked what my job was would be my union . Now this isn't the only instance whereby I have come to this conclusion , when speaking with an official with OPEIU on the crisis in downtown NYC regarding HIP's removing 186 union jobs from downtown , good paying jobs they were obligated to keep there when they used "Empire State Development Corp.'s WTC Job Creation and Retention Program", none of the big papers here in New York would carry the story , the Times (which has this so-called worker friendly stance said it was too small an issue) refused as did all the others , the only paper that would run the story was New York Newsday. I consider it very newsworthy, and refuse to buy any other paper. Not to mention the fact that Newsday is the only paper here in New York which reports on employee misclassification and tax evasion by nonunion contractors .

Media ownership

the tie to net neutrality

"A Federal Communications Commissioner said that the censoring of political speech during a recent Pearl Jam performance illustrates the need for network neutrality." Link

FROM : SaveTheInternet

What is Network Neutrality? Network Neutrality — or "Net Neutrality" for short — is the guiding principle that preserves the free and open Internet. Put simply, Net Neutrality means no discrimination. Net Neutrality prevents Internet providers from speeding up or slowing down Web
content based on its source, ownership or destination.

Ok that means hypothetically, that without "Net Neutrality", if Disney, who is partnered with Verizon , has a "Union" issue and someone posts an article on UnionReview about it, Verizon is within their rights to throttle our sites basic internet bandwidth to the degree that it would be frustrating if not impossible to view it. Think this isn't a possibility, think again .

FROM: SFGate.com

"If you missed the incident, Verizon Wireless initially refused to transmit text messages over its cellular network from Naral Pro-Choice America, a pro-choice group, to its members. Naral uses text-messaging to update its supporters on pro-choice policy and the message would have only gone to people who had signed up to receive them. But several days later, Verizon did an about-face and agreed to send the messages. Nonetheless, according to news reports, Verizon did not retreat from its position that it is entitled to decide what messages to transmit. This is censorship of the first magnitude."

As a matter of fact , those that oppose Net Neutrality have garnered the talents of "spin-doctor' Rick Berman, former lobbyist for big tobacco and current creator of Center For Union Facts, whose main focus is to tarnish unions through truths, half-truths and out right propaganda.

Basically his site Hands Off The Internet is a giant scare tactic to those in the world that believe everything they read. Basically if you read through Berman's web sites you can easily understand this joke.

Q: How can you tell that Rick Berman is lying? A: He opens his mouth FROM : SaveTheInternet

What else are the phone and cable companies not telling the truth about?
AT&T and others have funded a massive misinformation campaign, filled with deceptive advertising and "Astroturf" groups like Hands Off the Internet and NetCompetition.org. Learn how to tell apart the myths from the realities in our report, Network Neutrality: Fact vs. Fiction.

Well this was installment #1 of my "Mad as Hell", stay tuned as I once again someday sift through all the misinformation and spin-doctoring and get another story here.

Heres the 2nd. installment from UnionReview.com: Mad As Hell#2 - Australia dumps corporate government in favor of labor and what's important here