1109 News Listing

The National Union has notified all affected CWA Locals that Verizon intends on laying off Members on Wednesday Nov 18^th.  The Company will do this as part of the recent surplus declaration. Presently the only Members subject to a lay-off are those not protected by the job security letter that have hire dates after Aug 3, 2003.

The Union maintains that a lay-off at this time would be a violation of the collective bargaining agreement and will continue to fight these lay-offs in order to win our Brothers and Sisters jobs back.

In an effort to help our Members and their families while the Union fights this lay-off we are providing the following information.

From unemployment offices to veterans’ services to child care, the Unemployment Lifeline is a one-stop guide that links workers to the resources in their area. You can contact the Unemployment Lifeline by clicking the link below.

unemploymentlifeline.com/

Hundreds face Layoff while thousands of jobs are contracted out.

NYS Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, and other city and state elected officials joined with hundreds of CWA members and leaders on the steps of City Hall November 12^th to call on Verizon to stop the layoffs of hundreds of workers across New York and New Jersey.

The layoff axe has already started to fall at Verizon.  Thirty five Verizon Business technicians were laid off in New York in September, as were 24 Customer Service Reps in New Jersey.  And hundreds of technicians in the New York metro area face layoff in the next days or weeks.

“Every one of these cuts means another middle class New Yorker out of work in the toughest job market in our lifetimes,� said District One Vice President Chris Shelton. “Verizon isn’t hurting. Last year they made more $6.4 billion, but instead of keeping jobs in New York, they’re laying people off and sending jobs out of state and overseas.�

Speaker Silver was joined by Public Advocate-elect Bill de Blasio, NYC Comptroller-elect John Liu, Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, and NYC Central Labor Council President Jack Ahearn, all of whom pledged to use the power of their offices to pressure Verizon to put a stop to layoffs and outsourcing of jobs.  Working Families Party Executive Director Dan Cantor de nounced the greed of Verizon’s executives, who raked in $59 million in compensation in 2008.

Workers facing a layoff—and several already laid off—were also present at the rally. “In this economy, losing my job would be a real hardship, especially with a baby on the way,â€�  said Louis Calemine, an 1106 member from Queens whose job is on the chopping block. “ It’s wrong that a greedy corporation like Verizon is making billions in profits while still laying us off.â€� Marsha Richardson, a laid off Verizon Business worker from Local 1101, she told about life after her layoff in mid-September.

Verizon claims that it must reduce the workforce because of the decline in copper access lines, and to show Wall Street that it is cutting costs.

 But the truth is, these moves clearly violate contractual provisions that prohibit layoffs when our work is being contracted out—and thousands of jobs at the cost of tens of millions of dollars are currently being contracted.  It’s work that our members facing layoff can do, including:

• 787 DSL tech support jobs that have been contracted out to Mexico, India, Canada and the Phillipines.
• Hundreds of jobs on both sides of the river marketing FIOS door to door.
• At least 500 customer service jobs, including staffing Verizon Wireless kiosks in malls and big box stores, taking billing inquiry calls, and staffing marketing events.
• 700 outside plant jobs such as flagging and placing buried cable.

The company admits that in the first half of 2009 alone, it spent nearly $41 million contracting out the work of nearly 1,000 outside plant technicians!  Tens of millions more were spent on other contracting initiatives.

 The first salvo in our campaign against Verizon layoffs came at a rally and picket in Newark on September 30^th against the New Jersey layoffs. Thanks to Senator Ron Rice and Assemblyman Albert Coutinho for showing their support. 

 Starting November 14^th, CWA activists will be leafleting Verizon Wireless stores to let customers know the truth about how Verizon treats its workforce.

This is only the beginning of CWA’s Fight for Good Jobs at Verizon!

Washington, D.C — The Communications Workers of America commends House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the House of Representatives on passage of its health care plan.

“The Affordable Health Care for America Act gets it right. It doesn’t tax middle class and working Americans to pay for health care like some Senate proposals would. It means that families won’t face cuts in benefits and higher costs. It provides the real health care reform that our nation needs,” said CWA President Larry Cohen.

Especially important, the House plan guarantees that employers – with exceptions for small business — pay their fair share by requiring them to provide insurance or pay into a common fund so responsible employers don’t continue to pick up the tab for freeloaders, he added.

“The House reform plan will provide enormous benefits to our nation. Workers won’t fear the loss of health care for themselves and their families if they are laid off or change jobs. Pre-Medicare retirees will be protected against cutbacks in their health care benefits. And the House plan includes effective restraints on escalating health care costs, which has driven up costs for working families and made American businesses less competitive,” Cohen said.

It’s time for the Senate to move forward on real health care reform that will provide working and middle class families the health care we all need. Our nation can’t afford to wait, he said.

CWA has filed a lawsuit charging Verizon Communications with denying workers the rights and protections of the Family and Medical Leave Act. The class action lawsuit covers Verizon workers in Districts 1, 2 and 13.

CWA and individual workers have laid out extensive complaints against Verizon. “Verizon has created a number of arbitrary administrative procedures that it requires workers to follow if they want to be certified for FMLA, but these procedures are not a part of the FMLA law. They shouldn’t be used to deny workers their rightful FMLA benefits, but that’s exactly what Verizon is doing,� said CWA General Counsel Mary O’Melveny.

FMLA provides workers at companies with 50 or more employees with up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave per year for the birth or adoption of a child; care of a spouse, parent or a child under 18 for a serious health condition; care of a child over 18 with mental or physical disabilities, and an employee’s own illness.

Verizon’s policies are a real Catch-22:

• If a worker followed verbal instructions from the company’s absence reporting center, and those instructions were wrong, though the worker didn’t know it, the claim is denied.
• If a worker couldn’t file the full report on time, because her doctor was on vacation or unavailable, the claim is denied. If another physician in the same office completed the report, but didn’t spell out the relationship between the two medical providers, the claim is denied.
• If information was missing from the claim, for example, the doctor’s office didn’t complete an item, the claim is denied.
• If a supervisor makes an error in reporting a workers’ claim, it’s denied.

At Verizon, as far as FMLA is concerned, once a claim is denied twice, a worker loses her FMLA rights.

 CWA reaffirmed the need for U.S. telecom policy to combine the goals of ensuring an open Internet with encouraging investment in a 21st century broadband system, in response to a new initiative announced by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski.CWA supports Genachowski’s proposal to develop rules to protect an open Internet, but also called on the FCC to move forward in setting rules and policies that will encourage investment, ensure reasonable network management, safeguard transparency, promote media diversity and lead to the growth of good jobs in the telecommunications industry.

That’s the only way the United States can regain its standing among industrial nations as a leader in broadband technology, CWA said. 

In the past, the U.S. missed several opportunities to promote the build out of broadband networks. This is more important than ever, if the U.S. is going to encourage investment in next-generation networks and boost our lagging economy. Get more info at www.speedmatters.org.

Currently the U.S. ranks 15th in the world in terms of broadband penetration and 28th in terms of broadband speed. CWA’s Speed Matters campaign will continue to focus public attention on what the U.S. must do to ensure that all Americans have access to the promise of high speed Internet.

CWA’s Executive Board this week outlined a CWA action plan to fight efforts in Congress to tax employer health care plans and to win the real health care reform union members need, including an employer mandate.

Here’s a summary of board action:

Taylor Becomes New D7 VP on Retirement of Louise Caddell
The Board elected Mary Taylor as District 7 Vice President following the September 22 retirement of Louise Caddell. Taylor has a long record of service to CWA in Minnesota, most recently as assistant to Caddell who was elected District 7 vice president in 2008.

Caddell has been an outstanding leader and has spent a lifetime in service to CWA members in two districts and the Communications and Technologies sector, said CWA President Larry Cohen.

Action Plan to Fight Taxation of Health Care and Win Real Reform
The Executive Board adopted a three-part action plan that is critical in the fight to kill the proposed tax on health care. “Taxing health care would be a disaster for CWA members and retirees and we will go all out to make sure that the Senate hears our voice,” Cohen said.

Here’s what we’ll do:

• Directly meet and engage with senators who are the key players in reconciling differences in the various legislative proposals on health care reform. This includes the Senate Finance Committee which is working on a bill with many bad proposals for working families, the Senate HELP Committee (Health, Education, Labor and Pensions) and the leaders of the three House committees and the House leadership on H.R. 3200, which best meets CWA’s priorities for real reform. 
• CWAers must be actively involved in getting our message to members of Congress through meetings, personal letters and other communications. More than 100 CWA activists will be dedicated to coordinating leafleting at worksites, collecting letters for senators and making sure our voice is heard at political meetings.
• CWA employers must join us in the fight to defeat any effort to tax health care plans. “We are asking CWA employers to get by our side in this critical fight,” Cohen said.

Organizing
CWA has one of the union movement’s most exciting and active organizing programs going. Our organizing campaign at Delta Airlines is the largest organizing effort underway in the United States. This drive among 20,000 flight attendants will determine whether 7,000 flight attendants at the former Northwest Airlines will get to keep their 60-year history of bargaining rights or lose them as a result of arbitrary election rules in the airline industry. In another exciting campaign, in Suffolk County, N.Y., CWA organizers are working with more than 8,000 county workers. 

The board also discussed the need to ramp up quickly in training new organizers who will be very busy once the Employee Free Choice Act passes. The board is exploring a Strategic Industries Fund program to help train the organizers CWA will need. “CWA organizers are extremely busy right now and are doing terrific work. We need to increase our numbers in ongoing organizing campaigns and also need to be ready for the boom in organizing that will follow passage of the Employee Free Choice Act,” said Seth Rosen, CWA District 4 vice president and chair of the Organizing Committee.  

The board also reviewed other organizing plans in the airlines, telecom and public sectors.

Employee Free Choice
The board renewed CWA’s commitment to passing the Employee Free Choice Act by November after Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick named Paul Kirk to fill the seat of the late Edward M. Kennedy until a January special election. Efforts to firm up the votes of those senators who haven’t fully committed to the bill are continuing, with the goal of assuring the support of at least 60 senators who will vote for cloture and allow the bill to move to the Senate floor for a final vote.