Get a different Union. One that allows your Executive Board to hire a Professional Business Agent. A Business Agent with an education in Labor Law, Labor Relations and Negotiations. You will never be served well by a Union that forces you to elect a bus driver as a Business Agent or Assitant Business Agent. One who seems like a nice guy, or has a cute smile. (MIKEY?) ;) A bus driver is simply not qualified. He is not looking out for your best interests, he is tired of driving a bus, and wants a BIG RAISE! A one week seminar back east will never teach him what he needs to know. And, I am sorry to say, he could possibly look like a real moron in serious negotiations. Especially if he flips the bird to a member of the Transit Agency negotiating team, at the negotiating table.

A professional Business Agent may also have prevented your Union dues from being spent foolishly in an attempt to thwart the majority of the voters in the State of Washington.

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), November 20, 1999

Answers

I feel my union dues are well spent. I am on the chopping block and would be pissed off if the union stood by and watched a 1000 of us loose our jobs. Unions are about workers and keeping them employed. If 695 is found constitutional, so be it, but I would hate to loose my job to something that is never tested.

You all knew it would be tested, why can't you sit back and let it happen, or are you scared that you embraced something unconstitutional?

-- iman (iman@xxx.com), November 20, 1999.

Good luck in your attempt to thwart the majority of the voters in the State of Washington. (why do I suspect this was posted by Mikey?)

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), November 20, 1999.

the voters are not the ones who will debate the constitutionality. Who ever presides over this case could give a rats #$% what the voters say. Remember a when term limits were voted in and the courts said so what.

-- iman (iman@xxx.com), November 20, 1999.

Maybe. But if you guys kiae $2,5 million plus legal fees, every time us guys spend $250,000 for an initiative, I'm personally willing to help subsidize A LOT of initiative

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), November 20, 1999.

You have a personal gripe. Your anger is valid. I have friends and former coworkers being laid off from their Transit jobs. I don't like it. But until unresponsive government gets this tax burden lightened from our backs, we have to deal with it....I am not insensitive to what has been dealt to you. Bus Drivers are some of the hardest working people I have ever met. Anyone think it is easy to drive a 10 hour shift, with no chance for a meal, drink or restroom break? Many Drivers are faced with lousy working conditions. (Transit is exempt from some WA standards of labor, required by law, sad but true) Are these cushy jobs with easy to drive roads and easy to manuever vehicles? What happens when drivers have a minor brush with a sign? You think your Union is responsible for Metro's higher wages? They are not. Metro needs to pay that much to get decent employees, and I belive you deserve every damn penny. You don't need that Union to get what you have. You have been betrayed by your Employer and your Union. You just don't realize it. As I see it, you are of a victim of the tax and spend politicians, who can't prioritize, who spend OUR money, with no regard to the responsibility of their actions. I-695 was voted on by the majority of the citizens, who have felt this growing tax burden too long. It is my assertion that had transit not been affected, most of your coworkers would have supported the iniatitive. You are also a victim of a Union who never thought to challenge some of the spending of MVET funds or other taxes in a transit budget. Your union knows full well, where much of the fat in Transit Budgets lie. They frequently use the information in negotiations with management. I know of no instance, when your Union made it known to voters or even a Transit Board, that they opposed any new spending measure. Perhaps you believe that would be unwise? That it would not further your Unions/your agenda? Then I would simply state the obvious, you are all as much to blame as anyone. And, for the record, anyone who presides over this case may well be subjected to an election. Do you suppose this may have an influence? Maybe, maybe not. In any case. I'm not going anywhere. I will continue to fight for lower taxes, in any way shape or form!

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), November 20, 1999.

I have a hard time feeling sympathy for what should be a private sector job anyway, and a waste of my taxes.....in my opinon.

-- no chance (kingoffools_99@yahoo.com), November 21, 1999.