November 22, 2009
What's Inside:
School bus drivers in St. Joseph will decide today whether to unionize their work force.
Union representatives have recently began courting local drivers from First Student bus company. They say negotiating for a contract can bring better pay and working conditions, several drivers said Thursday after returning from their afternoon routes.
“We’re worth more than what we’re getting,” said Cheryl Richardson, a St. Joseph school bus driver for nearly 11 years.
The union, Teamsters Local 838, was handing out literature and asking drivers for support outside First Student’s headquarters on St. Joseph Avenue. Union members declined to speak with the News-Press.
Teamsters Local 838 was recently involved in contract negotiations with First Student on behalf of school bus drivers in Olathe, Kan.
Driver Ron Fleming, 41, was unsure how he’d vote today despite coming from a union family and previously being in a trucking union. “It’s just something I’m going to sit down and pray about (tonight).” He said he’d like to see better organized bus routes.
Jackie Suesens, a monitor who supervises schoolchildren on the bus, said she’s been satisfied with First Student’s management and pay.
She said unionization discussions began last year, shortly after First Student acquired Laidlaw Transit. Last June, First Student told the News-Press it employs 80 to 85 bus drivers in St. Joseph.
Stephen Robbs, 53, disembarked from his massive diesel machine with a shirt and pin advocating for unionization. He said a union could negotiate for newer buses with air conditioning and wages that will lower high driver turnover.
“There’s not talk about a strike, just negotiation,” Mr. Robbs said. “I know if the bus drivers are happy, that’s going to transfer over to the students.”
Ahmad Safi can be reached at ahmadsafi@npgco.com.
This story has 14 comments. Click here to join in on the discussion.
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we saw the infinite wisdom of union leadership last winter when silgan-stone went on strike, and those people lost their jobs. the unions have no power any more, they are really a step backwards, and cause more trouble for their members than it is worth. i was union for 5 years, and all they did for me was cost me wages every week, with no real representation when we needed it, and no real bargining power. first student employees would be wise to vote against it. one last thing, if the employees do decide to take a unionization offer seriously, get what they are offering in writting. don't take their word, it won't stand in court.
Dear God, what are these people thinking? Does no one learn from the mistakes of other company's employee's (most recently Smurfit-Stone)? What possible benefit could there be for union representation? Better working conditions?? Really? Will the union get them a cushion for their seat?
The unions have been (and still are) killing this town. Please use your heads, with unemployment nearing 10%, is demanding more money the most prudent negotiating tactic?
Many people need jobs, and they'll happily take yours...
RJW,
You are right unions have been killing this town for years and now look where it is at.Also how much do you think this has to do with new business coming to this town I bet a bunch.So we continue not to attract new business and have no goodpaying jobs with benefits.I like your comment about the cushioned seat.
This is all we need a union school bus drivers and then when they are not happy and want to strike our children do not get to school.
The hypocrisy.
Everyone wants to play the crying game for firefighters, but are the people that bus your CHILDREN to school any less important?
You people need to get your heads out of your @sses.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If you unions demanding money for one group is suitable then it must be for another group.
That being said any idiot trying to strong arm their employer for more money right now is an idiot and should be relieved of duty.
Businesses are closing left and right, people can't make house payments, car payments or their financed living room outfit payments and they think someone else is to blame for their money situation. Appalling. To most of these people a $300 transmission repair would become a life emergency and I'm supposed to feel bad or be on their side asking for more money? Absurd.
Stop buying a soda every day, stop buying cigarettes, eating out, drive a beater that you paid cash for until you can save up enough to buy a better beater, rinse and repeat until you're in control of your life.
The best decision you can make in life is to accept that you're in control of it and if you make it good for you, then it's you who'll be rewarded. But somehow if you don't make it in life it's supposed to be someone else's fault? Ridiculous.
You people would make me laugh if the condition wasn't so sickening and apparently contagious.
It can be argued that this crap started with social security. Let the people invest their own money how they see fit and take from them the notion that, "the government is looking out for me."
Give a man a fish and feed him for a day, teach him to fish and feed him for life.
"I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer." -- Ben Franklin, 1766
it would be nice if this article had mentioned the starting salary.
JAFO,
Do you really think that the union put Smurfit-Stone under?
The company had 3.5 billion of debt with 22,000 employees accross North America and Asia. Were all 22,000 on strike at the same time? Blame the union if it makes you feel good, but it sounds like some bad management decisions and economic conditions to me.
Sounds like L.O.D has got on board with Dave Ramsey.
Some very bad decisions as well on the unions part to go on strike if they knew their company was in this position.And it just opened a opportunity for the company to solve 2 problems at the same time close a plant and save money and merge it production in another one of their plants and to get ride of the union issue they were having at this plant.Sometimes comnsession need to be made to keeps ones job and benefit for their family's. Just my own opinions and thoughts.
taxed out, jafo says noting about the striking workers putting smurfit out of business. he states a simple fact, that this economy is certainly NOT the time to let some union rep put their two cents into the mix. the rep has NOTHING to lose.
rjw hits home with his comment that there will be a line of applicants for those jobs..........
as for mr. robbs... who does he think will pay ultimately for air conditioned busses?
Looking back farther into history than Smurfit Stone, what did the Unions do for Shewood Medical, Quaker Oats, FoodBarn, etc.
The Union is courting the transit company because they Want money. Where do you think the Unions get their money?
Union Dues for starters. Who pays the Union Dues?
What happens when you are laid off, and the Union still wants their Union Dues.
What about when the Union was striking against Green Hills in the North End? The only people who benefited were the Picketers paid by the Union, and the local tire repair shops, because the picketers kept distributing nails and screws across the parking lots so that people who did drive across the picket line would get flat tires.
You want to Join the Union? Do a little more research, talk to some former Union members before you make up your mind.
Did the Union cause Smurfit-Stone to close?
The Union wanted an above average pay raise, Smurfit-Stone said that they couldn't afford it in this economy. The Union/workers voted to strike.
Smurfit-Stone tried to work it out but the Union stood fast. Smurfit-Stone decided to close the doors at the St Jo facilities.
So who is to blame? Smurfit-Stone or Union.
I do believe that the Union did cause Mead to move out of town.
Since I haven’t been behind the wheel of a school bus I don’t know what ‘condition of work' they have. I have no idea if there is room for improvement, as I am guessing that most people that have posted here don’t really know what it is like to work for First Student.
I am told that it is a part-time job, so what can the Union really do?
BTW I feel from 1st hand experience that the Teamsters are the worst Union out there.
40 hour work week, pensions, overtime pay, seniority, company paid health insurance, fair days work for a fair wage, dignity in the work place, child labor laws, all terrible things brought to us by unions.
The decline in unions has coincided the decline of the middle class in the U.S. and unfortunately most who bad mouth them are the ones who could directly benefit regardless of wether they belong to a union or not as the unions getting better wages and working conditions for their members drives other similiar employers to do the same for fear their employees may organize for union representation. When the unions go away employers will have free rein.
XJotowner,
I agree 100%, most union bashers won't admit any of the facts you listed but that doesn't change anything. I expect to see a continued decline in unions until the working conditions degrade once again to that which spawned the unions in the past. I've heard the stories from my grandfather of those conditions experienced firsthand in the 30's and 40's. I'm not saying everything the union does is great but every worker today has benefited from the progress made in the past.
It's terrible that St. Joseph so many factories, but putting that solely on organized labor is a bit of a stretch.
The simple-minded would have you believe a correlation between a decline in unions and decline of the American middle-class is interdependent. I assure you, it isn't.
Outsourcing alone has been the biggest contributing factor in the earnings-gap that exists in America today.
Anyone who fails to make that distinction will have a weak viewpoint at best, and uneducated at the worst. I am not saying you are uneducated, only that you obviously have an agenda or you would acknowledge the entire situation. My guess is admitting those facts doesn't help your agenda therefore you neglect to talk about them and probably, "don't care."
The comment came from all the people complaining about unions. So that is what I responded to. Yes, I would agree outsourcing has been the demise of both the middle class and the unions as the jobs that have been outsourced have been mostly union. Thus the interdependence of which you speak is a correlation of the loss of mostly union jobs to outsourcing.
Education is relevant to the subject, everyone is educated and uneducated all in the same as no one knows all about everything and if one thinks they do than they are a fool.