Brothers and Sisters,
By now, most of you have read the latest negotiations update letter or heard, that the TWU & IAM International Association Executive Committee began negotiating with American Airlines the week of March 27th in Washington, D.C. After that week, the Association update letter drove questions as to who was In the executive sessions. As was explained to our members during the first week, the IAEC did not Include a TWU M&R/Stores negotiating team member. Those questions ultimately drove emails to TWU International President Lombardo to include a member of the M&R/Stores negotiating team into the negotiating sessions.
This week we arrived in Washington, D.C. and were informed that one M&R/Stores committee representative would be allowed in the executive session. while we all would prefer two, the TWU International determined that Gary Peterson would represent our group and as a negotiating team we agreed that was in the best interest of our committee; and we were unified in that decision. While Gary participates in the executive sessions, our committee continues to work with the IAM negotiating team on open items for the executive committee. As we have said from the start, we are committed to doing everything within our authority to represent you and bring back the best contract that we have been promised by American Airlines. Keep In mind, these are still negotiations, and the company is not giving us anything because they are nice guys. We have to work through the negotiating process, even though it continues taking longer than we want for our members; but American could speed the process up by moving forward with language that leads the industry.
So long as we remain together in our effort, we will deliver what the membership has been promised:
Fratemaily,
Dale Danker, Gary Peterson, Rollie Reaves, Jason Best, Mike Bush and Jay Sleeman
April 19, 2017 Letter from M&R Committee Negotiations in PDF