The next regular meeting of BRS Local 20 will be held Saturday February 28, 2015 at 8:30 a.m. at the Chillicothe Comfort Inn & Suites, located at 250 Business Hwy. 36, Chillicothe, MO. Reservations may be made at 660-646-9900.
Following are brief minutes from our last meeting held in Naperville, IL. November 1, 2014.
The meeting opened at 8:30 a.m. with 8 officers, 9 members and 1 guest present. The minutes from our previous meeting were read and approved. A treasury balance of $20,702.74 in checking and $21,680.06 in c.d.’s was reported. Two new members were voted in.
Nate Estes reported on: Two overtime claims in Galesburg for attending meetings outside of assigned working hours, more to come on this. Nate also reported on his attendance at the Illinois State AFL-CIO convention, there were 3 resolutions passed for the upcoming Illinois Legislature session. 1) Minimum of 2 crew members on trains. 2) Support of high speed passenger rail, and 3) Support of Amtrak. Nate also discussed a reprimand for a signalman even though it was CHS’s mistake. Nate also mentioned we were in the process of having some local 20 shirts produced.
Joe Baker reported on: The contracting agreement vote approaching November 12 which would prevent BNSF from entering into a national contracting agreement with other railroads. It includes a 5 year extension, an increase in the minimum number of BNSF signal employees to 1675, and several other items that are available to see in the agreement.
Jerry Moore reported on: A time claim for straight time pay on rest days, human caused crossing activation failures, the huge expansion going on in the railroad industry, the general committee is working on getting a foreman training class implemented, and our 3% raise coming January 1, and the section 6 bargaining notice being filed.
Craig McLaren reported on: Nationwide membership in the BRS is around 11,000 members, our general committee has approximately 330 dues retention paying supervisors, including 23 in our local. General Committee added a second Assistant General Chairman to assist with the huge work load encountered due to the heavy handed policies of the company. Craig also discussed the importance to keep using the hotel grievance form in the case of sub-standard rooms, and the need for our new members to get as much driving practice as possible. The CDL issue is extremely important, this is a zero tolerance issue for failure.
Guest Dan Petro discussed the following: The importance of FELA, and the huge advantages it has over ordinary workman’s comp laws. Dan also discussed voting for people who will protect our job and pensions. Dan also talked about “Act Of God Laws” concerning maintainers being called out in dangerous weather conditions. Dan stressed the need for us to discuss how the system works with our family. There is a link to FELA information on our website. If any member has any problems or questions call Dan, he is definitely in our corner and we are lucky to have an attorney like him associated with us.
New Business: A by-law change was approved changing meeting locations for the April and June meetings. Nominations for local officers will start in February. Please let me or any other officer know of any nominations. We will be nominating a President, 1st Vice President, 2nd Vice President, Recording Financial Secretary, 3 trustees, and 5 Local Chairman. The Local Chairman districts are Aurora, Hannibal, Ft. Madison, Ottumwa, and Savanna. We also need grievance committee member nominations for those districts. We are still having cable locating issues. There was a question of on district crews working 8 days on and 6 off. The carrier can only change the work schedule if it is a unanimous vote on the crew to do so. We will be having 2 extra meetings coming up during the safety certification sessions. Sandwich, Illinois on February 4 and Burlington, Iowa March 11. They will be held in the afternoon/evening after the safety meetings conclude.
In closing I would like to again ask everyone who is not on our mailing list to consider doing so. It really does save our local money and time. I would also like to encourage everyone to get on our general committee mailing list as well You can send your information to Ken Strickland at brskes@att.net. If any of you have any changes in residence, e-mail, employment status etc. or know of someone off work, please notify me. It helps with keeping up on the per capita taxes we pay grand lodge and general committee. Hope to see you in Chillicothe February 28.
Fraternally,
Ed Leeson
Recording Financial Secretary, BRS Local 20
309-202-1260
brslocal20@comcast.net
