Friday August 5, 2011

As the hours tick down toward contract expiration, we are no closer to reaching an agreement than when negotiations began. The company continues their pattern of coming to the bargaining table with inaccurate information resulting in incomplete answers to our questions.

The reports we are receiving from Locals across the Verizon East footprint show our members are engaged in this fight and focused on defeating the retrogressive bargaining proposals Verizon thinks they can bully our members into accepting. This company has placed the most retrogressive package of proposals before our members that anyone at the bargaining table has ever seen. Just to remind everyone of the horse manure the company still wants you to accept:

Healthcare benefits:

The company is demanding premium contributions and changes for both the medical plan and the dental plan costing our members and retirees up to $6,000 per year

Wages:

Wages - both annual and progression increases tied to your yearly evaluation

Eliminate Differentials

Eliminate Pay Premiums

Eliminate all Overtime Caps

Create new job titles for the consumer and business call centers that would work on a commission based wage schedule

Pensions:

Eliminate the Pension Plan

Eliminate the Pension Cash-Out option

Eliminate the Sickness Death Benefit

Benefits:

Eliminate accident disability benefits and cut in half the sickness disability benefits

Reduce or eliminate sick time pay

Reduce Paid Holidays

Job Security:

Eliminate the Job Security Provisions for all employees

Eliminate the 35-mile transfer provision

Eliminate provisions in Force Adjustment Plan

Eliminate New Contracting Initiatives allowing them to increase the level of contracting

The list goes on and at this point, there appears to be no end in sight. We are less than 24 hours from contract expiration and still this company insists on crying poor mouth at the negotiating table and acting as if we need to settle for the crumbs that fall from Lowell’s dinner table.

Well Lowell, we looked it up, there is no one working for Verizon named Oliver Twist! None of us are going to come to you and ask, "Please Sir, May I Have Some More?" We are the people in this company that make it run. We will not beg you for what is rightfully ours to begin with, A FAIR CONTRACT.

It is disgraceful for you to ask our members and retirees to sacrifice years of negotiated benefits while you sit back in your two million dollar mansion on your five acres in beautiful Mendham, NJ and think about your vacation home on Smith Mountain Lake in Virginia. How about instead of spending another 2.1 million dollars just for the land you bought there, you and your cronies at Verizon take a little less in your executive compensation? Perhaps by doing that some of our retirees won’t have to choose between eating or paying for their healthcare.

Verizon, we are not going to stand by and let you destroy more than fifty years of bargaining history. The clock is ticking and time is running out. If you didn’t hear us before, hear us now, "WE WON’T GO BACK". We are in this fight for the long haul and we will last one day longer than you will until we reach a fair agreement. HEAR US NOW: