SheepDogg

Really? Because I remember being a pilot for an AA wholly owned, negotiating with Doug Parker when all three of AA's wholly owned regional carriers were all represented by ALPA and I don't recall ALPA doing anything other than looking out for ALPA National's owned self interest. If AA pilots ever do vote in ALPA, when that honey moon period is over, reality is going to hit them hard. There is a reason AA pilots left ALPA and formed their own union. AA pilots for ALPA are chasing a fantasy.

ImSoSuss

AA Left ALPA for a reason? Like a reason that existed around the Cuban Missile Crises and has no relevance today?

BrazilBusDriver

IIRC, that reason was ALPA was too soft and wouldn’t let AA pilots use all the tools at their disposal (ie, a strike) to secure the best deal possible. It’s hard to imagine the APA of 2024 being as hard nosed as the APA of 1964.

I think an intellectually honest person would ask “who is the reason we have as good of a contract 2023 as we have?” and the answer is it’s DALPA and to a lesser extent UALPA based upon Delta negotiating the pay rates they did, and United balking at their first TA and initiating recalls. Would APA have negotiated an industry leader if they got a TA first? None of us know for certain because that history didn’t play out, but I’m thankful that AA was last in the chute for negotiations based upon the snap up clause being underwhelming.

If anything comes of this card drive, I’m voting for the union I trust to negotiate for us in 2027 and 2028. APA shouldn’t be offering dues holidays (I mean happy they’re doing it, but it doesn’t sway me), sending out dismissive emails, and having officers get red in the face and angry talking about the card drive at new hire dinners. They should be making the case that they’re the ones that can best represent us. It’s…curious that they aren’t. They’ve had a lot of time to refine that messaging. I guess 8500 cards was a lot more than they ever thought ALPA would get.

Sliceback

If they had 8500 cards the process would have started. Instead it's "we're almost there. Send more cards." We have no idea if it's at 2,000 or 7,000 cards. Where's the openness and transparency about the card drive totals? If the membership was truly overwhelmingly in support of ALPA, as the pro-ALPA supporters say, why hasn't the trigger amount already been reached?

Ski Bird

It's an admittedly limited data point, but I did not have this experience at my new hire dinner in May.

After the sales pitch of all the APA had to offer, the topic of the ALPA card drive came up during the Q&A, and the union reps took about 20 minutes to explain the issues at hand. I felt that the discussion was professional and informative.

Of course, I'm fully aware that there are always three sides to every story [His, Hers, and the Truth]. I knew I was getting the APA version of the story ... but I didn't walk out feeling like the strength of their argument relied on smear tactics or anything.

A question arose earlier in this thread that I was eager to see a discussion on. The thread wandered into different territory however, and the point was not addressed.

Namely ... let's say for the sake of argument, that a majority of union members feel that their union officers are no good (for any fill-in-the-blank reason) ... then why is it not an option to vote out the unruly / out-of-touch reps and replace them with officers that are more in line with the majority?

Heading straight to dropping one union for another seems a little ... I dunno ... scorched earth to me.

I'm not trying to pick a fight or pour fuel on the fire, but I haven't really wrapped my head around why a card drive is the obvious and only plan of action here.

Was hoping someone could explain why the card drive was the tool in the toolbox we reached for when it seems that other, less drastic, tools exist that would address members' concerns.

BrazilBusDriver

I'm glad to hear that cooler heads have prevailed over the intervening months. My experience was my own, and I have no reason to believe it continued at other new hire dinners, but I found it extremely off-putting. The big IT meltdown happened around that time, too, and the email we got didn't really take any accountability IMHO, so it all left a really sour taste in my mouth. Before all that, I was firmly in the "remain with 1% dues, why mess with the status quo" camp.

The long and short of it is that you can either merge unions or one has to be decertified and the other certified (or no union selected) through a card drive. It's the RLA process for employees choosing to select union representation, so the really short answer is "that's how the law is written". I won't get into why folks want to go to ALPA over APA because the reasons are myriad and the grievances aren't mine, which I think is what you're really asking. I'm truly on the fence, and if we get an election I want to hear what both APA and ALPA claim to have on offer, so I'll let the others chime in.

From wikipedia: "The NMB has the responsibility for conducting elections when a union claims to represent a carrier's employees. The NMB defines the craft or class of employees eligible to vote, which almost always extends to all of the employees performing a particular job function throughout the company's operations, rather than just those at a particular site or in a particular region. A union seeking to represent an unorganized group of employees must produce signed and dated authorization cards or other proof of support from at least 50% of the craft or class. A party attempting to oust an incumbent union must produce evidence of support from a majority of the craft or class and then the NMB must conduct an election. If the employees are unrepresented and the employer agrees, the NMB may certify the union based on the authorization cards alone."

joepilot50

The structure and regs of APA have the apathetic/unplugged/disinterested protecting the union officers from recall.

Or it's the usual case of people saying one thing, but don't actually vote or participate. They say Person A sucks, but they don't actually vote at all.

Just have to take a look at this past election round, especially in DFW. Voter turn out was horrendous.

BrazilBusDriver

I'm just a big dumb pylote, but my math says (8500-???number of intervening retirements)/~17,000 is probably < 50% of members + 1 member. If ALPA truly does have 8,500 cards as they claim, I suspect it's coming. Or they could have substantially less as you insinuate. Or a large percentage of the 8500 could be from folks that are no longer eligible to participate because they're now retired. Time will tell.

But I'll say the 8500# is shocking if actually true (hell, even 7,000 would be), especially because lukewarm support/mildly positive feelings for/about ALPA as a national organizaiton doesn't translate into bothering to go through the pain of getting a card, filling it out, and mailing it back. From personal experience.

JulesWinfield

This is the issue, not the union. I’ve been at two ALPA carriers. One union was terrible, and the other was great. We have to be more active as a group and vote in good candidates. Obviously, APA has issues, but ALPA isn’t going to swoop in and magically make things better.

Margaritaville

Because cards expire and have to be signed again. This is common in every union drive and it's always something management types or outgoing union focus on in their disinformation campaigns.

Think of it like fighting management with the French army or fighting with the USA army. The French are tenacious but lack the resources and determination the Americans have. APA will never have the resources ALPA has especially the 100 million dollar war chest and men in Washington DC. Where was APA in the Age 67 debate for example? Where is APA fighting against AI replacing pilots or reducing the minimim crew numbers? Trust me AA management would much rather sit across the table from APA.

A recall would bring new soldiers with the same inept resources. The APA board had the chance to merge with ALPA and decided not to for self serving reasons. That would have been the ideal solution to avoid the drama now taking place.

AA is an outlier because we don't have the same seat at the table that United and Delta have. We are sitting at the kids table listening to the conversations take place at the national level.