Ad Lib

Jay, you have every right to be angry, but your frustration is misdirected:

(1) Prior to 1999 ASA and Comair were independent airlines who developed their own route networks using their own marketing, flying their own code. Their companies were very profitable and a few senior pilots became millionaires on Company stock.

From 1999 to 2000 Comair and ASA were bought by Delta Air Lines. Their code became Delta code. The back office functions of ASA and Comair ceased to exist, they were no longer independent airlines. They were operationally integrated with Delta. Under traditional ALPA merger policy these acquired airlines would be merged.

However, the Delta MEC wanted no part of a ASA / Comair / Delta merger. The reasons given at that time by the then MEC Chairman were:

* No military pilot would want to begin their career flying RJ's
* RJ's did not pay enough to be a mainline aircraft
* The quality of Delta pilots would diminish because qualified pilots would not want to fly for Delta if Delta operated RJ's at mainline
* ASA and Comair pilots were not qualified to be Delta pilots (web boards were full of allegations of ASA & Comair pilots being drunks, felons and lacking a College degree)

The Delta MEC was not alone. Other mainline MEC's saw the potential to outsource "undesirable jobs" and use the extra profits to subsidize higher mainline pay. Together, changes were made to ALPA's Constitution to remove the term "operational integration" in an effort to weaken merger policy.

To take advantage of this new outsourcing paradigm (popular word back then) Delta announced an order for 500+ RJ's in 2000.

The ASA and Comair pilots went to ALPA with a request for a Policy Implementation Date to trigger merger policy at the 2000 Board of director's meeting. This was a "seniority grab" since the ASA and Comair pilots were trying to follow ALPA policy at that time and not presupposing an outcome in the SLI. In the crew room my MEC Chairman briefed that "by aircraft size, or paycheck size, we can expect a staple." However a few crew room blowhards with no official position were talking that they wanted "Date of Hire."

The Delta pilots ignored official positions and ran with the "Date of Hire" allegations, although that was never a position and not evident on a single piece of paper. Using this false threat, the Delta pilots worked themselves into a frenzy.

At the 2000 ALPA Board of Director's meeting the ASA and Comair pilots' request for a merger was denied.

Now there was a problem (at least from the ASA / Comair perspective). Five hundred new jets were coming without any scope to control who would fly them. The ASA and Comair pilots were stripped of their code and had no control over any flying, even that which they had developed on their own prior to the acquisition.

The ASA and Comair pilots tried to negotiate scope which would bind Delta Air Lines Inc. to job protections for ALPA members. They feared outsouring of the DCI portfolio to non union carriers.

ALPA took the position that pilots could not use their scope to bind third parties. Duane Woerth wrote the ASA and Comair MEC's & Leo Mullin stating under no uncertain terms the Delta MEC had the exclusive right to bargain Delta flying. No scope which protected ASA or Comair would be authorized by ALPA National.

While the Delta MEC's interest in preserving its exclusivity at the bargaining table was completely legitimate and what they needed to do, the effect was that the ASA and Comair pilots were completely shut out of their own scope negotiations by ALPA policy which was based on a flawed legal premise.

The ability of two parties to bind a third party is common in contract law. We all bind third parties with the transfer of liabilities that we have in our own personal insurance policies. ALPA was mistaken, the result of lawyers which practiced politics, not law.

After being shut out, the RJDC was born from within the ALPA Air Safety experts and MEC's of ASA and Comair. The Cooksey part of the Ford / Cooksey litigation refers to a former ASA MEC Chair. IMHO the RJDC lost its way after exhausting every opportunity of gaining a change in ALPA policy internally and decided to go to the Courthouse. But, on the facts, they were correct in trying to get ALPA to change bad policy. They were correct about the threat of outsourcing and they were right that thousands of jobs were lost to ALPA members forever.

There is no factual basis for an "RJDC seniority grab" allegation. The RJDC only represented the plaintiffs, came along years after any SLI effort, was after a completely different set of goals and had no ability to represent ALPA pilots. Apples and Oranges. In fact, the RJDC and JC Lawson disagreed on Lawson's positions. In fact "RJDC supporters" were among the most fervent in seeing the benefit of having Delta guys who might want to come to ASA, come on over. After all, getting Delta guys on the property helped build the bridges that were needed.

Now what about the NWA pilots? Was their merger request a "seniority grab" ? Somehow we knew that a merger with NWA was needed. Was it because they flew bigger airplanes? In a word, yes. But, you can see in Delta's own merger presentation, the DC9 was considered less than worthy and it was argued those pilots should go to the bottom.

So we are in the corundum of representing pilots differently based on the airplanes they fly. There are obvious economic reasons for that, but, from a unity (and job protection) perspective ALPA needs to learn that EVERY job is precious.

(2) Yes there was pressure during pre bankruptcy negotiations to reduce costs at the threat of a gun. However, once ALPA adopted it's acceptance of outsourcing the question became "how much are those jobs worth?" In bankruptcy, bargaining credits were negotiated for selling jobs. Those bargaining credits were applied to other parts of the contract deemed more valuable than the junior member's jobs. This is particularly evident at NWA where the credits are discussed in the open, but the same thing went on everywhere. At Delta you simply need to refer to the notes around the time of LOA 49 & 50 (if I'm not mistaken). Of course those got wrapped up in LOA51. Things were moving quickly in the wrong direction then.

As a matter of historical fact no scope clauses were thrown out by any Judges involved in the recent rounds of airline bankruptcies. Like the "RJDC scope grab" was this threat also based on misinformation to confuse pilots into accepting scope concessions which were then reallocated to other parts of the contract? Based on the historical record contained in negotiator's notepads and ZipLines, I believe that argument can be made (perhaps not won)

Jay, yours and many other pilots' anger is misdirected towards straw men. When you figure this out you will feel a lot better when you see a f-Comair pilot & ALPA member show up to work for you in your right seat.

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Again, our problem now that we have accepted outsourcing is the constant argument over "what's that job worth?" Violations of scope are used as bargaining opportunities. Once sold, the value of the "credit" is rapidly allocated and used up. In the next round of bargaining the credit has expired (or been nullified in bankruptcy) and there's no credit and no job to sell. Your MEC is weaker because it represents fewer pilots and less of the flying than before. The result will be poorer results at the bargaining table.

Scope sales are always a leading indicator for poorer results in future bargaining.

We really need to return the days when scope was considered sacrosanct. It will increase our power, improving our results and restore dignity to this profession.

Scoop

Ad Lib,

Very educational post. I took the "seniority grab" phrase to mean not only the RJDC fiasco but as you said the supposed COMAIR push for DOH. I was told, and it was accepted as common knowledge, that around the time of the COMAIR strike DALPA agreed to try to bring the COMAIR guys on a staple but that they wanted nothing to do with it, and pushed for DOH - which was a non-starter.

I am not really sure who could positively confirm or deny this, maybe the then MEC members, but if true what a bummer for the majority of COMAIR guys. From your post I gather that this was not true, if so it is even more of a bummer, if as you say a few "blowhards" started the DOH myth which effectively killed any potential agreement.

Scoop

Jay5150

{edit}

heluva post. I have neither the time nor the motivation to track down all of your claims. You may me 100% spot on. I dunno.

I appreciate your accuracy of past events, and maybe there was alot going on.

What you can't dispute, unless I'm missing something from your blog entries, is the fact that during the "big" Delta furlough. Comair basically said ....

F.U.

Tell me where I'm wrong in this, and where they are justified. Yeah, we would leave when we were recalled. Of Course.

Would've went along way towards encouraging "good blood" between the unions. Just like the qualified guys would've left when their time was called.

I'd love to have a flow between us and Comair, pre-2001. After that, F'em. I don't give a damn if I'm a ComAir guy ever gets on with us.

J

Jay5150

BTW, {edit}

My reply was mostly directed towards your misguided slam on "YGBSM"'s post.

He didn't say that the ComAir strike had an effect on their ability to get hired or interviewed based on DALPA's views. It "may be" based on Delta, u know the big corporation's views.

Big Difference.

Jay5150

Just so I'm clear. You think a "xx" year Comair 900 Captain should now be a 777 Ca.

Not going to call you out. But anyone who thinks this, is an effin moron. Not sure you're that far off, what with talking about flying fatigued and with your flask of scotch in your bag. Some things you keep to yourself, rook....

Justdoinmyjob

Maybe at Comair, but not at ASA. When I started there in 1995, there was no marketing department, ans all we flew was DL code. There was no independant route structure, flown with ASA code. As far as millionaires, only George and John were. They were the majority owners, and if memory serves, there were no pilots with any stock of any sizable amount.

shadyops

The fact that DAL ALPA at the time would give more thought to what military pilots wanted than other ALPA pilots goes to show you how defunct that union is. Some of these sentiments still exist today. I am not trying to start infighting, but it should be noted.

STINKY

I got a question. So DALPA has the power to get rid of 60+ RJ's from these deals. Does that void there contract with pinnacle?

The contract to extend them to 2020 from the selling of Mesaba

acl65pilot

You bring up a salient point. Trust me that is the interesting aspect of this. DAL has signed contracts for these services that go until 2020. Lets let the lawyers answer this question as it is one that has a ton of impact. I for one will not even project an answer on here for many many reasons.

acl65pilot

Correct, but they and comair owned their respective codes; OH and EV. When DAL bought them they got the ATA code. When they sold EV (ASA) they retained the code. (Very important point might I add) It means that ASA absent getting a new code cannot sell their own ticket stock.