November 13th to 19th, 2022
856,
It was a busy week around the local office as the full-time officers were preparing to head off to participate in the regional resolution committee next week before attending conference over the following weekend. We have a whole slate of folks scheduled to cover the office in our absence, so don’t feel like you can’t call if you have a question or really need some help with something.
THE RETURN TO NORTHEAST
It sounds like the title of a scrapped Lord of the Rings book, but the return to Northeast is happening over the weekend. On Monday morning, LCAs and PO-4s will report to work in part of the Northeast building and later that morning, letter carriers will arrive and sort their mail before heading out for the day.
When we were discussing the situation with local management agents on Wednesday at the facility, one of them said, “It’ll be just like the old days.”
One of our LJHSC members replied dryly, “Yeah, September 12th.”
I laughed hard at that one. It was too good.
We had a special mid-week report on the matter here: https://cupwwpg.ca/2022/11/16/northeast-flood-update/
We had another discussion with management today regarding all the extra driving carriers have had to do over the last couple of months. The employer has a plan and a set of data, and we will be reviewing it before the pay will land on cheques. We have to cross reference with annual leave lists and daily staffing logs and we’re not sure how long that will take, but count on it taking a few days. We hope the money comes in before December 25th, but it may not appear until the new year.
We really need to respect the rule that no one ventures into the area that is still being renovated. First Response, the contractors doing the renovations have imposed a zero-tolerance policy for intrusion into their space. Supervisors and LJHSC members will be reiterating this policy with every individual on Monday morning, and possibly giving reminders about it through the next two weeks. Please be patient with this and don’t cross the line!
THE B-SIDE
The B letter carriers at the Southwest depot are not happy. There are some major challenges with their routes and daily assignments.
Some of the B routes out of Southwest are difficult to manage because carriers have to balance three bundles of mail (manual mail and flats, sequenced short and long mail, and flyers) on two arms while opening gates and scanning small packets of, “hobby supplies,” from China. They really don’t give us enough arms for this job.
I’ve had a couple of discussions with some B-route letter carriers at the depot and I will be visiting the depot in two weeks to start talking about what we can do to try and make this situation better.
Switching to the Deerfoot model was never going to be perfect, but it was preferable to SSD. Now we have a new challenge, and if we all bring some ideas to the table, we can figure something out.
PRAIRIE CONFERENCE
Tomorrow, the four local full-time officers will be flying to Edmonton to participate in the pre-conference resolution committee. The committee begins its work on Sunday and will meet until Wednesday evening.
The committee reviews all of the resolutions submitted from locals around the region and debates those resolutions. Maybe two resolutions are identical. It happens. The committee would then have one of those resolutions cover the other so that only one resolution will be presented to the delegates at the conference.
Perhaps there are several resolutions speaking to the same idea, but they are slightly different. This would give the committee licence to create a composite resolution that captures the spirit of multiple resolutions and present them as a single, consistent resolution to the delegation at the conference.
There are a few ideas from around the region that loom large in the resolution book. Prorated dues will have to be discussed. Nine of the 94 general resolutions from around the region speak to prorating dues. There are also multiple resolutions that deal with remote work options for full-time officers. Three resolutions are calling for the return of area councils to discuss and debate resolutions at even more levels before they get to this point, conference.
There are 94 general resolutions and 26 of them came from this local. There are 10 policy resolutions, and three of them are from Winnipeg. We are definitely big players in this game.
Your local delegates will be arriving on Wednesday afternoon, so you’re still able to run into them and tell them what you think about ideas like prorating dues and allowing union officers to work in the cities they live in, not Ottawa or a regional capital.
There won’t be much rest for the delegates. Conference opens on Thursday morning and goes until Sunday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. There are special presentations and debate sessions scheduled for the evenings. The days are long and can be tiring. But it can feel valuable to participate in your union’s democratic processes. We hope local members are happy with their representation.
After conference, delegates will be flying home and are expected to report to work the following day. Troopers.
I’ll file a report if I can next week. It may be challenging to find the time, but I will see what I can do. It will primarily be about the conference and the spirit of your union.
Peace,
Matthew