Latest / United We Scan / Candidate Q & A Part 3

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Candidate Q & A Part 3 · United We Scan

• 0:15
  Welcome to the United We Scan Podcast, the podcast by rural
• 0:18
  carriers for rural carriers. The views expressed in this
• 0:22
  podcast are of the presenters and the presenters only and do
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  not represent the views, opinions, or strategies of the
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  Please leave a comment or question for us below.
• 0:47
  Thank you. Now here are the hosts of the
• 0:50
  United We Scan podcast. Welcome back everybody.
• 0:54
  Episode 77 today we're going to do our candidate Q&A, part
• 1:00
  three. We had some more questions come
• 1:03
  in at the end of April, beginning of May.
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  So we are going to do that this evening with James, Bill and
• 1:10
  myself. And just a quick how was, oh,
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  and Toasty, I can't forget about Toasty up in here too.
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  He's included. And how was your week toasty?
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  Hot. Very hot.
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  We broke the heat index record here in San Antonio area like
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  two days in a row now, but other than that just it's been really
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  light now. Been getting done around 2:30
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  instead of my usual 3:30 packages or steadying out,
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  especially on my newer neighborhoods.
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  There's getting everything that they've already needed and
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  they've stopped ordering a bit. So calm down a bit.
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  It's making it a little bit easier, but waiting for these
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  new subdivisions that are opening up to start moving in
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  and then I'll probably get it all back again.
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  Other than that, James, how was your week?
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  Oh, it was a normal week at the post office for me, a little
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  heavier on the packages and the mail for a little bit there.
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  We've got some political looking out already.
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  I know you had your runoffs and toasty, but it's still, we're
• 2:22
  starting to see it trickling in our office.
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  So reminder guys, anything political, you gotta endorse and
• 2:28
  plug in a special place so the supervisors can count it every
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  single day 'cause we have to treat it like first class mail.
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  But other than that, just on my way back from the Detroit Tigers
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  game, it was pick out the park for breast cancer awareness.
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  And so we do pray for anybody that's dealing with cancer of
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  any form, especially breast cancer.
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  But yeah, it's been my week. How about your week, Bill?
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  Another week recuperating, going stir crazy.
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  A lot of paperwork I'm putting together by mailing for the
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  national or the state officers NSS, which my cohorts have yet
• 3:13
  to get to me. But OK.
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  We got to the end of June and just enjoying the time off and,
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  you know, trying not to go nuts because I hate sitting around.
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  But when they put a four inch hole in your belly button,
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  there's not much you can really do.
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  I hear ya. Kristen, how's your week?
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  My week was interesting. I can't go into too much detail
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  on here, but if you're on the pre show you kind of heard about
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  it. And by the way, I did send you
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  my stuff to be sent out, so via e-mail EDF file along with the
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  banquet table stuff, yes. Well, the banquet that I got
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  your banquet tables already paid for.
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  Yep. And I should have had my letter
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  was included with that. Better go back and check that
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  she should, if not I. Yeah, yeah, I will.
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  Other than that, my route inspection for Tuesday was
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  postponed. I was off Wednesday for my
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  daughter's doctor's appointment, which has now turned into going
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  in twice a week or NST testing and growth monitoring on
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  ultrasound and with umbilical Doppler.
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  So baby is small, smaller than the doctor's comfortable with,
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  but other than that, heart rate's good, kick count's good.
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  It's just small right now. So they're just going to monitor
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  that for a while if he has a growth spurt and catches up
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  though, and the monitoring until then, she right now is scheduled
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  out twice a week through the middle of August.
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  So yeah, that's pretty much been, I work today, my K day,
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  and then I'm off the rest of the week with our state convention
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  starting caucus immemorial tomorrow evening, business
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  Monday, Tuesday, post convention board meeting Wednesday,
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  Thursday and then doctor's appointment Wednesday.
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  So yeah, I'm off the whole week or Friday, not Wednesday,
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  doctor's appointment Friday I'm off the whole week.
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  So I don't go back to work till a week from Monday.
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  So all right, that hasn't been too bad.
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  So guys, I got these questions pulled up.
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  Are you ready to begin? Let's.
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  Get it? Done.
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  Ready. All right, I only.
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  Have your best job. I have one question that is
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  directed towards Bill, so I'm going to get that one out of the
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  way and then everything else. I don't know.
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  Everything else is for all four of us.
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  Let me look into it, I'll get back to you.
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  Right, this one is for, Bill says.
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  What is your number one priority goal once you're in office?
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  What do we need to do to help you achieve your goals?
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  I would like to say the elimination of tables 2:00 and
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  4:00, but I'm I'm torn the the toxic atmosphere in the post
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  office is almost as equal concern.
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  But in my case, I walked away from a job that offered me
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  substantially more money because of the incident that occurred
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  and the money didn't matter. In the same respect, some people
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  will work at lower paying jobs if they like working there.
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  So I'm conflicted in regards to how how to balance those two
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  topics out. Yes, you can attract people with
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  better pay. It doesn't mean that you're
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  going their people, that they're going to be trained correctly,
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  that they'll stay in the job and that they'll enjoy the job if
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  they're going to an office. Just horrendous in regards to
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  how they treat carriers. So to me, I think we need to
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  start with the better pay to attract better candidates.
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  But immediately after that, and that's a one time shot in
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  correcting the pay and we have to address the situation in
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  regards to the toxic atmosphere in the post office.
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  I'm going to give you a little insight to the toxic atmosphere.
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  An individual I know just got done the Pennsylvania State NAPS
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  convention. That's the convention for super
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  postmasters, all the EAS employees that can attend, and
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  out of the entire state of Pennsylvania they had 4-5
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  attendees. Now how piss poor is that in
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  relation to the amount of carriers to attend their local,
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  state and the National Convention?
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  Their number one topic at this convention was the toxic
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  atmosphere, the constant harassment from a SO we're not
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  the ones experiencing and I know first hand in my office had it.
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  The managers, the supervisor, EA employees are also suffering
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  from toxic atmosphere. They are under the falsification
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  of data just to get reports done.
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  First class mail being reported. And they have a problem because
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  of the fact that there are snitches in the offices that
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  these people work at or reporting back to pooms and
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  district managers when these reports are filed as being
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  complete. And yeah, these duties are done
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  and everything's been, you know, addressed in the course of a
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  work day and they're coming back.
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  Wrote up 11 EAS employees in PA District 2.
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  So until the post office can be into submission to a contract to
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  treat people with dignity and respect, to hire trained
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  individuals, not just the patsies they know they like or
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  some clerk moving up, people with real world experience in
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  management, we're not going to resolve that problem as far as
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  having a toxic and and hostile work environment.
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  And then it starts with, you know, our, our president starts
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  with our, the director of Labor operations and it's going to
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  start with the director of Stewart operations and everybody
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  down to the local Stewart put this in effect and start
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  defending our carriers as they should be and, and have them
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  treated like human beings, not just numbers on some damn
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  report. I agree and I'm kind of going to
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  add in on to that is how can the membership help us with the
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  toxic work environment things? Stand up for yourself and start
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  filing them with grievances as if there's no paper trail.
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  And that's true that it starts with the person standing up for
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  themselves. And I know there's plenty of
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  timid people out there. Even timid people have the the
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  point of no return means they're quitting.
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  And that's time it's too late for us to salvage the situation.
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  You're in an office and you see somebody in the step up and
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  speak out. These are your brothers and
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  sisters in the craft, whether you like them or not, because
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  like I've always said, if they go after one, they will go after
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  all of us other and file. All right.
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  You are breaking up a little bit still, Bill, but we'll move on.
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  OK, Go back up to the top here. All right, this one's for all
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  four of us, but I have, I pulled out paperwork on this one, so
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  I'll take the lead once I read it off.
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  Currently, there's no introductory material on the
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  union, what it actually does, how it can become involved in
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  your individual workspace, how to participate, whether as an
• 12:21
  observer or participant in union activities.
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  Pass the sign here for payroll deduction of dues.
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  Is there any plans to fill this void?
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  Does your plans, if any, allow for no union non union members
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  to view this information? I'm going to take the lead
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  because I actually have several copies of the recruitment
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  booklet for the union. I was able to get a bunch of
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  copies. This is the ones that I know my
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  for my state anyways, our recruiters that go to the
• 13:06
  orientations and as well for our Academy facilitators and it is
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  actually a 17 page booklet including the 1187 and it the on
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  the cover it says the National Rural Letter Carriers
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  Association. Please accept this personal
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  invitation from the NRLCAS 100 and a 7000 plus members to join
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  the association that can provide you with the best information
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  concerning your rights and responsibilities of rural letter
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  carrier. Our organization has compromised
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  rural carriers working for rural carriers.
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  Please accept this personal invitation to join us today.
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  Enclosed are some brief examples of what your active membership
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  has waiting for you. And this was this edition that I
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  have is February of 2023. I'm just going to go over the
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  table of contents that would kind of gives you the overview
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  that they give us. And table of contents subject is
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  why it pays to belong leave replacement benefits summary the
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  current evaluated pay system for regular and relief carriers
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  frequently asked questions compensation salary and wages
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  contractual language non career employee health benefits relief
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  carrier pay stub gives kind of a little overview on that stuff.
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  How do I contact my steward slash district Rep Services
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  administered by the NRLCA insurance services endorsed by
• 14:44
  the NRLCANRLCAA family organization.
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  NRLCA insurance plan by national general Atlanta postal credit
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  union summary enrollment instructions 1187 form and then
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  the membership enrollment form tear off.
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  So there is actually a booklet out there.
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  I it does actually. Like I said it is 17 pages long.
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  It's got QR codes for both Android and Apple for the NRLCA
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  mobile app in there It bargaining unit rule at carrier
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  Leave replacement benefit summary goes over the stuff
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  about leave replacements. It talks about the evaluated pay
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  system, explanation of the different types of routes and
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  and then it talks about for you know, the relief carriers and
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  going over 40 hours during the week.
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  You know that are the duties of a rule under fax, Are the duties
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  of a rural leave replacement the same as a regular rule carrier?
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  For the most part, yes. Because of the part time nature
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  of the job, there are some duties that can be required of
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  rural leave replacements that cannot be required of rural
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  carriers. Otherwise the duties and
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  responsibilities the leaf replacements are the same as
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  those of a regular rule carrier. Handbook PO6O3 defines the
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  duties and responsibilities. It provides instructions for
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  carrying out those duties and responsibilities, compensation,
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  salary, wages. It does have the table the looks
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  like table four and Table 3 schedule in there.
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  It's got the memorandum of understanding for non career
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  health, employee health benefits from when that first started.
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  Kind of goes over what the paycheck stub looks like and the
• 16:44
  explanations of them tells you how to locate your steward on
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  the website or app. And then it talks about the
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  services administered, Labor Relations, administrative,
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  legislative and then again you have the national General APCU
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  stuff in there. So there actually is a booklet.
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  I would definitely look through it and go over it and see if
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  there was anything that could be changed or added in.
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  Definitely for sure is what I would do.
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  All right, guys, go ahead next. Who wants to take that one if
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  they want to add in? If anybody, If not, I will.
• 17:26
  I'll add in. I'll add into that.
• 17:28
  OK, well I, you know what I I said this at SWAC too, when I
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  was doing my nomination speech. We have a whole generation that
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  has grown up on YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, TikTok.
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  We need to adapt our message and our teaching style to short
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  form. Short form videos make it kind
• 17:55
  of quirky. That's what they that's what
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  kids like, that's what this younger generation likes.
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  That's what people like me with ADHD.
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  We like to learn in port little one minute tidbits.
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  We need to be able to adapt. When we can do that, people are
• 18:10
  going to be more interested. They're going to learn more.
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  They're going to be more apt to say, OK, I'm getting value from
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  these videos. I'm getting value from learning
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  and knowing what exactly what to do in all of this.
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  So they're going to eventually recruit in because they're gonna
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  say, OK, now I get what's going on with the union.
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  It's not just, you know, oh, they take money from me and half
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  the time when I have a grievance, even as a non member,
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  they still don't handle it. So why should I pay, you know,
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  3020 dollars a paycheck in order to be a part of the union that I
• 18:44
  don't feel does anything for me. We need to adapt, we need to
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  change. We need to update our website
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  that is so difficult to navigate.
• 18:53
  You know, you click on one thing and thinking it's in there.
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  Nope, it's not in there. You got to go to another page.
• 18:58
  You know, we, we need to adapt. We need to change our message.
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  We need to update and refresh the way we think about
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  communicating to the carriers and communicating to this
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  younger generation. I mean, today at work, I was
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  making a little joke about one of the Rcas in our office lives
• 19:17
  in the neighborhood next to me. And I, we always say, hi,
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  neighbor, you know, type of deal.
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  And I said Heidi Ho neighbor, which is a home improvement
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  reference. He didn't get it.
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  He was born in the 2000s. So I'm just sitting there kind
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  of sad that I'm, you know, 37 years old and, you know, to me,
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  it's still kind of fresh in my mind.
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  But to him, he didn't get it all.
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  So you, you have this younger generation that you have to be
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  able to reach as well and explain to them how things work
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  because they need to, to know and that we can't keep doing the
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  same old format, you know, put it on a PowerPoint, put it on
• 19:55
  APDF and just send it out. Oh, there's plenty of good
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  information on the site, if you can understand it, if you can
• 20:01
  interpret it. And that's the problem that a
• 20:04
  lot of people have been having with RX, with everything that we
• 20:07
  have with the union and communications and contract is
• 20:12
  it's not put into simple terms. It's all legalese.
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  It's all kind of commuted. You have to.
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  Have a different type of mindset to dissect it and to mold it
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  into a way that other people can understand as well.
• 20:29
  I completely agree with you 100%.
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  Bill or James, either one of you have anything to add to that
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  one? I'm going to piggyback right off
• 20:37
  a toast there and I agree with them 100%.
• 20:42
  It's one of the things that I want to fix is is the convoluted
• 20:45
  website. You know, how hard is it to find
• 20:48
  out who your steward is on that website?
• 20:50
  You have to know you have to click on departments, then you
• 20:52
  have to click on steward operations, then you have to
• 20:54
  click on Find my Steward to enter the zip code.
• 20:57
  Why is it so hard to put a little search box in the top
• 21:01
  left corner of the website saying find my steward?
• 21:05
  Punch in your zip code here and you find out who your steward
• 21:08
  is. No, you got to go through four
• 21:10
  different places to get there. Our stewards should be talking
• 21:14
  to our carriers. They should be going into these
• 21:16
  offices and saying, Hey, I'm your steward.
• 21:19
  If you need anything, here's my card and here's your Weingarten
• 21:22
  rights in a card. They should be talking to these
• 21:25
  carriers in their offices. It shouldn't just be, oh, well,
• 21:28
  here's the union at your, at your orientation.
• 21:31
  Now when you go to your office, you don't see a steward.
• 21:34
  Well, your steward needs to be there.
• 21:36
  It's it's time to stop being reactive to things.
• 21:39
  It's time to start being proactive.
• 21:42
  We need to stop coming out with little tidbits 2 weeks, three
• 21:45
  weeks after the fact on the website.
• 21:47
  We are in the modern day age of information sharing.
• 21:51
  That's why we're having this podcast.
• 21:53
  Here is a modern day way of sharing information.
• 21:56
  Why is it that our union takes a week, two weeks, 3 weeks to get
• 22:01
  information out to the carriers? Or even in times two months to
• 22:04
  file a Step 4 on something. This information should be right
• 22:09
  front and Center for carriers. And I don't care who you are,
• 22:14
  you should know who your steward is.
• 22:16
  You shouldn't be a 10/15/20 year veteran and not know who your
• 22:19
  steward is. As one of the carriers I talked
• 22:22
  to is a 15 year veteran and didn't know how to get a hold of
• 22:25
  their steward or where it was located on that website.
• 22:29
  So getting our carriers in front of their stewards, letting them
• 22:34
  know that they could talk to them, telling them that hey, if
• 22:37
  you have any problems, get a hold of me, I'll be there for
• 22:41
  you. That is the key priority that we
• 22:43
  need to have for this crap. Well, do you have anything?
• 22:50
  Yeah, it's James stole my Thunder on the Stewart
• 22:54
  situation. Why isn't it that just that
• 22:57
  simple? Put your zip code, Stewart pops
• 23:00
  up. It's not that hard.
• 23:02
  The problem is you create a Facebook page, but you're not
• 23:06
  allowed to comment on it. The point if you can't have a
• 23:09
  two way conversation. Now for the people who like
• 23:14
  those said no technical language, it's lawyer language
• 23:18
  and that's the way contracts are and you're not going to get away
• 23:21
  from that because that's lawyers draw it up like that.
• 23:27
  But there is not a problem with you putting up a factual item
• 23:33
  and then putting a little blurb underneath it and saying this is
• 23:37
  what it means. I mean, if you read some of our
• 23:42
  contractual obligations, you'll sit there and and go Batsy
• 23:48
  because of the fact that you're not a lawyer and you don't
• 23:52
  understand how they went from A to B to C back to A back to E
• 23:56
  back that B back to the F It. It doesn't make a lot of sense.
• 24:00
  But if you understand them and put it together, it does make
• 24:05
  sense. Unfortunately in this modern day
• 24:09
  and age, people don't have OK the comprehension skills because
• 24:18
  of the fact that they are if they want the information in
• 24:22
  1530 seconds at the Max. So therefore, you have to you
• 24:26
  have to condense it for them to be able to comprehend exactly
• 24:30
  what it is. It's not their fault.
• 24:33
  It's not a the deficiency, it's the thought process that young
• 24:37
  people have developed it. So if you want to get the young
• 24:41
  people involved, how they'll understand it.
• 24:44
  And that's that's the point that, you know, Jose Lane, that
• 24:48
  if you want people involved, then you have to get short,
• 24:52
  sweet, to the point, succinct and credible so that they say,
• 24:58
  oh, I, I want to get involved or I need to get involved.
• 25:04
  But the fact of the matter is that people still writing this
• 25:07
  stuff are not the people who are working under those rules and
• 25:12
  regulations. So we have to change the format
• 25:15
  that we present the contract, the MO us and everything else so
• 25:20
  that people can get it in that little 15 second.
• 25:25
  That way they'll have enough state in a grievance, in a local
• 25:31
  state convention wherever feel on equal footing because they
• 25:37
  understand the material and down to those, you know, segments.
• 25:43
  I just want to add 2 in, you know, as we're talking about,
• 25:47
  you know, Toasty talking about, you know, moving forward, you
• 25:50
  know, in the technology and getting it out there, especially
• 25:55
  with the younger generation coming in because that, you
• 25:57
  know, the younger generation coming in is definitely going to
• 26:00
  be the future down the road. And you know why, you know,
• 26:05
  having a video or something like that, but being able to sign up
• 26:09
  via the website, via the app. Now, yes, I understand it's a
• 26:13
  payroll deduction. You have to have an actual
• 26:16
  signature. How many of us have done loans?
• 26:19
  I've done my car loan with APCU and personal loans where they
• 26:23
  send you a DocuSign and you just initial initial and you you sign
• 26:28
  on the DocuSign. Why couldn't we do something
• 26:30
  like that as well? Because it costs money.
• 26:36
  Costs money to print out a bunch of these booklets.
• 26:38
  That sounds like a. Lot yeah, exactly that too, but
• 26:42
  you got to adapt and and kind of pigging back piggybacking off a
• 26:46
  bill. If you go into the magazines on
• 26:48
  the website, you can actually go look at the one that we had from
• 26:52
  the last contract where they said, hey, here's what's
• 26:54
  changing in the contract. Here's the new verbiage.
• 26:56
  And if you look through the new verbiage right after it in red
• 26:59
  text is an explanation of OK, here's why.
• 27:04
  You know, the let's say the PTF position that it was created.
• 27:07
  You know, for you have to have at least, you know, APTF for
• 27:10
  every 10% of K routes for every 1010 K routes.
• 27:14
  And it explains under there, you know, for, you know, routes 5
• 27:18
  through 15 is 1 PTF or 16 through 24 isn't, you know, two
• 27:23
  PTFS. And it explains in simple detail
• 27:27
  why it's created and what it does.
• 27:29
  We need that for the whole contract so that way people can
• 27:31
  go, OK, that's what that means. That's you know, OK, this is
• 27:34
  where I could have a grievance 'cause this is what it was meant
• 27:37
  to be, not this convoluted sense of twisting the words.
• 27:41
  And well, OK, maybe you know, management can get away with
• 27:44
  that. No, let's let's do another and
• 27:48
  when we get the contract. Let's do another one for the
• 27:50
  full contract explaining, OK, This is why we do this.
• 27:53
  This is why we have this section.
• 27:55
  This is where you're protected on this.
• 27:58
  Which would technically be what the Arcam is supposed to do, we
• 28:02
  just have to update that, am I right?
• 28:09
  Please don't bring, Please don't bring up the Arcam.
• 28:12
  OK, OK. Our new steward said.
• 28:15
  Our new steward said. Our Cam I says never mind, it
• 28:18
  just went away. Hey, exactly my my new stewards
• 28:21
  like our Cam. What's that?
• 28:23
  So Oh. My goodness, no.
• 28:25
  Well on the same thing they were also told everything's on, you
• 28:28
  know, majority of it's on the website blah blah blah.
• 28:31
  If you're in a very rural area, you don't always get the
• 28:37
  greatest Internet. My local steward does not have
• 28:39
  the greatest Internet. I look up a lot of the
• 28:43
  information that he needs and print it out and give it to him
• 28:45
  because he doesn't have the greatest of Internet to be able
• 28:50
  to sit down and do that. He can't even stream ATV show,
• 28:53
  you know, he's running off satellite Internet.
• 28:55
  I know he just upgraded so it's a little bit better.
• 28:58
  He's got sketchy cell phone service.
• 28:59
  He has to do the, the, the, the service bar dance in the house.
• 29:04
  If I try and call him when he's home, if he's not outside on the
• 29:07
  back patio where he might have half a signal, you know, well,
• 29:11
  there's still carriers in those in those areas like that.
• 29:15
  So, yeah, you know, you've got to have a means to be able to
• 29:18
  reach out to everybody. And so, yeah, I would
• 29:21
  definitely. Let's move on.
• 29:26
  All right, next question, Why did none of the candidates come
• 29:31
  and campaign at Eastern or Western states conferences?
• 29:36
  Well, for me, I'll start off real quick.
• 29:41
  What? Table 2.
• 29:42
  Table two is why? Yeah, yeah, James, toast to your
• 29:48
  Table 2, aren't you? Yes, I am.
• 29:51
  Yes, you are. So the three out of the four of
• 29:53
  us are table two. That is one of the biggest ones.
• 29:57
  I did not have enough time as being a newer regular carrier to
• 30:02
  take off yet more time or be afford to take off leave without
• 30:06
  pay. I could not afford to go.
• 30:10
  I only went to mid states. It was local for me.
• 30:15
  That is my regional conference so I did mine there.
• 30:18
  I wish I could have gone to the other ones this year.
• 30:22
  Unfortunately both financially and time wise was not feasible
• 30:27
  for myself. Same here, it's I went from 48K
• 30:35
  to 41K last year and then barely up to 44.
• 30:39
  You know, I was still donating plasma.
• 30:41
  I was trying to, you know, catch up on bills and keep, keep our
• 30:44
  heads afloat and just couldn't afford to do multiple.
• 30:49
  I already went to SWAC 'cause that was my my regional as well
• 30:54
  announced there and then I was able to save up enough and
• 30:59
  scrounge and got a good deal. Thank you, James, for Mid States
• 31:05
  to go ahead and make it to that one as well.
• 31:11
  James is in the same boat with us on that one, so we know that.
• 31:15
  Yep, and. Go ahead, James.
• 31:17
  Finish off. Yeah.
• 31:20
  I would have, I would have gone, but I used all the extra funds I
• 31:25
  could to go to SWAC first because thanks to Bill I had a
• 31:29
  room available for me and most of my other expenses were
• 31:34
  covered as well with both Bill and Toasty helping me out with
• 31:38
  that. But in order to go to Eastern,
• 31:42
  it would have cost me more money than I had, same with Western
• 31:46
  and SAC and it wasn't affordable to me to be able to get to
• 31:52
  those. Well, it wasn't affordable to go
• 31:54
  to SWAC either in terms of gas to drive down there.
• 31:58
  I mean, the flight would cost the same as the as the fuel I
• 32:00
  spent to go down there. But we tried to tried to cover
• 32:04
  at least a couple of them because it's important to us to
• 32:08
  be involved in that. And I apologize if I offended
• 32:11
  anybody in those regions. I felt like we were quote UN
• 32:15
  quote shunning them for it, but it really was cost prohibitive
• 32:18
  for us. Unfortunately, we're not the
• 32:20
  national board that gets paid to go to all those events.
• 32:24
  So we have to cover them on our own, but that's my take on it.
• 32:30
  Go ahead, Bill. All right.
• 32:33
  From my point of view, I attended SWAC with James and I
• 32:38
  was, you know, financially capable to go to almost all of
• 32:42
  the things the conferences that I'd like to.
• 32:46
  We had a death mother-in-law. I had a stent put in my right
• 32:52
  leg for a calcium deposit, was blocking blood flow, and because
• 32:57
  of my mother in law's past, I couldn't go to mid stage, which
• 33:00
  I really wanted to go to #1 because of the people who'll be
• 33:05
  there #2 because of the size of that conference in relation to
• 33:10
  the number of craft employees it represents.
• 33:14
  The Eastern seats is one I've attended a number of times and I
• 33:21
  found to be very unfulfilling. It's more of a environment than
• 33:28
  anything else and and you know, you do get an opportunity to
• 33:31
  stand up there and, you know, put your platform out for people
• 33:36
  to examine it. It's like I said it, it it
• 33:42
  wouldn't, wouldn't behoove me to go there.
• 33:45
  And Western states doesn't work out time wise for me because I
• 33:50
  had the second operation. But that one there Western
• 33:55
  states is, is one of those ones I really want to go to.
• 34:01
  Again, timing is everything. Like you says, we're, we're not
• 34:05
  on the national board. We don't get paid trips to go to
• 34:10
  these conferences where, you know, these people can go to
• 34:13
  these conferences and and, you know, extend their platform,
• 34:16
  even though they're not supposed to be politicking.
• 34:18
  You know, it goes on on every day, every place they travel to
• 34:24
  in the flesh. And unfortunately, I do have the
• 34:28
  means go to them. I just didn't have the timing
• 34:31
  for it. It is circumstances.
• 34:33
  And I, I'm glad I attended SWAC because I thought that was the
• 34:37
  most eye opening in regards to how our national president looks
• 34:43
  at our craft. And you, you, you, you
• 34:47
  freeloaders and you scabs. You know who I'm talking about?
• 34:56
  All righty. And on to the next one.
• 35:01
  This one. I think we're going to take an
• 35:03
  order of the offices that we're running.
• 35:07
  What is the first thing you want to change if elected?
• 35:10
  I know we've kind of covered this a little bit, billed it a
• 35:12
  little bit, but I'm going to have you go for it again.
• 35:15
  What is the first thing you want to change if elected?
• 35:20
  The paid tables, the elimination of two and four.
• 35:24
  You can hire people at a better age and you may be able to
• 35:30
  retain them. The first thing people you know
• 35:33
  ask for when they say, you know, what does the job pay?
• 35:37
  You know, how much time do I get off?
• 35:38
  What are the benefits? They're concerned about being
• 35:42
  able to meet the needs of their family before they take
• 35:45
  position, you know, to meet and meet their finance commitments
• 35:48
  to their car loan, their rent, their mortgage, their food,
• 35:52
  whatever. So that would be the first
• 35:54
  issue. And once that issue is resolved,
• 35:58
  then we can step on to the next season.
• 36:00
  Like I said, the toxic atmosphere in the United States
• 36:03
  Postal Service is second thing on my agenda because the fact
• 36:08
  that you've lost too many people who have up and walked out of
• 36:12
  their own careers because of management has to be addressed.
• 36:19
  All right. And since I'm going for the
• 36:21
  second command, I'll go next. The first thing I'd want to
• 36:25
  change if elected well alongside with the pay tables is Bill was
• 36:30
  saying my next gosh, where do I start with this one as Vice
• 36:39
  President. The first thing I would want to
• 36:45
  change that I would have control of changing.
• 36:53
  Jeez, there's there's just so many things on my list.
• 37:01
  Bill can go for the pay tables. I'm going to go for the the
• 37:09
  treatment of newer Rcas as, as, as a vice president is the one
• 37:14
  that works with USPS headquarters on the training
• 37:18
  materials, the Academy, the OJT materials, which the new stuff
• 37:23
  just came out. I can't wait to be able to
• 37:26
  finally see it, especially the OJT booklet as being an OJI.
• 37:31
  I'm really looking forward to seeing that.
• 37:34
  I would want to keep it updated. So I OK, I'm going to go on with
• 37:39
  the training. It took five years to get this
• 37:41
  update, and I would want to make sure that it was updated, even
• 37:48
  if it not even completely reprinting it.
• 37:50
  But if there were certain changes that need to be made and
• 37:53
  were agreed upon, then to at least have an addendum or a
• 38:00
  secondary book handout, something else that goes with
• 38:04
  the current material, the new stuff out there that would be
• 38:08
  able to go out right away and not have to wait, you know, the
• 38:13
  five years or however long. But making sure that the
• 38:18
  training material was kept up to date as much as possible, as
• 38:22
  quick as possible and in the quickest way.
• 38:26
  I know that we're talking about USPS.
• 38:28
  I I understand that quick is definitely not a priority with
• 38:32
  them lately, but that would definitely be, and that would be
• 38:36
  right down into the treatment of new RRCASI mean you know, you'll
• 38:41
  have all these new Rcas come in and management will just kiss
• 38:47
  their butts left and right. But as soon as those two full
• 38:51
  pay periods are up with the OJT, they're throwing them to the
• 38:54
  wells and doing them directly right, right.
• 38:56
  I would like to see it done as a suggestion to make sure that an
• 39:05
  RCA is proficient on their primary route prior to having
• 39:11
  them go on another route. Yeah, it would definitely be
• 39:14
  training, would definitely training and retaining and the
• 39:17
  way that they treat the new employees is definitely a
• 39:20
  priority, top priority on my list and that I'd want to
• 39:24
  change, James. Well, you are absolutely correct
• 39:31
  on the treatment of the post office.
• 39:33
  I've been running on the harassment platform the constant
• 39:37
  harassment for management. But the very, very, very first
• 39:41
  thing that I'm going to change is I'm going to change the
• 39:45
  constant settling for language only for things that we already
• 39:51
  have language on. Management has made it their
• 39:56
  goal to find every little piece of the contract they can violate
• 40:00
  and violate it to see what will settle for language on it for
• 40:04
  and settling for language for language that already exists.
• 40:08
  Is just doing The Dirty to the union so it's time for us to
• 40:14
  start putting a financial burden on the post office for violating
• 40:19
  the contract. I want to make it so expensive
• 40:22
  to violate the contract that management will actually start
• 40:25
  following it because they constantly sit there and just
• 40:29
  go, Oh, well, I didn't know. You know, I find it kind of
• 40:33
  interesting that whenever we are disciplined by management, the
• 40:38
  ruling is it doesn't matter if you don't know you violated it.
• 40:42
  Ignorance of the law is not an excuse in many instances, and
• 40:46
  management's ignorance of the contract can no longer be an
• 40:51
  excuse. Toasty.
• 40:58
  For my position, it's basically working with the director of
• 41:01
  Stewart Operations and I, I want to unleash the hounds, so to
• 41:06
  speak. I want to be able to get our D
• 41:09
  Rs or AD Rs to just go ham on management, work with James to
• 41:15
  go ahead and make sure that we no longer settle for language
• 41:18
  that we start, you know, 100% at least cease and desist at the
• 41:23
  minimum. And then from there, go with the
• 41:26
  financial penalties, make sure that we grieve and get
• 41:30
  notification back to the carriers about their grievances,
• 41:34
  about the information that they're requesting.
• 41:36
  Have an open line of communication with everyone
• 41:40
  because we need to stop management from mismanaging,
• 41:45
  even though they have a right to do it.
• 41:47
  We're going to make sure that they stop.
• 41:49
  We're going to make it so difficult for them to do their
• 41:53
  jobs because they're having to deal with all these grievances
• 41:55
  and they're having to go into all these meetings because we're
• 41:59
  not going to take it anymore. We need a fighting spirit.
• 42:02
  Again, we need to go ahead and just go for the jugular, start
• 42:06
  going for those financial penalties and start holding them
• 42:09
  accountable. Thank you, guys.
• 42:15
  I definitely have to agree on all aspects of that too.
• 42:19
  All right, next question. Now this is not one we really
• 42:22
  have control over as a national board, but I'm going to go ahead
• 42:29
  and read it. This question is concerning the
• 42:32
  buying back of our time from our RCA sub days to go towards
• 42:36
  retirement. This is and there give an
• 42:40
  example of their office. This is our office.
• 42:42
  Currently route one's regular has seven sub years.
• 42:46
  She would like to buy back. Route 2 is me and I have 14
• 42:50
  years. Route 3 has 17 years and Route 4
• 42:55
  has 12 years. Route 5 has eight years and our
• 43:01
  aux carrier is an RCA now for 24 years.
• 43:06
  Yes, that's not a typo 24. I know this not may not be the
• 43:10
  norm for some areas, but it is here.
• 43:13
  It would be great to have the option to buy back and I
• 43:18
  completely agree, having been an RCA for just under nine years.
• 43:22
  I I completely agree. I would love to be able to, to
• 43:26
  take, be able to put that, you know, some of that time towards
• 43:30
  my retirement computation. Unfortunately, that is
• 43:34
  completely out of the union's hands.
• 43:36
  That is an act of Congress and the proposition is out there,
• 43:42
  but it's getting on your on your congressional representatives to
• 43:51
  sponsor and support the bill and make headway.
• 43:54
  It's been reintroduced several times and it tends to not get
• 43:58
  very far. And when they did have it back
• 44:02
  in the day, it was there was money in coffers that were.
• 44:08
  So it was a prorated amount. The thing is, and unless they
• 44:15
  were able to do that again and that's where the financial thing
• 44:18
  comes in. I know for me if it was
• 44:23
  something that we could do, I probably would not even be able
• 44:27
  to afford to buy back my RCA time.
• 44:31
  That's that's the biggest hiccup on that is if there is not
• 44:38
  financial coffers for that to offset what our costs would be
• 44:44
  directly, you know the 100, whatever our costs would be once
• 44:48
  it's calculated to help, to help support that, it would not be
• 44:54
  financially feasible even for me with just under nine years in
• 44:58
  it. I can't imagine somebody trying
• 45:00
  to buy back 10/15/20 plus years of an RCA how much that would
• 45:07
  cost. I mean that we're, we're, we're
• 45:10
  talking a couple years worth of salary.
• 45:19
  Am I wrong guys? You said it perfectly.
• 45:23
  Yeah, they talked about it at at SWAC and at mid states about the
• 45:26
  cost of of a bill like that. So it's yeah, you can, we can do
• 45:31
  everything what we can. We can work with the PAC, the
• 45:33
  political action committees, We can work with everyone.
• 45:35
  We can meet with as many Congress and senators as
• 45:40
  possible to go ahead and get it passed.
• 45:42
  But like you, like you just pointed out, it's there's that
• 45:45
  cost to it and it's, it's kind of breathtaking.
• 45:50
  Yeah, it really is. Well.
• 45:53
  There, there actually is one thing that we can do as a
• 45:57
  national board and that involves this current contract
• 46:00
  negotiation and that is to get the resolution or one similar to
• 46:06
  it that was passed at National Convention, which is at Rcas
• 46:11
  that have either 2080 hours or two years in a service with the
• 46:16
  Postal Service, move over to a career RCA position.
• 46:20
  And then that way they could start earning that retirement.
• 46:24
  Unfortunately for those like in my office, a 17 year, 15 year, 5
• 46:29
  1/2 year in my 3 1/2 years wouldn't be able to buy it back
• 46:35
  with that unless like you said in act of Congress, your
• 46:38
  representatives and senators need to pass that bill.
• 46:42
  So it's on every single rural letter carrier out there, every
• 46:45
  city carrier too, all of them to push for that buy back and get
• 46:50
  it out there. You know, send them a letter,
• 46:52
  call them, e-mail them, anything.
• 46:54
  Just tell them that you think that that's something that they
• 46:58
  should pass. But other than that, that's the
• 47:00
  only other option. But that would only work for new
• 47:03
  hires and Rcas that have been there for that amount of time or
• 47:08
  more. And they would then start at
• 47:10
  that very moment the contract is signed.
• 47:16
  Anybody else? I've got a point of view on this
• 47:20
  because of the fact that affect me.
• 47:23
  But my biggest point of view is that we brag at the National
• 47:29
  Convention when we collect $1,000,000 per pack.
• 47:35
  And yet we we don't put anything in the magazine monthly basis to
• 47:40
  contact our representatives to push this bill through, to push
• 47:45
  through and amend that as you don't have to buy back all your
• 47:48
  years. You can buy back the year you
• 47:50
  want to buy back. Like you said at table two, it's
• 47:56
  cost prohibitive for most people.
• 47:59
  And I don't understand we're at this point with James simple
• 48:06
  explanation, if you have this many hours in, you're qualified
• 48:10
  as a career RCA 20 years as an RCA is is excusable.
• 48:17
  And maybe it's because of the location of the office, the
• 48:21
  hours, whatever persons decide to stay there and and and remain
• 48:25
  in that position. But after all that time, they
• 48:29
  should have a retirement investment in their name.
• 48:35
  It it it's beyond me that this is still going on.
• 48:39
  Again, it's out of our hands, but have the ability to
• 48:44
  influence it and once a month when we put our magazine out, we
• 48:48
  ought to be addressing this, bring it to the workers minds
• 48:53
  every damn month because they're the ones in the contact there
• 48:59
  and get this pushed through without enough vocalization from
• 49:05
  the membership to their their representatives in Congress.
• 49:11
  We're not going to go get anywhere as the union.
• 49:17
  All right, moving on, what are you doing to protect the
• 49:22
  carriers from losing money every six months during the wrecks?
• 49:30
  Well, I, I, I think the biggest protection we can do for the
• 49:39
  carriers is education and not just say, well, you can read the
• 49:45
  information on the website, all the information's available on
• 49:49
  the website. I think I could take, you know,
• 49:52
  a note out of Tosi's playbook because, you know, like I said,
• 49:57
  today's day and age with these younger ones coming in, it comes
• 50:02
  down to fully understanding what the Rex scans are, educating
• 50:12
  yourself on them and applying them when you should be properly
• 50:19
  while you're out on the route. At the same time, ensuring that
• 50:25
  your edit book is up to date every month that you're mapping,
• 50:29
  you are present for your mapping every month and making sure all
• 50:34
  your pinpoints are correct, your TCPS are correct, your line of
• 50:39
  travel is correct. Yes, standards dropped on many
• 50:45
  things and unfortunately without going back in and renegotiating
• 50:53
  standards, that's unfortunately not going to change.
• 50:57
  But I think a lot of the ones, especially with some of these
• 51:00
  routes that are still losing comes back to, you know, you can
• 51:05
  lead a horse to water, but you can't get them to drink.
• 51:08
  But I do think all that information on Rex scans and the
• 51:16
  educating of the carriers instead of just saying, well,
• 51:20
  it's on the union website needs to be available for every
• 51:26
  carrier, regardless if they are dues paying or not, because
• 51:31
  again, this effects their wages. It should be available.
• 51:35
  I've said it in the past and I would, I would want to make sure
• 51:40
  it was available to everybody. And this kind of will tie in
• 51:45
  with the next question as well. But I'm going to finish this up.
• 51:50
  And, and then as we're training our new RC as like I said, I
• 51:53
  have not seen the new training materials I knew they're
• 51:55
  supposed to include in Rex. I know as as an OJI I've got the
• 51:59
  training switched around with the last two RC as in my office
• 52:03
  to where when I'm doing their OJT I'm having them do all the
• 52:08
  Rex scans, the clock in the depart to route start load in
• 52:11
  load. Whereas before they weren't
• 52:13
  doing them, we were just doing the start load in load.
• 52:15
  Now we flip that around so when the regular comes in to take the
• 52:18
  other half, they're only doing the start load in load and the
• 52:21
  new RC as are doing all of them when we're out on the route and
• 52:26
  we, the RCA has more than one trip to the door with parcels I
• 52:30
  show I have them put it in so they get into that habit right
• 52:34
  then and there. If they have a postage due, I
• 52:36
  show them that postage due scan right then and there.
• 52:39
  If you know as, as all that stuff, unscanable parcel door,
• 52:43
  miscellaneous, all those little ones, you know, I do those as
• 52:48
  they come about while I'm training.
• 52:51
  Unfortunately, we don't get to experience them all during the,
• 52:55
  during the limited training that we have.
• 52:57
  And I think that needs to change as well.
• 53:00
  But it really comes down to getting the information out and
• 53:04
  if that means a YouTube video or, or something short and sweet
• 53:10
  describing, OK, the six mandatory ones.
• 53:13
  Well, you know, an A series on an episode on the six mandatory
• 53:17
  ones and then an episode on the ones that we do on the route.
• 53:24
  And, you know, break that up into a couple of them because
• 53:26
  there are quite a few of them and it, you know, a quick
• 53:28
  explanation with a scanner to show them how it's done, like in
• 53:32
  real time. I would love to have something
• 53:34
  like that. That way, if somebody was like,
• 53:37
  oh, hey, they could go look at it right then and there and be
• 53:39
  like, and, and they see it how it's done, not just reading it
• 53:43
  on a piece of paper with an arrow, highlighting a box with a
• 53:47
  picture of a scanner. You know, like I said, taking
• 53:50
  the piece out of Tosi's playbook there of, you know, something
• 53:54
  that's interact, you know, not quite a little, maybe a little
• 53:57
  interactive as well, but at least they can see it in action
• 54:00
  and what it is and where to do it and how it pertains to what
• 54:03
  they're going to do there. I think that's the biggest thing
• 54:07
  it comes down to with some of these routes that are
• 54:09
  consistently losing time is the mapping definitely is a huge one
• 54:15
  as well as those additional scans while you're out on the
• 54:17
  route. All right, I'm going to pass
• 54:21
  that on to the rest of you. I'm going to go with Toasty
• 54:23
  next. What we're doing is we're
• 54:28
  exactly on this podcast, we're trying to educate you.
• 54:30
  We're trying to get give you the information in a digestible
• 54:33
  manner. We're trying to give it to you
• 54:35
  while you can listen while delivering.
• 54:38
  You don't have to sit there in front of computer and watch a
• 54:40
  video or you know, try to do that.
• 54:42
  This is a way that we can do multiple things.
• 54:45
  You know, if you want to watch a video of that, what's easier for
• 54:48
  you, we can go ahead and start doing that.
• 54:50
  Go ahead and keep an eye out. I was getting ready to start
• 54:53
  editing, but other than that, with podcasting, you can listen
• 54:58
  on the route, put in your earbud, you know, one earbud.
• 55:01
  Be safe and basically we. Just got the talk.
• 55:04
  You're not supposed to have earbuds on while you're driving,
• 55:06
  but you can have one earbud in while you're on the workroom
• 55:10
  floor. Case in your mail.
• 55:12
  Or if you have Bluetooth in your POV or in the Metris.
• 55:16
  A speaker. A speaker?
• 55:18
  Yep, a speaker in your LLVFFV, whatever you're driving.
• 55:24
  And that way you can hear the information.
• 55:26
  It may take a few times, or you may be like, OK, you know, I
• 55:29
  have a question about that. You know, try to remember.
• 55:33
  Or if you need to write it down, try to write it down and send a
• 55:35
  message. You know, we have the Discord
• 55:37
  group, there's the Facebook group.
• 55:39
  There's multiple avenues where you can ask questions.
• 55:42
  That way you can get clarification, and that's what
• 55:44
  we're trying to do. We're trying to make it easier
• 55:47
  for everyone to understand the entire process.
• 55:53
  James. Your point on the scanners is
• 55:59
  exactly accurate, but I want to specify that there's also
• 56:04
  another aspect of this that a lot of people are forgetting
• 56:07
  about when it comes to your evaluation.
• 56:11
  And that is this is an average of everything.
• 56:15
  Our current president loves to talk about bell curves.
• 56:19
  Our evaluation is a bell curve. So when you have days constantly
• 56:26
  where you have 100 and 10200 packages consistently, and then
• 56:30
  you have that one day where you have 10 packages, guess what?
• 56:34
  Your evaluation just dropped because of those 10 packages.
• 56:38
  That one day because Amazon didn't show up, the postal truck
• 56:41
  didn't show up, and so you only delivered 10 packages, well,
• 56:44
  that just hurt your evaluation big time.
• 56:47
  And then the next day, if you don't get the packages that were
• 56:51
  supposed to be for that day or they're just slowly filtered in
• 56:54
  throughout the week, that keeps your evaluation lower.
• 56:58
  So you have to be cognizant of what's going on with your route
• 57:02
  on that. Same with the mail volume.
• 57:05
  You know when you have a heavy Monday and then the rest of the
• 57:10
  week you're breaking? Up, James.
• 57:15
  So you have to monitor, you have to monitor what's going on with
• 57:20
  your route every single day and make sure that you're covering
• 57:25
  everything that you need to do every single day.
• 57:30
  And also the mini mail surveys, knowing what you can and cannot
• 57:37
  dispute is another one I still think.
• 57:41
  Again, this is stuff that's found on the website, but again,
• 57:45
  I feel it's something that every Craft member should have access
• 57:49
  to right away on how to properly dispute mini mail surveys as
• 57:56
  well as there was one more thing and it just slipped my mind.
• 57:59
  I'm sorry. Go ahead, Bill, if you got
• 58:00
  anything to add on to this. Well, me, one of the one of the
• 58:10
  problems is that we are dependent on management to train
• 58:15
  our carriers in the Rex program. And we have seen that it's been
• 58:20
  such a catastrophic failure because they weren't trained,
• 58:25
  therefore falls back on the union.
• 58:28
  Then the union turns around and, and puts the onus on the
• 58:32
  carriers. What is the purpose of the union
• 58:37
  if it doesn't educate the carriers?
• 58:39
  I mean, it it, it's not a matter of you have to go to school
• 58:43
  every day or anything like that. It's a matter of having that
• 58:46
  information available to them and not that they have to search
• 58:50
  through the NRLCA website for 20 minutes to find one iota of
• 58:56
  information pertaining to their situation.
• 58:59
  I'm talking about a daily, weekly, monthly, every single
• 59:06
  day, if not several times a day. If situations come up, it ought
• 59:10
  to be posted on that situation in regards to the what that
• 59:15
  carrier's, you know, looking for.
• 59:18
  If management is incapable, unwilling the experience, just
• 59:26
  stupid, OK, to the point where they can't even train the
• 59:31
  carriers. And we've seen this across the
• 59:33
  country. I've seen in my own office
• 59:36
  because none of our our supervisors were ever trained.
• 59:38
  Our postmaster was never trained.
• 59:41
  And it becomes the onus of the union to make sure the
• 59:44
  membership has access to that material, educate themselves in
• 59:48
  regards to the Rex program, in regards to the six O 3, the Elm,
• 59:52
  you know, any publications. They need to protect themselves
• 59:56
  as well as to do their jobs, you know, in a professionally
• 1:00:01
  efficient manner, safely every day.
• 1:00:04
  So to sit there and blame management, that's a cop out to
• 1:00:08
  me. And, and we ought to be out
• 1:00:10
  there educating the carriers to make sure that they have all the
• 1:00:13
  resources available to them. To make sure that they're
• 1:00:16
  getting paid for what they're doing.
• 1:00:19
  And as the the director of Stewart Operations, I know James
• 1:00:24
  will immediately turn around and say we will not settle for
• 1:00:28
  language. There will be financial
• 1:00:31
  penalties for every time you violate the contract.
• 1:00:34
  We are going to make you pay. Like I said in my statement in
• 1:00:37
  the magazine, we're going to make the USPS stand up and take
• 1:00:42
  notice because we're not going to back down.
• 1:00:47
  We're tired of it and we're coming after you.
• 1:00:55
  All right. And like I said that one kind of
• 1:00:58
  fed into the next question here. Do you intend to open the NRLC
• 1:01:05
  website to non dues paying rule carriers or create a partially
• 1:01:11
  password site that they can access or leave non union
• 1:01:15
  members where they are now with no official way to access union
• 1:01:19
  information about their job? I you know I am not against
• 1:01:29
  opening part of it up to non union members the things that
• 1:01:33
  affect their job directly, especially with Rex, the Rex
• 1:01:37
  information should be available. I do believe there should be
• 1:01:41
  more information available to non union members, but there are
• 1:01:45
  still information that union members would have, you know,
• 1:01:49
  that would still be under password but not everything
• 1:01:54
  Bill. I'm torn on this because I, I
• 1:01:59
  grew up in a union household and from the, from the, you know,
• 1:02:03
  late 60s and 70s, I've seen the consequences of non union versus
• 1:02:11
  union. And as of this moment, I'll
• 1:02:14
  stand at this, there are avenues that we can provide non union
• 1:02:22
  members. I'm not sure that we need to.
• 1:02:29
  And the reason I say that is because there are other websites
• 1:02:31
  out there, ruralinfo.net and you know, there's the OWCP things
• 1:02:38
  on, on Wednesdays. There's fed up.
• 1:02:41
  There's a number of, you know, podcasts out there that can
• 1:02:45
  guide you into information that you need training materials per
• 1:02:49
  SE that people need to do their jobs, whether they're union or
• 1:02:54
  non union, I believe should be posted their local offices.
• 1:03:00
  And it's at that point it's on them to make use of that
• 1:03:05
  material that's available. But I don't think we should be
• 1:03:09
  providing it to them off the database because of the fact
• 1:03:13
  that the union members are paying to support that database.
• 1:03:18
  Our website is paid by these dues.
• 1:03:22
  So I I'm a little torn, but I'm going to remain that that the
• 1:03:27
  union website remains for the union carriers and the other
• 1:03:31
  carriers. They can turn around and use
• 1:03:34
  other resources for information, as well as talking to their
• 1:03:37
  union brothers and sisters in their office.
• 1:03:44
  Toasty. I think I'm with you on the
• 1:03:49
  RRECS stuff at least because technically it does affect union
• 1:03:53
  members. You see, when APTF is a senior
• 1:03:55
  PT or yeah, senior RCA or PTF is a union member, and somebody who
• 1:04:02
  is a non union member either bids off a route or retires,
• 1:04:06
  Well, that route's now screwed up because the carrier before
• 1:04:10
  them didn't do the right scans or didn't do the scans properly,
• 1:04:15
  mapping properly, a number of things.
• 1:04:18
  Well, now it's going to take a year for that union member to
• 1:04:22
  bring that route back to where it's supposed to be.
• 1:04:24
  Incorrect format, incorrect mapping and all of that.
• 1:04:29
  It negatively effects them. So we need every single carrier
• 1:04:33
  to be educated on basically what pays us.
• 1:04:39
  So that way, no, no carrier is negatively affected because no
• 1:04:42
  matter what, we're all the same craft.
• 1:04:45
  We're all in the same job. Sure, we do different routes, we
• 1:04:48
  do different, you know, hills and streets and dirt roads, but
• 1:04:54
  it's the same job. We all do it.
• 1:04:58
  We need to make sure that everyone's paid correctly and
• 1:05:00
  everything is done correctly. Counterpoint.
• 1:05:05
  Counterpoint. Go ahead.
• 1:05:10
  I'll, I'll agree with Tosti on that.
• 1:05:13
  In my office, I performed 98% of the training for reps and I
• 1:05:20
  explained to people what you do affects your paycheck.
• 1:05:23
  I held my scanner up. I held my wallet up and
• 1:05:26
  explained what goes in the scanner goes in your wallet.
• 1:05:28
  If you don't put it in your scanner, you don't get paid for
• 1:05:30
  it. La da, la da la da.
• 1:05:33
  I also explained to the RCAS and even the ones that weren't
• 1:05:36
  there, I went around later on to make sure every RCA knew.
• 1:05:39
  What this route gets credited for is based on what you put
• 1:05:44
  into the scanner, how you're doing your job, what functions
• 1:05:46
  you're performing. If it affects the route pay, it
• 1:05:50
  affects your pay. So you have a vested interest in
• 1:05:53
  this route. Whether you do it one day a
• 1:05:56
  week, two days a week, whatever, it affects your paycheck.
• 1:06:02
  So if you shortcut it, you're shortcutting yourself.
• 1:06:06
  And if I'm the carrier of record, I find out you're
• 1:06:09
  shortcutting and you have to deal with me because now you're
• 1:06:13
  affecting my paycheck. Now in light of that, I've had
• 1:06:18
  union members who've had full access to all the materials, all
• 1:06:22
  the training, their routes went down because they skipped on the
• 1:06:27
  process and then they cried about it.
• 1:06:31
  And it's taken them the three mini mail surveys to get close
• 1:06:35
  to where they were, not back to where they were, but close.
• 1:06:39
  But now they see the value of doing their job correctly.
• 1:06:43
  You still will have RC as out there, you know, skipping on,
• 1:06:46
  you know, procedures. We have regulars that do it.
• 1:06:50
  AB one, he goes through his route, it's an 8.6 hour route,
• 1:06:55
  and if he puts six hours in every day, that's a long day for
• 1:07:00
  him. But that's his route and that's
• 1:07:02
  what he prefers to do and he doesn't really care.
• 1:07:05
  And he doesn't check up on a sub or anything because he doesn't
• 1:07:08
  care. He's getting done in six hours
• 1:07:10
  making a 43 K. You can't possibly get everybody
• 1:07:16
  to agree to do the job correctly.
• 1:07:19
  You can't possibly get people to not nagle in the office with a
• 1:07:24
  supervisor to ever have a relationship with or be in
• 1:07:27
  buggies with somebody or a former ADR or whatever.
• 1:07:31
  It doesn't matter. You're always going to have
• 1:07:33
  those rotten apples in the barrel.
• 1:07:36
  What you can do is turn around and educate everybody at the
• 1:07:39
  same level, at the office level. And I, I, I can't agree to that.
• 1:07:47
  You know, like you said, a gentleman steps into a route
• 1:07:50
  that, you know, nobody took care of because they were a non union
• 1:07:52
  member. Well, that's the problem of that
• 1:07:55
  office. Because in my office, everybody
• 1:07:57
  got the same amount of information, same amount of
• 1:08:00
  support, and they all had my phone number and they all made
• 1:08:03
  use of it except for several carriers and their routes are 40
• 1:08:07
  ones and J routes now. So it's up to the individual.
• 1:08:13
  You can't protect everybody from themselves.
• 1:08:16
  And yes, Mr. Johnson, split routes are a big headache.
• 1:08:22
  James. What do you well, I'm, I'm go
• 1:08:29
  ahead. Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna
• 1:08:31
  actually split the two. So in my opinion, the website is
• 1:08:37
  paid for by dues paying members. So therefore they should have
• 1:08:42
  access to every bit of information that this union
• 1:08:44
  produces, every bit of it. But I also believe our non dues
• 1:08:50
  paying members have a right to the public information.
• 1:08:55
  So that would include all the postal manuals, that would
• 1:09:00
  include the contract, that would include the training materials
• 1:09:04
  for wrecks and things like that. They don't have to have full
• 1:09:08
  access to every piece of information.
• 1:09:11
  They can get that by paying dues to help support the system.
• 1:09:16
  But I also believe that if we get a leadership in the office
• 1:09:21
  that the carriers actually feel are taking care of the carriers,
• 1:09:25
  a lot of the people that pulled their dues will go back into a
• 1:09:29
  dues paying status. Because I've talked to so many
• 1:09:33
  carriers that have left the the union with Do's because they
• 1:09:41
  felt they weren't being listened to, they weren't having their
• 1:09:45
  issues discussed or they were being completely ignored like
• 1:09:51
  Bill said as a joke earlier. Let me get back to you on that.
• 1:09:55
  Let me look into that. I'll get back to you.
• 1:09:59
  Don't worry about it. I'll get with you and they
• 1:10:02
  don't. It's time for our union to
• 1:10:06
  listen to the people, and people should have access to the most
• 1:10:11
  basic pieces of information to do their jobs.
• 1:10:24
  All right, next, go ahead. So somebody going to talk?
• 1:10:31
  All right. This, this, this is what we we
• 1:10:33
  are representing, ladies and gentlemen.
• 1:10:36
  We're representing ourselves as being just the candidates, you
• 1:10:40
  know, for a national ourselves as being your voice because
• 1:10:46
  we're not going to do this alone without your help.
• 1:10:48
  We're not going to do this and we're not going to do this
• 1:10:52
  without your knowledge. So, you know, when situations
• 1:10:55
  come to come to a head and need the leadership step in, you're
• 1:11:00
  going to be able to get a hold of us.
• 1:11:02
  Yes, there is a chain of command, but the President's
• 1:11:07
  office OK or the buck stops at the Department of of Stewart
• 1:11:12
  Operations and it and we will listen to you because we're not
• 1:11:19
  going to be out there on your route.
• 1:11:20
  You are. So you have no, it's fine.
• 1:11:25
  And then we'll step up and be your voice.
• 1:11:31
  All right. This next one says, do you think
• 1:11:42
  accepting pushing for A1 Member one vote will become an option
• 1:11:47
  in our union under new leadership bill?
• 1:11:52
  Yes, it's the only fairway to represent the crack.
• 1:11:58
  I, I, you know, 1%, yeah. Not not by 1% of the people who
• 1:12:03
  can afford, but by everybody who pays dues. 100% yes.
• 1:12:11
  Yes, and I agree, and that was my thing too is I absolutely
• 1:12:14
  think it should be 1 member, one vote.
• 1:12:17
  Every member should be able to vote on who their national
• 1:12:20
  leaders are. I completely agree with that
• 1:12:23
  100% Kosty. Same, you know, we, I get the
• 1:12:29
  delegate system, I get the, you know, representative type of
• 1:12:33
  deal, but it, it's, it's too convoluted.
• 1:12:36
  A lot of people don't understand it.
• 1:12:38
  I mean, even my local, former local president of our union
• 1:12:43
  didn't understand like you have to be a national delegate in
• 1:12:46
  order to vote on the national board of who's going to be.
• 1:12:52
  So we need to be able to create a system.
• 1:12:55
  We need to be able to find out how to make it work and go ahead
• 1:13:00
  and push for that. James.
• 1:13:06
  So I've actually had this discussion several times with
• 1:13:09
  people about the one member, one vote issue here.
• 1:13:13
  And the biggest roadblock we have to that is that is a
• 1:13:18
  constitutional change. And constitutional changes are
• 1:13:22
  voted on at National Convention. And you have a lot of people
• 1:13:26
  that attend National Convention that don't want to give up that
• 1:13:30
  power, just like the national board members don't want to give
• 1:13:34
  up the power that they have. And they're going to try and do
• 1:13:38
  anything and everything they can to prevent themselves from
• 1:13:41
  losing those positions. And those people that are on
• 1:13:45
  that floor, some of them who just come to visit their friends
• 1:13:49
  once a year are going to want to take away that power from the
• 1:13:53
  craft itself of the one member, one vote, if it were brought up
• 1:13:57
  as a resolution. And it has now, it has in the
• 1:14:02
  past and, and it's failed every time.
• 1:14:04
  And, and the reason is, is because the people that attend
• 1:14:07
  National Convention aren't willing to give up that power.
• 1:14:12
  And I believe our National Convention does do a lot of good
• 1:14:15
  for the craft when it comes to voting on resolutions, when it
• 1:14:19
  comes to talking about the resolutions that are up for
• 1:14:24
  discussion and things like that. But our national board should be
• 1:14:30
  representative of the craft as a whole, not just an elected
• 1:14:36
  representation of the craft that is mostly elected by name
• 1:14:41
  recognition only. And that is the biggest problem
• 1:14:46
  that we have and the biggest roadblock to the one person, one
• 1:14:49
  vote. All right.
• 1:14:54
  This next one is kind of interesting.
• 1:14:58
  Sign on bonus for new hires. Has it been done in the past and
• 1:15:02
  should we have it now? Toasty?
• 1:15:10
  I haven't even given any thought to this.
• 1:15:13
  I know that's a good one. I mean, it'd be a nice
• 1:15:19
  incentive, obviously with conditions, you know, you have
• 1:15:22
  to stay for so long type of deal.
• 1:15:25
  That's how a lot of other companies do it as well.
• 1:15:29
  That's something that we could try to push for in negotiations,
• 1:15:32
  but that's not up to us. It's up to, you know, post
• 1:15:36
  office and what we can get out of them and what we can
• 1:15:40
  negotiate and fight for. Wouldn't mind fighting for it
• 1:15:43
  absolutely, but you know, it, it's just one of those things
• 1:15:47
  that, you know, put it on the table and if it's an absolute
• 1:15:50
  no, like that's a non starter, OK, you know, try again next
• 1:15:53
  year, But that would actually probably help, especially for
• 1:15:58
  the the routes that are POV That way, you know, hey, you know,
• 1:16:03
  you have this to look forward to.
• 1:16:04
  So that way that vehicle that you bought, you can put, you
• 1:16:07
  know, a lot of money down towards it or put in, you know,
• 1:16:10
  a hefty amount of repairs towards it.
• 1:16:13
  For those that are, you know, LOV or, or Metris, that's, you
• 1:16:16
  know, a nice little bonus later on to, to just stay to make sure
• 1:16:21
  that you you make it through. But yeah, thinking about it
• 1:16:26
  more, it, it sounds like a good deal.
• 1:16:28
  That's something we should definitely write up in a
• 1:16:30
  resolution, especially for conventions coming up.
• 1:16:34
  I, I, you know, definitely it's not something that people think
• 1:16:37
  about, especially in our line of work, but we, I, I could
• 1:16:46
  definitely see, you know, if a resolution was put forth and
• 1:16:50
  passed, definitely not something that I would take off the table
• 1:16:54
  right away. That would have to be, I mean,
• 1:16:58
  obviously, you know, even if it was something that was, you
• 1:17:01
  know, once you're out of probation or you hit your one
• 1:17:04
  year mark, something of that nature, I wouldn't be against a
• 1:17:09
  a sign on bonus, James. I'm going to go against a sign
• 1:17:19
  on bonus. And don't get me wrong, I
• 1:17:24
  believe in incentivizing people to stick around is a great thing
• 1:17:27
  to do. But I think instead of giving
• 1:17:30
  management the bonuses for the offices, it should be the the
• 1:17:35
  people who actually make it happen, which would be the
• 1:17:38
  carriers on the ground, the carriers, the clerks, the people
• 1:17:42
  in that office that get management those quote UN quote
• 1:17:45
  bonuses. It should be a craft employee
• 1:17:49
  who's been there five years, 10 years, whatever should get the
• 1:17:53
  bonus more so than somebody who just came off the streets and
• 1:17:58
  stuck around for a year. And I'm not I'm not putting down
• 1:18:02
  anybody that's actually stuck around for a year, especially in
• 1:18:05
  some of these offices that I've heard about.
• 1:18:07
  But you incentivize people to be hired in.
• 1:18:12
  What are you doing to incentivize people to stay
• 1:18:16
  beyond that incentive bonus? That is the key that we're
• 1:18:21
  looking for. The part where carriers stick
• 1:18:23
  around to retirement and stick around past to to retirement and
• 1:18:28
  get everything out of this career that they possibly can.
• 1:18:34
  We need better pay more so than we do a just a a sign on bonus
• 1:18:39
  for the carriers. The carriers deserve better,
• 1:18:44
  they deserve better treatment and they deserve a better
• 1:18:49
  working environment across the board.
• 1:18:53
  Instead of paying bonuses, put it in our paychecks on our pay
• 1:18:57
  scales. Bill and then we're going to
• 1:19:03
  wrap this question up and then one more question we're going to
• 1:19:06
  get to tonight and then we're going to wind down for the night
• 1:19:08
  because we're over an hour already.
• 1:19:11
  So Bill sign on bonus yay or nay?
• 1:19:14
  I'm I, I'm a bonuses of the fact, like James says, give it
• 1:19:20
  to the people who have already earned it.
• 1:19:23
  Bonuses are, you know, to stay for a certain amount of time.
• 1:19:28
  It's not a true incentive in regards to doing the job, being
• 1:19:34
  more proficient. If we do get the better pay, if
• 1:19:39
  we get rid of take two and we can get pay scales up to match
• 1:19:45
  inflation. The cost of living important to
• 1:19:49
  me than giving bonuses out the new people versus the people
• 1:19:52
  who've been around, you know, 1520 years.
• 1:19:58
  No, I I'm against the bonus system.
• 1:20:02
  All right. I definitely could see both
• 1:20:03
  sides of the that case. All right, one more question for
• 1:20:07
  this evening and then we're going to wind this one down and
• 1:20:10
  we'll do a part four later on. With the current available
• 1:20:15
  technology, is it really necessary for the union to
• 1:20:19
  maintain and pay for residences for the national Board members?
• 1:20:25
  It seems that it would be more cost effective to pay for
• 1:20:28
  travelling when an actual face to face meeting is actually
• 1:20:32
  needed much of the day to business.
• 1:20:35
  Seems like it could be done in a remote manner.
• 1:20:39
  This would be more this would more easily allow board members
• 1:20:43
  to visit local offices and interact with members.
• 1:20:47
  In a related matter, it seems with modern technology we should
• 1:20:50
  be offering an option for Craft members to attend local meetings
• 1:20:55
  via Zoom or similar technology. We should still require a quorum
• 1:21:00
  in person, but there is no reason we can't offer
• 1:21:03
  participation virtually. Bill.
• 1:21:09
  I wouldn't get rid of all those homes and invest in condos
• 1:21:15
  almost, you know, like, you know, a timeshare situation not
• 1:21:20
  at not, not at timeshare, but like a timeshare so that when
• 1:21:23
  you had to be in Alexandria for business with the United States
• 1:21:27
  Postal Service, you'd have a place to stay.
• 1:21:31
  The homes that we have are $1,000,000 homes because of the
• 1:21:36
  area they're in as, as demonstrated during COVID, our
• 1:21:43
  national officers demonstrated, you know, quite clearly you can
• 1:21:47
  conduct business from home. So why are we paying for lawn
• 1:21:51
  services and we're paying for utility bills and everything
• 1:21:55
  else that we really don't need on a day-to-day basis.
• 1:22:01
  And if you have smaller units where, you know, like I said, a
• 1:22:05
  condo where you can just buy in, take the train, drive, whatever,
• 1:22:11
  and have a a, you know, comfortable place to reside in
• 1:22:14
  while you're conducting business, I'm all for it.
• 1:22:20
  The current language in Constitution says that we have
• 1:22:25
  to furnish living borders for them.
• 1:22:31
  Limitation on what those are and is act.
• 1:22:37
  The Constitution does not say we have to furnish those as in
• 1:22:43
  furniture and yet they have taken that to an extreme on some
• 1:22:48
  of the maybe 5 residences in Alexandria, VA. 3100 dollar
• 1:22:55
  colonial desk 12 hour, you know $10,000 TV's, you know the six
• 1:23:03
  $6800 match. You know, when you go to a
• 1:23:08
  hotel, you don't turn around and tell them that, oh, you want,
• 1:23:11
  you know, the, the, the Super queen pillow deluxe, no
• 1:23:15
  mattress, no, you get what you get.
• 1:23:19
  Matter of fact, the last time we had a in Pennsylvania, the
• 1:23:26
  officer stayed in a different hotel because they had better
• 1:23:29
  facility. What the hell?
• 1:23:34
  I mean, folks, that just that just blows away.
• 1:23:39
  But the fact of the matter is we don't need these large
• 1:23:42
  residences or our national bull, and I'm all getting rid of them.
• 1:23:51
  James. So I'm in the middle on this
• 1:23:58
  because I know that somebody like Bill would turn around and
• 1:24:06
  if he's in Alexandria and the Postal Service is doing
• 1:24:09
  something, he's gonna walk right on over to their building, knock
• 1:24:12
  on the door and be like, all right, let's sit down and talk
• 1:24:16
  because he wants to get the results as quickly as possible.
• 1:24:20
  I understand we can do stuff with technology.
• 1:24:22
  I understand that we can, you know, limit things.
• 1:24:26
  Also, the reason why they had these homes in the 1st place was
• 1:24:31
  because at the time that this was put into the constitution,
• 1:24:36
  the postal carrier was the breadwinner in the house and the
• 1:24:41
  other spouse was the stay at home parent.
• 1:24:44
  And they were a one job household which we used to be
• 1:24:49
  able to afford. Now we're in a 234 job household
• 1:24:54
  with two people in it just to barely stay afloat in a lot of
• 1:24:57
  instances. And I believe that downsizing
• 1:25:02
  what we have in Alexandria would be a good thing.
• 1:25:06
  But we also have to maintain records, not only the current
• 1:25:12
  digital ones that we have, we also need to maintain the paper
• 1:25:16
  ones because every single document that the union has
• 1:25:22
  produced, especially step fours, Mous and things like that, have
• 1:25:30
  to be kept as they are applicable in instances where
• 1:25:35
  there isn't another one to replace it.
• 1:25:37
  So you have to have those records and having them in a
• 1:25:41
  specific office to do the union stuff helps them focus more on
• 1:25:49
  taking care of the union. At least it would for me.
• 1:25:52
  If I was sitting in an office that was specifically for the
• 1:25:55
  director of Stewart Operations, I'm going to be focused on that
• 1:25:59
  specific task in that office. If I was doing it from home, I'd
• 1:26:02
  be distracted by my cat, my dog, you know, whatever else is going
• 1:26:06
  on in my house. But when I'm in an office that I
• 1:26:10
  am locked into that specific job, that's what I'm doing.
• 1:26:16
  So there's, there's double sides to all of this, but we have to
• 1:26:20
  think about what is actually best for the craft as a whole.
• 1:26:24
  And being right there next to the Postal Service if anything
• 1:26:27
  hits the fan is probably the best bet overall for the
• 1:26:31
  protection of this craft. I, I, I've kind of split on it
• 1:26:38
  too. Just, I mean, I could definitely
• 1:26:42
  see Bill's side of downsizing. I mean, like it.
• 1:26:48
  I know Ronnie has said this in past national conventions about
• 1:26:52
  people uprooting their families to move to Alexandria.
• 1:26:57
  You know, and you see it now with, you know, a lot,
• 1:27:01
  especially if you have small kids, you know, that's I think
• 1:27:05
  pays a big thing on people not wanting to step up and run at
• 1:27:09
  times, especially if you have school aged children.
• 1:27:13
  You know, for me, in my instance, if I was to be
• 1:27:16
  elected, I would be going down and I think my daughter said
• 1:27:21
  she'd come with me, but why would I need a whole house if
• 1:27:27
  it's just one or two people? I, I definitely see the
• 1:27:30
  downsizing to like a condo that's available or for the what
• 1:27:36
  is considered the resident officers.
• 1:27:39
  Now that way we do have a place to stay.
• 1:27:43
  We have the normal amenities, but I don't think it needs to be
• 1:27:48
  luxurious in any manner. You know, give me a comfortable
• 1:27:50
  bed that I can sleep in. It's not going to rack my back
• 1:27:52
  every night. A stove, some cookware, ATV and
• 1:27:56
  a desk to set up my computer. You know, I don't need a lot.
• 1:28:00
  I can be in a minimalist. I, I think the minimalist thing,
• 1:28:04
  definitely I see that size like what with what Bill's saying and
• 1:28:10
  I'd see where James is saying as well with, you know, you're, you
• 1:28:15
  want to be focused. And I'm the same way because
• 1:28:17
  even just sitting down here in my little spare room in my
• 1:28:20
  basement, you know, I got my kittens running back and forth.
• 1:28:23
  I've got, you know, the other half is upstairs watching TV or
• 1:28:27
  playing video games. You guys have all heard, you
• 1:28:30
  know, my daughter come in and out when she's gone to work or
• 1:28:33
  comes home from work or whatever and says hi, you know, post show
• 1:28:37
  or what not, you know, there's those distractions.
• 1:28:40
  So yeah, you know, minimal, smaller, I don't, you know,
• 1:28:45
  don't need anything spacious. So no, yeah, I I'm kind of in
• 1:28:48
  the middle of that as well. Toasty.
• 1:28:51
  I know the position you're running for is a non resident
• 1:28:54
  position, but what is your feeling on this?
• 1:28:58
  I agree on the downsizing. Let's let's clean up the books.
• 1:29:01
  Let's make it super simple, you know, let's go to the condos.
• 1:29:06
  Let's go ahead. And yes, some people are
• 1:29:08
  uprooting their whole families, which is why I'm not running for
• 1:29:12
  a resident position. I'm not going to uproot my two
• 1:29:14
  kids from the school that they're at right now.
• 1:29:17
  The what we've built so far here, just to go all the way
• 1:29:21
  over there to just try to get this job done.
• 1:29:24
  I'm not going to make a career out of this.
• 1:29:26
  And it shouldn't be a career out of this.
• 1:29:28
  That should be a, you know, like a Stewart position that you
• 1:29:31
  should do it for the good of the craft, get what you need to get
• 1:29:35
  done and then go back to your route so that way you can
• 1:29:37
  experience what current carriers are going through.
• 1:29:41
  You know, none of the board had to deal with 5010 thousand for,
• 1:29:47
  for me, $14,000 cut in pay and for other people it was $14,000
• 1:29:53
  cut in pay and they lost their days off and then turn around
• 1:29:56
  and told you had it too good for too long.
• 1:29:59
  Don't worry about it. Be happy with what you have.
• 1:30:03
  No, I'm sorry, no, that you, if you're not experiencing it, you
• 1:30:07
  don't know the struggle. Come back to your route, figure
• 1:30:11
  it out, talk to your fellow Co workers, your brothers and
• 1:30:14
  sisters, and then go back later. But I'm not going to make career
• 1:30:21
  of this. I want to do my four years.
• 1:30:22
  I want to help out the craft, come back, watch my kids
• 1:30:25
  graduate, you know, send them off to college.
• 1:30:28
  If they're going to go to college or whatever they're
• 1:30:30
  going to do, support them through that.
• 1:30:32
  Maybe run again later on once they're older and, you know,
• 1:30:36
  maybe they start having grandbabies, I'll go ahead and,
• 1:30:38
  you know, maybe run again then. But I'm not going to make a
• 1:30:40
  career out of it to try to get an additional retirement.
• 1:30:44
  I like the plan that I'm on now. I want to help the craft though,
• 1:30:48
  so that's why I'm doing this. And I agree with you the same
• 1:30:51
  way, you know, even as as a resident officer, it's not a pad
• 1:30:57
  my retirement or, you know, get off the route and go sit in a
• 1:31:01
  luxurious, you know, in a, in a bigger house and, and you know,
• 1:31:07
  all that stuff. To me, it's not, you know, give
• 1:31:09
  me a minimalist condo, the basics that I need to survive,
• 1:31:14
  go to my grocery shop and place to cook.
• 1:31:17
  You know, that that's all I need a place to rest for the night,
• 1:31:21
  you know, kick my feet up after a full day in the office.
• 1:31:24
  Plus that that's, that's all I need.
• 1:31:27
  And then you know, when I know that I'm you know, where it's
• 1:31:31
  time to hang my head up on that spot and go back to my route.
• 1:31:36
  And you know that we've paved the way for the next cycle of
• 1:31:40
  national leadership to come up. It doesn't need to be a full
• 1:31:46
  2345 bedroom house, you know, a two-bedroom condo.
• 1:31:49
  That's all I need. I am definitely a good on the
• 1:31:52
  sizing and like I said, it's not a pad my retirement for me at
• 1:31:56
  all. It it's to help the craft.
• 1:32:00
  It's to be there for the craft to let the craft know that yes,
• 1:32:02
  we are listening. We are we're we're trying to do
• 1:32:05
  what we can to make things better for the entire craft.
• 1:32:11
  Anything else to add guys? I just want to say you're
• 1:32:15
  exactly right. You know, something that just
• 1:32:18
  fits the people that are going to be doing this job.
• 1:32:21
  No, because guess what? At the end of it, you go back
• 1:32:25
  home to your route. Current national board members,
• 1:32:29
  when they leave their positions, they want to go retire.
• 1:32:33
  I know that one of them did go back to their route for
• 1:32:36
  approximately 2 weeks before they decided it wasn't for them
• 1:32:40
  anymore and wanted back out on on the union duties.
• 1:32:43
  So that tells you exactly their mindset.
• 1:32:47
  They can't handle the job that we do now, so they want to stay
• 1:32:52
  in union leadership positions, but it shouldn't be so cozy and
• 1:32:56
  comfortable up there that they want to stay there past
• 1:33:00
  retirement and keep doing union leadership stuff until they
• 1:33:05
  decide they finally want to ride off into the sunset in
• 1:33:08
  retirement or they kick the bucket while they're in office
• 1:33:11
  that. Was kind of grim.
• 1:33:19
  I, I, I didn't have, I didn't have anything to say to that.
• 1:33:23
  So. I, I just, I just tell it how it
• 1:33:26
  is. That's, that's what it is.
• 1:33:27
  We got to tell it how it is. It's the same to the craft.
• 1:33:30
  If you're going to do stuff, you got to tell the craft exactly
• 1:33:33
  how it is, exactly what's going on and exactly where things are
• 1:33:36
  going. You can't go around and just try
• 1:33:39
  to make everybody feel better about things because you have to
• 1:33:44
  be honest with the craft. I agree, you know, and, and you
• 1:33:49
  know, going following reading through this again, you know,
• 1:33:53
  allow board members to visit more local offices and direct
• 1:33:56
  room members. And I know I've touched on this
• 1:33:58
  in the past with, you know, we have to get permission to go
• 1:34:03
  onto a work room floor to visit an office ahead of time through
• 1:34:05
  via USPS. That I, I right at this as it
• 1:34:09
  stands right now, that's what we have to, that's what a national
• 1:34:12
  officer has to do is have permission to enter into an
• 1:34:14
  office. However, you know, and I've
• 1:34:17
  mentioned this before, you know, I'd be all about, you know, the
• 1:34:23
  summer picnics somebody's, you know, region is doing or
• 1:34:26
  something like that. Reach out to me.
• 1:34:28
  And if we're not tied down in the middle of contract
• 1:34:31
  negotiations or there's not an emergency that we're handling,
• 1:34:35
  you know, I'm all about not officially and I'm saying
• 1:34:39
  officially not being paid by the union to go travel, to go hang
• 1:34:43
  out with the membership and talk to them directly face to face
• 1:34:47
  during the down times. I I think that would totally be
• 1:34:52
  workable in certain situations. And the NR OS too.
• 1:35:00
  Exactly, yes. You know, put put your faces out
• 1:35:05
  there, let the people see who you are and let let them, you
• 1:35:09
  know, piss on your shoulder, cry on your shoulder, whatevers, you
• 1:35:13
  know. But, you know, put the face
• 1:35:16
  forward and let them know that the unions here and we want to
• 1:35:19
  know, you know, what your concerns are.
• 1:35:22
  Absolutely. All right, guys, we're getting
• 1:35:26
  on to 9:30. We're going to go ahead and wrap
• 1:35:28
  this up tonight. Do you guys have anything that
• 1:35:30
  you want to say? Final words, anybody, James?
• 1:35:36
  Well, we want your vote. We're pushing for that with
• 1:35:42
  these Q&A S And yes, we're politicizing our podcast a
• 1:35:46
  little bit by doing so, but we want to show you what we're
• 1:35:50
  thinking because it's difficult for us to get out to the
• 1:35:54
  membership in a normal way. The current leadership has the
• 1:35:59
  national magazine that they send out, and that is just them
• 1:36:04
  politicizing themselves as well in many instances because
• 1:36:08
  they're talking about the crap right then and there.
• 1:36:11
  This is our only platform that we really have that we can sit
• 1:36:15
  down, talk about the things and show you what we feel.
• 1:36:20
  And the biggest thing we want to show you is that all of us
• 1:36:25
  together know that at the end of the day, we're all in this
• 1:36:29
  together. Toasty, you know, yeah, if
• 1:36:37
  you're going to national, we would really appreciate your
• 1:36:40
  vote. But you also have to, well, this
• 1:36:42
  is also for those that are voting for national delegates.
• 1:36:45
  You know, if your ballots are already in or they're, you know,
• 1:36:48
  still going out, try to reach out.
• 1:36:51
  I know I went through, I have a list of over 100 people that I
• 1:36:55
  searched through Facebook. They have something.
• 1:36:58
  I tried to message them, you know, Hey, you know, how do you
• 1:37:01
  feel about the current state of the union?
• 1:37:02
  That's all. I asked them and then they
• 1:37:05
  responded back. Based on that response, I either
• 1:37:07
  voted for them or I didn't. You know, it would be nice if we
• 1:37:11
  had the system of, you know, one person, one vote, you know,
• 1:37:16
  where everyone gets to vote on the entire board.
• 1:37:18
  But we don't have that yet. We can try to work towards it,
• 1:37:23
  but we got to get enough people to vote on it.
• 1:37:25
  When we get to National Convention, You know, we're,
• 1:37:29
  we're doing this for y'all. We're, we're fighting for y'all.
• 1:37:34
  We're, we're tired too. We're exhausted too.
• 1:37:38
  We're upset about the mismanagement and the way
• 1:37:42
  carriers are being treated. We want to be your voice.
• 1:37:47
  Let your voice be heard. We appreciate everything that
• 1:37:51
  you can throw at us. Bill.
• 1:37:56
  Well, I'm going to coin a phrase that we use a lot in
• 1:37:59
  Westchester, and that is you can't make this shit up.
• 1:38:04
  Now I know that doesn't sound very presidential, but it's the
• 1:38:08
  reality of our current situation.
• 1:38:12
  And when I talk to people and I see the Facebook postings, the
• 1:38:18
  other social media, you know, postings that are out there and,
• 1:38:21
  and, and I just shake my head and, and, and say, you can't
• 1:38:25
  make this shit up. I, when the, the question came
• 1:38:28
  up about buying back time and there was RCA for what, 23
• 1:38:32
  years? Is it 23 years, 24?
• 1:38:35
  And I'm sitting here going, Oh my God, it's like, you can't
• 1:38:39
  make this shit up. I mean, you know, where's the
• 1:38:43
  reward for all the years of service for this individual?
• 1:38:48
  But where, I mean, where, where's the pot of gold at the
• 1:38:50
  end of the rainbow? Where, where is the retirement
• 1:38:53
  cushion that they should have? And as much as stuff goes on in
• 1:38:59
  my office, I see it repeated across the country.
• 1:39:03
  And I'm sick and tired of it. And it's time to put a national
• 1:39:07
  board up there with leadership who's willing to go to bat for
• 1:39:12
  you. Not interested in padding their
• 1:39:13
  retirement. OK, not interested in power and
• 1:39:17
  authority. But we're interested in the
• 1:39:20
  individual, every individual in this craft.
• 1:39:25
  That's, that's our purpose. That that's our goal.
• 1:39:29
  Represent everybody, not ourselves.
• 1:39:32
  Trust me. It it's, it's not a picnic to go
• 1:39:35
  to, you know, Alexandria and be displaced from your families.
• 1:39:39
  It's not a bad deal for me. I'm in Pennsylvania, so I'm
• 1:39:41
  only, you know, 2 1/2, three hours away.
• 1:39:44
  But other people are travelling from across the country and
• 1:39:47
  they're going to be disconnected from their families.
• 1:39:51
  This is the sacrifice we're willing to put out.
• 1:39:53
  Oh, OK. You get the big salary and all
• 1:39:55
  that. We will show you what the
• 1:39:58
  national board should look like. We will be putting in the hours
• 1:40:03
  and the effort. To make sure that you are
• 1:40:07
  represented, that you have complete faith in the integrity
• 1:40:13
  of those people that you elect into the national board.
• 1:40:18
  Because the last thing I had before you put me in the into
• 1:40:20
  the ground is my word. And my word is gold.
• 1:40:26
  I will go out of my way and I have gone out of my way
• 1:40:29
  throughout my life to help others, even at a cost to myself
• 1:40:34
  because it's the right thing to do.
• 1:40:36
  That's the way I was raised. It's a gland my wife wishes I
• 1:40:40
  didn't have. But I'm sorry, I I can't can't
• 1:40:44
  stand to see people treated poorly.
• 1:40:48
  I can't stand to see craft members fighting with them each
• 1:40:51
  other. And I just can't stand the fact
• 1:40:54
  that you can't make a living wage at the table, too, in the
• 1:40:59
  United States Postal Service in this day and age.
• 1:41:08
  Thank you guys. And yeah, I, you know, I, I'm,
• 1:41:13
  I'm not a politician either. I'm a rural carrier.
• 1:41:17
  I'm a human being. I'm me.
• 1:41:20
  Sometimes I thought slipped my mind, I get scatterbrained.
• 1:41:24
  I'm, I'm just me. And but the one thing that I do
• 1:41:28
  care about is, is the rural craft.
• 1:41:31
  I mean, I love my job. I have a target on my back in my
• 1:41:35
  office right now. For whatever reason, management
• 1:41:38
  won't talk to me or tell me what their issue is with me, But they
• 1:41:42
  want to me and another carrier, they want to tell the other
• 1:41:47
  carriers to not associate with us what we did.
• 1:41:51
  We have no clue because they won't bring it to us.
• 1:41:53
  I mean, I've been, I, you know, I'm on that receiving end.
• 1:41:55
  I know what that's like. I, you know, I, I stand up for
• 1:42:00
  myself. I stand up for the other
• 1:42:02
  carriers in my office. I represented them as as a
• 1:42:06
  steward when needed when I was a steward.
• 1:42:09
  I still stand up for everybody in my office as a carrier when
• 1:42:14
  things need to be stood up for and that, you know, wants to put
• 1:42:18
  a target on my back. So be it because, you know, I'm
• 1:42:21
  the flavor of the month to, to put the bull's eye on.
• 1:42:25
  Really need to get a shirt with a bull's eye on the back one of
• 1:42:27
  these days. But you know, I, I care about
• 1:42:31
  everybody and I try, you know, to listen to everybody.
• 1:42:35
  And for one of our listeners who reached out to me and I told him
• 1:42:38
  I'd give him a call as soon as, you know, as soon I do apologize
• 1:42:42
  for not getting back to you right away.
• 1:42:44
  I will definitely within this week.
• 1:42:46
  My state convention's up Tuesday.
• 1:42:48
  I'm going to try on Wednesday or Thursday to give you a call.
• 1:42:50
  Again, I apologize. A lot of things have come up,
• 1:42:54
  the office stuff and then, you know, stuff on the home front
• 1:42:56
  too. So you know, it, it, it's there.
• 1:42:59
  You know, we're human beings, but we're people that care about
• 1:43:03
  everybody and we want to do what we can for you guys to to make
• 1:43:08
  sure that we have a healthier future for the craft because,
• 1:43:13
  you know, together we can be that change.
• 1:43:16
  We just need you to support us. You know, yes, we, we have
• 1:43:21
  turned several of these episodes into more of a campaigning
• 1:43:24
  thing, but it is our way to get our word out to people and to
• 1:43:31
  hopefully get people to become more active, to see the benefits
• 1:43:37
  of being a union member and to be active and what it means to
• 1:43:43
  be active. To know that your little voice
• 1:43:45
  may have a change. You could write a resolution
• 1:43:49
  that goes all the way up and through and eventually into a
• 1:43:51
  contract. You don't know if you don't take
• 1:43:54
  that chance. You don't know if you can be
• 1:43:57
  part of the change if you don't step up.
• 1:43:59
  I mean, I, I, I ran for this position two years ago as an
• 1:44:04
  RCA, you know, just to get RC as at National Convention is
• 1:44:08
  pulling teeth at times because we are the Subs, we're the one,
• 1:44:11
  we were the ones that were working so the regulars could
• 1:44:15
  go, the ones that you know, were full working and going.
• 1:44:18
  And now as a regular, I am still there fighting for every single
• 1:44:22
  RCA and every new regular. And not just new regulars, but
• 1:44:28
  our veteran regulars out there too.
• 1:44:30
  You know, I, I fight for Bill, I fight for James, for Toasty, for
• 1:44:34
  myself, for my Co workers, for my Co worker, you know, for my
• 1:44:38
  craft members in the area offices, for my craft members
• 1:44:41
  across the country. I fight for every single one of
• 1:44:45
  you and put your best interests at the top.
• 1:44:49
  I mean, that's kind of a downfall for me is like tend to
• 1:44:51
  put everybody's interests ahead of my own at times, but that's
• 1:44:56
  just who I am. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm a human being
• 1:45:00
  that cares. And to know that you have four
• 1:45:04
  people right now that you're listening to that care and want
• 1:45:09
  to see the changes and want to try to make the changes.
• 1:45:14
  And we all need your support. So on that note, we are going to
• 1:45:19
  close up for tonight. We will be back at regular time
• 1:45:24
  next Sunday and James and I and have a state convention come up.
• 1:45:32
  Toasty is yours coming up too? He.
• 1:45:34
  Ran. He had to go work at Target.
• 1:45:36
  Oh, OK, sounds good. But James and I are are National
• 1:45:44
  Convention or national, excuse me, state convention.
• 1:45:47
  See, I came and talked straight half the time.
• 1:45:49
  Our state convention business starts Monday morning, but we
• 1:45:53
  have memorial and caucus tomorrow night, hence why we're
• 1:45:56
  recording today and it will be up sometime tomorrow afternoon
• 1:46:00
  before I head out for the week. So everybody, take care, stay
• 1:46:05
  safe, and we'll be back next week.