Looking Down the Barrel:
Breaking Away

by Steel Barrel News Columnist
L.T. Alsman

LT@SteelBarrelNews.com

Soon, there will be a meeting called to discuss the matter of breaking away from Local 2038, and forming a new I.L.A. Local office. There will be a vote on this action. Make your voice heard.

The following items are benefits of forming our own I.L.A. Local office.

1 All executive board members will be Beta employees. This will allow the Board to focus on Beta Steel's working conditions exclusively. This would not only improve the quality of representation, increase the time spent on Beta related issues, but also, the Board would be experiencing the same effects of their actions as all other Union/Beta employees.

2. Dues and check-off taxes will be used to improve the local's quality of representation, and not used to enhance the lives of the few persons that have historically consumed 2038's funding.

3. It will provide an opportunity to refine the grievance procedure to a more viable division of authority which will allow a grievant to negotiate a complaint without the premature interference of upper echelon persons from both sides.

4. Overhead costs could be drastically slashed. We all know what I am referring to here if you have read the "financial report" from the existing 2038 Local. For one thing, we can eliminate the practice of listing large expenditures as "other."

5. As a newly developed Local for the I.L.A., we would be allowed to construct our own Local By-Laws. They would have to comply with certain issues in our International By-Laws but the remaining issues could be directed toward the proper function of the new Local both contractually and financially.