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SUPREME COURT RULES AGAINST SEIU

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VectorMan

VectorMan

The Supreme Court announced Thursday its opinion in the Knox v. Service Employees International Union (SEIU) case, ruling that the First Amendment gives state employees the right to decline to pay dues used for political advocacy by the union.

More specifically, unions in California can no longer force non-union state workers to finance political campaigns. And now the legal precedent has been set.

But how did the SEIU get away with charging non-members in the first place? Red State explains:

In California, public workers are not required to join a union. Those that do not are assessed a “fair share fee,” usually a payroll deduction remitted to the union for representing their interests in certain areas. The fee assessed is a percentage of the amount charged a union member.
Under previous Supreme Court guidance, unions are required by law to notify non-members of the fee to be assessed which is based upon an audit of the previous year’s union finances. These are called Hudson notices after an earlier Supreme Court. Persons receiving the notice then have 30 days to object to the assessment. Most notably, the fees are supposed to be used for the costs incurred by the union in collective bargaining, not political advocacy.

However, in Knox v. SEIU, the SEIU in 2005 charged union and non-union state workers an “emergency assessment” without giving proper notice or the standard 30 days to fight it.

“Knox, among others, sued the union arguing that their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated in that they were not notified, via a Hudson notice, of the purpose of the special assessment, nor were they offered the 30-day opt out period,” according to Red State.

And although the SEIU was able to convince California’s left-leaning Ninth Circuit that because the original notices said assessments were “subject to change” that they were in the clear, the Supreme Court disagrees.

Justices Sotomayor and Ginsburg agreed with the judgment, written by Justice Alito, and ruled in favor of Knox. The final ruling was 7-2; Breyer dissented, joined by Kagan, according to SCOTUS blog.

Wait – Justices Sotomayor and Ginsberg ruled against the SEIU?

Whoa.

“All that money spent electing Obama, and his first SCOTUS pick rules against #SEIU,” the Washington Examiner’s David Freddoso tweeted when news of the decision broke.

Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work, issued the following statement after news of today’s ruling broke:

Today, the United States Supreme Court upheld workers’ First Amendment rights and struck down another union boss scheme to confiscate and spend state workers’ hard earned money for politics without their permission.
Attorneys from the National Right to Work Foundation…argued, and the Court agreed, that the workers should not be forced to subsidize union officials’ political spending, even for a short period of time.
The Court closed a giant loophole that allowed union bosses to confiscate money from workers’ paychecks for political spending sprees – and sent a message to union officials, once again, that forced political conformity is unconstitutional.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/supreme-court-rules-against-seiu/

Guest


Guest

This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

Guest


Guest

Walmart needs a union.

Guest


Guest

Pcola News Journal wrote:Walmart needs a union.

I guess there are people out there that are so dumb they would not understand that comment with a comma LOL

I call those people liberals LOLOLOLOLOLOL Laughing

no stress

no stress

wild_thing wrote:This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

depends on which state you live in. Unions dont have much sway here in florida. Non binding arbitration pretty much makes it a beg fest for unions.

VectorMan

VectorMan

wild_thing wrote:This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

I agree. Unions outlived their usefulness a long time ago. But, I was surprised Obama's pick voted against the Unions. Maybe there really is some hope and change coming. Very Happy

Guest


Guest

VectorMan wrote:
wild_thing wrote:This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

I agree. Unions outlived their usefulness a long time ago. But, I was surprised Obama's pick voted against the Unions. Maybe there really is some hope and change coming. Very Happy

Sorry but I completely disagree with you. With out unions our labor force would end up being treated just like they are in china (See Apple factory in china) or even worse. A company or corporations ultimate goal is to make a profit everything else is a distant second. Companies and corporations have no loyalty to their workforce and given the chance they will reduce wages, benefits, hours and anything else they can to increase profits. Capitalism is great but capitalism left unchecked and given free reign to do as they please would completely destroy the middle class and severely hurt the American worker because profits are more important than people to a business. Been that way through out history and will never change.

Unions have run a muck with all forms of government and that does need to be fixed but government is one of the worst offenders when it comes to labor laws because government employees are subjected to the whims of politicians who use government labor as a political tool. I have worked for a union shop, non union shop, and a government agency that had a union. Working for the government was just as bad as working for a non union employer and in some cases even worse, constant battles over working schedules, overtime, job requirements, job duties, assignments and I made 20k less than working for the non union employer, 36k less than the union employer for the exact same job doing the exact same thing. I would rather work for an employer that has a union presence any day of the week.

There is a lot of hate towards unions now and I honestly think part of the reason is because the non union private sector has failed and failed miserably. When the economy was booming no one gave a crap about unions, union members or government employees protected by unions. Now the private sector is in shamble people are pissed, envious because union members and government employees haven't been affected near as bad as private sector non union employees have.

Yes the unions have amassed a lot of influence and power when negotiating with the government and private sector companies and have abused that influence and power to the detriment of it's members but it needs to be fixed not completely dismantled. Unions have done many good things for the American worker and even though I lean repub 80% of the time but I can not agree with them on the Union issue.



Guest


Guest

VectorMan wrote:
wild_thing wrote:This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

I agree. Unions outlived their usefulness a long time ago. But, I was surprised Obama's pick voted against the Unions. Maybe there really is some hope and change coming. Very Happy

BTW I do completely agree with the ruling.

9SUPREME COURT RULES AGAINST SEIU Empty Failure of unions 6/22/2012, 1:48 am

Markle

Markle

alecto wrote:
VectorMan wrote:
wild_thing wrote:This is a BIG DEAL.

The unions are way too powerful and in my opinion we dont need unions anymore.

all they do is raise the cost of doing business and enforce rediculus rules, like you must pay this person $20 an hour at this $10 an hour job and he/she gets a break every hour.

You might say the unions are the thug arm of the far left for squeezing the blood out of everything they touch, including the Gov.

I agree. Unions outlived their usefulness a long time ago. But, I was surprised Obama's pick voted against the Unions. Maybe there really is some hope and change coming. Very Happy

Sorry but I completely disagree with you. With out unions our labor force would end up being treated just like they are in china (See Apple factory in china) or even worse. A company or corporations ultimate goal is to make a profit everything else is a distant second. Companies and corporations have no loyalty to their workforce and given the chance they will reduce wages, benefits, hours and anything else they can to increase profits. Capitalism is great but capitalism left unchecked and given free reign to do as they please would completely destroy the middle class and severely hurt the American worker because profits are more important than people to a business. Been that way through out history and will never change.

Unions have run a muck with all forms of government and that does need to be fixed but government is one of the worst offenders when it comes to labor laws because government employees are subjected to the whims of politicians who use government labor as a political tool. I have worked for a union shop, non union shop, and a government agency that had a union. Working for the government was just as bad as working for a non union employer and in some cases even worse, constant battles over working schedules, overtime, job requirements, job duties, assignments and I made 20k less than working for the non union employer, 36k less than the union employer for the exact same job doing the exact same thing. I would rather work for an employer that has a union presence any day of the week.

There is a lot of hate towards unions now and I honestly think part of the reason is because the non union private sector has failed and failed miserably. When the economy was booming no one gave a crap about unions, union members or government employees protected by unions. Now the private sector is in shamble people are pissed, envious because union members and government employees haven't been affected near as bad as private sector non union employees have.

Yes the unions have amassed a lot of influence and power when negotiating with the government and private sector companies and have abused that influence and power to the detriment of it's members but it needs to be fixed not completely dismantled. Unions have done many good things for the American worker and even though I lean repub 80% of the time but I can not agree with them on the Union issue.

UNION members have not been badly affected? Please go talk to the UNION auto workers in Detroit. Where did those jobs go? Where did Detroit go?

IF unions were beneficial, in this day and age, they would not have dropped in membership from 20.1% in 1983 down to 11.8% in 2011.

IF unions were so good, what happened to the airline industry, steel industry, auto industry, railroad industry...now government. See what has happened to our schools. Why has each industry, where unions have become dominent, failed?

Guest


Guest

Markle wrote:

IF unions were beneficial, in this day and age, they would not have dropped in membership from 20.1% in 1983 down to 11.8% in 2011.

IF unions were so good, what happened to the airline industry, steel industry, auto industry, railroad industry...now government. See what has happened to our schools. Why has each industry, where unions have become dominent, failed?


Businesses over the years have wised up to the fact that employees are important, that if they work with employees and listen to their concerns it provides a better working environment and if employees are happy they will be more productive which will help the business thrive and grow. I think this has lead to the decline in union memberships and that is fine because it means more businesses are evolving and being responsible to their employees. Like I said unions have done some good things. You can thank them for a 5day 40hr work week, they keep illegals from taking Americans jobs, and they do a good job of ensuring workplace safety standards.

Like everything else in the global world we live in today businesses have changed to change with the times unfortunately unions have not they still operate on a 1950's thug mentality as was this case against the SEIU. Yes unions have made a royal mess with some industries but a lot of those industries also have tons of government regulation. What has happened in the airline industry is unique, they are heavily regulated by the NTSB and the FAA for safety reasons. To meet those regulations they have to hire an army of people to comply. But hey everyone still wants low air fares so in order to increase air travel and turn a profit they started lowering their prices to the point of losing money. Unions prevented the airline industry from increasing profits by taking it from employees paychecks. In order for the airline industry to be profitable again two things have to happen, unions need to be realistic and not rape the industry, airline have to change their business model and start charging more.

I agree with you, our public school system is a disaster and while the union has had its claws in it big time politicians are just as much to blame. Government expects way above and beyond from it's employees as is the case with teachers. Government requires a teacher to have a degree and expects them to work extremely long hours for very minimal compensation (what I mean is a teachers day is not over once class is out, many work off the clock grading test, preparing lesson plans, etc.)keep in mind politicians are constantly playing games with their budget. Should a teachers salary fluctuate and still be asked to give so much because of the whims of a politician? I don't think it should. On the flip side the teachers unions are to unrealistic with some of there demands especially when it comes to firing a teacher. Personally I think a teacher should be held to a higher standard, paid accordingly and if they can't cut it they should be fired.

When it comes to government there is no balance between governments and unions. It is always from one extreme to another. I think this in large part is due to politicians and union bosses being in bed with each other and that has to stop.

I believe the reason most industry or companies where unions have become dominate fail is due to over zealous and unrealistic union members and greedy power hungry union bosses (GM, $100hr to put on a couple of bolts). Unions seem to forget the definition of the word negotiate.



Last edited by alecto on 6/22/2012, 9:36 am; edited 1 time in total

Sal

Sal

alecto wrote:Sorry but I completely disagree with you. With out unions our labor force would end up being treated just like they are in china (See Apple factory in china) or even worse. A company or corporations ultimate goal is to make a profit everything else is a distant second. Companies and corporations have no loyalty to their workforce and given the chance they will reduce wages, benefits, hours and anything else they can to increase profits. Capitalism is great but capitalism left unchecked and given free reign to do as they please would completely destroy the middle class and severely hurt the American worker because profits are more important than people to a business. Been that way through out history and will never change.

Unions have run a muck with all forms of government and that does need to be fixed but government is one of the worst offenders when it comes to labor laws because government employees are subjected to the whims of politicians who use government labor as a political tool. I have worked for a union shop, non union shop, and a government agency that had a union. Working for the government was just as bad as working for a non union employer and in some cases even worse, constant battles over working schedules, overtime, job requirements, job duties, assignments and I made 20k less than working for the non union employer, 36k less than the union employer for the exact same job doing the exact same thing. I would rather work for an employer that has a union presence any day of the week.

There is a lot of hate towards unions now and I honestly think part of the reason is because the non union private sector has failed and failed miserably. When the economy was booming no one gave a crap about unions, union members or government employees protected by unions. Now the private sector is in shamble people are pissed, envious because union members and government employees haven't been affected near as bad as private sector non union employees have.

Yes the unions have amassed a lot of influence and power when negotiating with the government and private sector companies and have abused that influence and power to the detriment of it's members but it needs to be fixed not completely dismantled. Unions have done many good things for the American worker and even though I lean repub 80% of the time but I can not agree with them on the Union issue.

Excellent post!

Guest


Guest

alecto wrote:
Markle wrote:

IF unions were beneficial, in this day and age, they would not have dropped in membership from 20.1% in 1983 down to 11.8% in 2011.

IF unions were so good, what happened to the airline industry, steel industry, auto industry, railroad industry...now government. See what has happened to our schools. Why has each industry, where unions have become dominent, failed?


Businesses over the years have wised up to the fact that employees are important, that if they work with employees and listen to their concerns it provides a better working environment and if employees are happy they will be more productive which will help the business thrive and grow. I think this has lead to the decline in union memberships and that is fine because it means more businesses are evolving and being responsible to their employees. Like I said unions have done some good things. You can thank them for a 5day 40hr work week, they keep illegals from taking Americans jobs, and they do a good job of ensuring workplace safety standards.

Like everything else in the global world we live in today businesses have changed to change with the times unfortunately unions have not they still operate on a 1950's thug mentality as was this case against the SEIU. Yes unions have made a royal mess with some industries but a lot of those industries also have tons of government regulation. What has happened in the airline industry is unique, they are heavily regulated by the NTSB and the FAA for safety reasons. To meet those regulations they have to hire an army of people to comply. But hey everyone still wants low air fares so in order to increase air travel and turn a profit they started lowering their prices to the point of losing money. Unions prevented the airline industry from increasing profits by taking it from employees paychecks. In order for the airline industry to be profitable again two things have to happen, unions need to be realistic and not rape the industry, airline have to change their business model and start charging more.

I agree with you, our public school system is a disaster and while the union has had its claws in it big time politicians are just as much to blame. Government expects way above and beyond from it's employees as is the case with teachers. Government requires a teacher to have a degree and expects them to work extremely long hours for very minimal compensation (what I mean is a teachers day is not over once class is out, many work off the clock grading test, preparing lesson plans, etc.)keep in mind politicians are constantly playing games with their budget. Should a teachers salary fluctuate and still be asked to give so much because of the whims of a politician? I don't think it should. On the flip side the teachers unions are to unrealistic with some of there demands especially when it comes to firing a teacher. Personally I think a teacher should be held to a higher standard, paid accordingly and if they can't cut it they should be fired.

When it comes to government there is no balance between governments and unions. It is always from one extreme to another. I think this in large part is due to politicians and union bosses being in bed with each other and that has to stop.

I believe the reason most industry or companies where unions have become dominate fail is due to over zealous and unrealistic union members and greedy power hungry union bosses (GM, $100hr to put on a couple of bolts). Unions seem to forget the definition of the word negotiate.

Amazing that 90% of your response was negative about unions. yet you still insist unions are great. I wonder why? Do you belong to a union? Because I have seen unions give high paying jobs to people who couldnt even do them over higher qualified people. I did my clinical rotation at a unionize hospital. The union there did not help, it hurt them and their patients. That hospital eventually went bankrupt and was bought out by a NON UNION.

So I dont understand your love for unions, even after reading your post. because all I can see is you worry about un checked business. The people will take care of bussiness that dont take care of them.

Just so you know, I have always respected your writings and post. I still do.

one more thing. since you lean republican 80% of the time, you are aware that Unions lean Left 100% of the time.

Guest


Guest

wild_thing wrote:
Amazing that 90% of your response was negative about unions. yet you still insist unions are great. I wonder why? Do you belong to a union? Because I have seen unions give high paying jobs to people who couldnt even do them over higher qualified people. I did my clinical rotation at a unionize hospital. The union there did not help, it hurt them and their patients. That hospital eventually went bankrupt and was bought out by a NON UNION.

So I dont understand your love for unions, even after reading your post. because all I can see is you worry about un checked business. The people will take care of bussiness that dont take care of them.

Just so you know, I have always respected your writings and post. I still do.

one more thing. since you lean republican 80% of the time, you are aware that Unions lean Left 100% of the time.

I was a member of a union when I was a federal employee. Before I took that job I kind of had the same attitude towards unions as you do. I have family and friends that are union members and I always wondered why they had such a strong support for unions because up until I was working with the federal government I had never been apart of a union. The shop I worked in developed hardware and software network interfaces for various equipment and systems (Military). We had several different managers and department heads due to the nature of the work, some civilians but mostly military. I had no plans on joining the union but just one year after starting I found myself needing help with a new department head (Military) that had a friend (retired military) who he wanted to place in my job.

It started by him giving me instructions on what he wanted done. The when it was completed he would complain that I didn't follow his instructions and that he had given me different instructions. I was miffed by this the first couple of times but just tried to make the guy happy and kept doing what he asked. after a couple of weeks of this I had another department head approach me and accuse me of purposefully delaying my work which was causing his department to fall behind and that he knew of the problems the other department head was having with me. I was blown away by that. So I confronted the guy that started all this. He told me he was tired of my poor performance and my inability to follow detailed instructions and if I didn't improve he would have me terminated(my direct supervisor, a civilian just gave me an excellent evaluation). At this point every time I went to talk to that guy I took a witness. That helped but then all of a sudden I start having some of the other department heads doing the same thing, my department head pulled me into his office and said he was starting to get complaints. I explained what was going on and he was NOT surprised and went on to explain how he had been hearing rumors they wanted me gone so they could hire the other guys friend. Low and behold while I'm sitting in his office the guy that started this walked in with a formal complaint and is writing me up for not following his instructions, after three write ups you are terminated and I had seen a couple of people terminated. At this point I realized what was going on and joined the union. Once the union got involved it got even worse. Multiple department heads would assign online training that had to be done by the end of the day but give me 8 hours of work knowing the training couldn't be completed, was accused of sexually harassing a man, called a liar more times than I can count, put into another department so I could be shifted to a flex schedule then assigned crazy hours all hours of the night and weekends. They even tried to get my security clearance revoked which would be a death sentence in my line of work because private contractors will not hire you in my line of work if your clearance has been revoked for any reason.

The icing on the cake was when I had to take emergency leave for a death in the family, my brother had passed. Our shop was a test and research facility that required travel to different testing sites throughout the world and because of this if you wanted to take leave for more than a week you had to have all department heads sign off on it which is understandable. I found out about this at 2:30am on a Friday so Saturday morning I had to call all the department heads to get approval because I needed to take a week of leave for the following week. That one department head said he could allow it because I was needed for a test he had scheduled the following Thursday. which was odd because we usually knew of test weeks in advanced. So I called the family told them I couldn't come down explained the situation. Monday morning he approached me offered his condolences and apologized for having to deny the request for leave. He then went on to explain how this test requirement had just came up Friday. I said it was fine I understood because of they type of work we did. Wednesday he approached me and said he was mistaken the test was the following week. I was furious, I knew exactly what he had done. I immediately called the union rep and asked him to go with me to speak to the commanding officer. I knew I was breaking the chain of command but I didn't care I wanted to talk to the CO. When the union rep arrived we went to the headquarters building, the CO was not happy I showed up with a union rep and went on the defensive, which is understandable. I was as polite as I could be and asked him if he could simply fix the problem with this guy, the union rep explained everything that had happened over the coarse of time and explained that he had documented it and spoke to witnesses that verified my complaints. The CO defending a fellow military officer said people make mistakes and that his department head just made a mistake on the dates of the test, he then said he didn't see any reason to speak with the department head over the matter and politely said that I was wasting his time.

We left his office and went to the union office where I filed six different grievances against the government, the department head, and the CO. It was the EEO and the hostile work environment grievances that got there attention because those go outside of the command all the way to OPM (Office of Personnel Management). The day the union formally filed the paper work things began to change for the better. It was submitted that morning and by that after noon I was in front of the CO. Now he wanted to fix the problem, now he was willing to talk to his department head, he even offered to move the guy to another division. I didn't even respond, I looked at my union rep and told him we were done and I was leaving. The look on the CO's face was priceless. The department head was transferred to another command the next day. From that point on I had zero problems, zero harassment, and zero complaints about my performance. I stayed employed with them for another 4 years then left to go work with Siemens group. I was with Siemens for 6 years before the issue was settled.

That is the reason I believe the unions are still useful, still needed and I support them. It does piss me off to see all the corruption in the unions, it does piss me off to see them choke the life out of businesses and government due to there own greed and wants, and it really pisses me off that they are aligned 100% with democrats. They helped me immensely in dealing with a very bad situation that could have had a profound negative impact on myself and my family for many years. For that I am grateful.

Guest


Guest

alecto wrote:
wild_thing wrote:
Amazing that 90% of your response was negative about unions. yet you still insist unions are great. I wonder why? Do you belong to a union? Because I have seen unions give high paying jobs to people who couldnt even do them over higher qualified people. I did my clinical rotation at a unionize hospital. The union there did not help, it hurt them and their patients. That hospital eventually went bankrupt and was bought out by a NON UNION.

So I dont understand your love for unions, even after reading your post. because all I can see is you worry about un checked business. The people will take care of bussiness that dont take care of them.

Just so you know, I have always respected your writings and post. I still do.

one more thing. since you lean republican 80% of the time, you are aware that Unions lean Left 100% of the time.

I was a member of a union when I was a federal employee. Before I took that job I kind of had the same attitude towards unions as you do. I have family and friends that are union members and I always wondered why they had such a strong support for unions because up until I was working with the federal government I had never been apart of a union. The shop I worked in developed hardware and software network interfaces for various equipment and systems (Military). We had several different managers and department heads due to the nature of the work, some civilians but mostly military. I had no plans on joining the union but just one year after starting I found myself needing help with a new department head (Military) that had a friend (retired military) who he wanted to place in my job.

It started by him giving me instructions on what he wanted done. The when it was completed he would complain that I didn't follow his instructions and that he had given me different instructions. I was miffed by this the first couple of times but just tried to make the guy happy and kept doing what he asked. after a couple of weeks of this I had another department head approach me and accuse me of purposefully delaying my work which was causing his department to fall behind and that he knew of the problems the other department head was having with me. I was blown away by that. So I confronted the guy that started all this. He told me he was tired of my poor performance and my inability to follow detailed instructions and if I didn't improve he would have me terminated(my direct supervisor, a civilian just gave me an excellent evaluation). At this point every time I went to talk to that guy I took a witness. That helped but then all of a sudden I start having some of the other department heads doing the same thing, my department head pulled me into his office and said he was starting to get complaints. I explained what was going on and he was NOT surprised and went on to explain how he had been hearing rumors they wanted me gone so they could hire the other guys friend. Low and behold while I'm sitting in his office the guy that started this walked in with a formal complaint and is writing me up for not following his instructions, after three write ups you are terminated and I had seen a couple of people terminated. At this point I realized what was going on and joined the union. Once the union got involved it got even worse. Multiple department heads would assign online training that had to be done by the end of the day but give me 8 hours of work knowing the training couldn't be completed, was accused of sexually harassing a man, called a liar more times than I can count, put into another department so I could be shifted to a flex schedule then assigned crazy hours all hours of the night and weekends. They even tried to get my security clearance revoked which would be a death sentence in my line of work because private contractors will not hire you in my line of work if your clearance has been revoked for any reason.

The icing on the cake was when I had to take emergency leave for a death in the family, my brother had passed. Our shop was a test and research facility that required travel to different testing sites throughout the world and because of this if you wanted to take leave for more than a week you had to have all department heads sign off on it which is understandable. I found out about this at 2:30am on a Friday so Saturday morning I had to call all the department heads to get approval because I needed to take a week of leave for the following week. That one department head said he could allow it because I was needed for a test he had scheduled the following Thursday. which was odd because we usually knew of test weeks in advanced. So I called the family told them I couldn't come down explained the situation. Monday morning he approached me offered his condolences and apologized for having to deny the request for leave. He then went on to explain how this test requirement had just came up Friday. I said it was fine I understood because of they type of work we did. Wednesday he approached me and said he was mistaken the test was the following week. I was furious, I knew exactly what he had done. I immediately called the union rep and asked him to go with me to speak to the commanding officer. I knew I was breaking the chain of command but I didn't care I wanted to talk to the CO. When the union rep arrived we went to the headquarters building, the CO was not happy I showed up with a union rep and went on the defensive, which is understandable. I was as polite as I could be and asked him if he could simply fix the problem with this guy, the union rep explained everything that had happened over the coarse of time and explained that he had documented it and spoke to witnesses that verified my complaints. The CO defending a fellow military officer said people make mistakes and that his department head just made a mistake on the dates of the test, he then said he didn't see any reason to speak with the department head over the matter and politely said that I was wasting his time.

We left his office and went to the union office where I filed six different grievances against the government, the department head, and the CO. It was the EEO and the hostile work environment grievances that got there attention because those go outside of the command all the way to OPM (Office of Personnel Management). The day the union formally filed the paper work things began to change for the better. It was submitted that morning and by that after noon I was in front of the CO. Now he wanted to fix the problem, now he was willing to talk to his department head, he even offered to move the guy to another division. I didn't even respond, I looked at my union rep and told him we were done and I was leaving. The look on the CO's face was priceless. The department head was transferred to another command the next day. From that point on I had zero problems, zero harassment, and zero complaints about my performance. I stayed employed with them for another 4 years then left to go work with Siemens group. I was with Siemens for 6 years before the issue was settled.

That is the reason I believe the unions are still useful, still needed and I support them. It does piss me off to see all the corruption in the unions, it does piss me off to see them choke the life out of businesses and government due to there own greed and wants, and it really pisses me off that they are aligned 100% with democrats. They helped me immensely in dealing with a very bad situation that could have had a profound negative impact on myself and my family for many years. For that I am grateful.

Thank you for the honest reply.

I respect you for that.

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