Posted:
April 30, 2015
The Marine Engineers' Beneficial Association is relying on inaccurate, incomplete and irrelevant information to support a new effort to overcome labor penalties and repair a rogue image resulting from a long-running jurisdictional dispute with American Maritime Officers over jobs in the Interlake Steamship Co. fleet on the Great Lakes.
MEBA's flawed defense of its contracts with Interlake and its revived attempt to restore good standing in the American labor community surfaced in a recent letter from MEBA President H. Marshall Ainley to American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations President Richard Trumka.
In his letter, Ainley sought relief from "raiding" sanctions imposed on MEBA by the AFL-CIO in May 2007 and April 2008 in response to two specific MEBA-Interlake contracts. The sanctions were applied under Article XX of the AFL-CIO Constitution, which prohibits one federation union from interfering with the established collective bargaining rights of another.
The Article XX sanctions were imposed on MEBA at the request of the Seafarers International Union of North America. AMO became a chartered affiliate of the SIUNA in November 2003.
Trumka forwarded Ainley's request for "a restoration of rights" under Article XX to SIUNA President Michael Sacco on April 15.
In his letter to Trumka, Ainley said the punitive measures remain in force despite a total payment of $2.5 million from MEBA and its benefit funds to AMO and AMO Plans in August 2008. This payment had "settled the case," Ainley argued.
Fact check: the $2.5 million payment - recommended strongly by a civil court judge in Ohio - was unrelated to the two cases in which MEBA was found by the AFL-CIO Executive Council to have violated the AFL-CIO Constitution by signing labor agreements with Interlake, a longtime employer of AMO engineers, mates and stewards.
The $2.5 million payment by the MEBA interests to AMO and AMO Plans in 2008 ended the "tortious interference" lawsuit brought by AMO against MEBA in Ohio in January 2006. AMO's action in this case focused exclusively on a MEBA-Interlake contract covering the company's self-unloading bulk carriers.
The MEBA-Interlake self-unloader contract was signed in July 2003 while a valid agreement between AMO and Interlake remained in force. As an independent, unaffiliated union at the time, AMO had no standing to pursue Article XX remedies.
By clear contrast, the Article XX sanctions at issue were levied separately on MEBA after AMO affiliated with the SIUNA, and they arose from MEBA contracts covering two vessels operated initially by Interlake subsidiaries.
One of these vessels was the integrated tug-barge Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder, operated under AMO contract by Interlake Transportation Inc. The second vessel was the straight-deck bulk carrier Stewart J. Cort, a fixture for many years in the defunct Bethlehem Steel Corp. fleet; Interlake Leasing III operated the Cort under AMO contract. Both vessels were transferred eventually to the parent Interlake Steamship Co., and the jobs went to MEBA.
Finding against MEBA in the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder case, Howard Lesnick, the AFL-CIO's Impartial Umpire, said MEBA had breached key provisions of Article XX and "unquestionably displaced AMO." Lesnick found "credible" evidence of a "collusive pattern" between MEBA and Interlake.
Lesnick uncovered a similar pattern in the Cort case.
In the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder case, MEBA has thus far failed to comply with the AFL-CIO Executive Council's "direction" to "disclaim and cease representation of the bargaining unit at issue"; in the Stewart J. Cort case, MEBA has defied the Executive Council's instruction to "either terminate its representation of the ... bargaining unit or enter into an agreement with the SIUNA to take alternative action to resolve this non-compliance dispute."
Both the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder and the Stewart J. Cort Article XX cases remain unsettled, despite Ainley's assertion that the $2.5 million payment to AMO and AMO Plans in 2008 had resolved both matters and despite his latest insistence to Trumka that MEBA would "comply with the provisions of Article XX."
In July 2013, MEBA had the opportunity to comply with the AFL-CIO Constitution and the AFL-CIO Executive Council's instructions but chose instead to sign a 12-year successor agreement covering the two vessels and the Interlake Steamship Co. self-unloader fleet.
In his letter to AFL-CIO President Trumka, Ainley also attempted to draw a parallel between the MEBA-Interlake relationship since July 2003 and an agreement between AMO and Liberty Maritime Corp. in October 2011.
"The AMO raided the MEBA by signing a contract with Liberty Maritime and taking over five vessels that had been under contract with the MEBA for over 20 years," Ainley wrote.
The MEBA-Interlake contract signed secretly in July 2003 upended the collective bargaining relationship that had existed between AMO and Interlake Steamship Co. for much longer than 20 years, but there are more critical distinctions between the two developments.
AMO had a live collective bargaining agreement in place with Interlake when then-MEBA President Ron Davis and a MEBA delegation met with Interlake principal owner James Barker and other Interlake executives at Barker's home in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where Davis and Barker signed the collusive, concessionary MEBA-Interlake contract nearly 12 years ago. There was no MEBA-Liberty agreement in force when AMO and Liberty signed a collective bargaining agreement nearly four years ago.
Moreover, MEBA members employed in the Liberty fleet at the time the company signed with AMO were not coerced into AMO membership as a condition of continued employment, as the Interlake fleet officers were in August 2003. Ruling in a class action grievance filed by AMO against Interlake in 2003, arbitrator Douglas Ray found that Interlake engineers and mates were indeed pressured into signing MEBA pledge cards upon the threat of "termination." *
In addition, MEBA's response to the 2011 AMO-Liberty collective bargaining agreement included a "tortious interference" lawsuit against AMO and two AMO officials - a complaint that was dismissed in December 2014. MEBA's appeal is pending in U.S. District Court in Washington.
MEBA is also awaiting court-ordered arbitration in the Liberty Maritime case, and Liberty's appeal of this order is pending as well in U.S. District Court in Washington.
In an apparent attempt to soften his letter's confrontational tone, Ainley noted that AMO, MEBA and a third union, the International Organization of Masters, Mates and Pilots, sometimes apply "a very effective tripartite agreement" when preparing licensed labor cost proposals for employers competing fiercely for government shipping contracts.
The tripartite concept was developed years ago by AMO. The intent was for the three U.S. merchant marine officers' unions to submit verifiably identical licensed labor costs to employers responding to government Requests for Proposals, or RFPs, thereby passing much of the cost-saving responsibility to employers bidding for the contracts.
The twist here is that, while Ainley invoked the cooperative spirit of the tripartite agreement in principle, MEBA spurned this approach in competition that led last year to Military Sealift Command's transfer of the operation and management of eight Watson-class LMSRs from a company that employs AMO to a company that employs MEBA and the MM&P.
MEBA did not include training in its total labor cost submission to the MEBA/MM&P employer that was awarded the LMSR contract. This drove the company's cost proposal down significantly but artificially, resulting in the substantial loss of AMO jobs on the LMSRs, AMO membership dues revenue and employer contributions to the AMO Pension, Money Purchase Benefit, Medical, Vacation, Safety and Education and Defined Contribution Plans.
These damages were in addition to the staggering, compounding losses suffered by AMO and AMO Plans as a consequence of the MEBA-Interlake relationship since July 2003.
Had MEBA agreed to tripartite terms in the LMSR bidding, it would not have gotten away with omitting the cost of training engineers for the LMSR jobs.
Ainley also cited mutual legislative lobbying on Capitol Hill in Washington as a "stable" aspect of the relationship between AMO and MEBA. But, as Ainley acknowledged, our two unions work in Washington "along with other licensed and unlicensed maritime unions in the industry."
This cooperative strategy among all unions - unrestrained by jurisdictional differences - is driven more by common commitment to a single cause than by cordial links between specific unions. As Ainley put it to Trumka in a rare moment of clarity, labor unites on legislative issues "to protect and promote the interests of the United States maritime industry that are often under attack."
And this practical political partnership is not limited to labor. AMO, MEBA and all other unions work closely with employer lobbyists representing companies that have either diverse labor ties or no union contracts at all.
But the greater point here is that the industry-wide political operation in the capital is immaterial to the immediate issue - whether freeing MEBA from Article XX sanctions would be appropriate under current circumstances.
One fact among many here is that Marshall Ainley got the facts wrong. AMO will document its case in the interest of an accurate and complete record should AFL-CIO President Trumka determine that a hearing by the AFL-CIO Executive Council is warranted.
Meanwhile, AMO remains open to honest, civil talks that could lead to a just, reasonable settlement. We await MEBA's call.
Paul Doell
National President
* In their public statements on this disturbing strategy in 2003, MEBA officials at the time called it "organizing" - an affront to every honorable union organizer in the United States. A union organizing drive begins with pledge cards, proceeds through a representation election and ends with a signed collective bargaining agreement. In the MEBA-Interlake case in 2003, what MEBA referred to routinely as "organizing" began with a signed contract and ended with strong-armed signatures on pledge cards; there was no representation election - the Interlake engineers and mates had not sought MEBA membership, but they had no choice and no voice.
Fact-checking MEBA on Interlake controversy, Article XX
The Marine Engineers' Beneficial Association is relying on inaccurate, incomplete and irrelevant information to support a new effort to overcome labor penalties and repair a rogue image resulting from a long-running jurisdictional dispute with American Maritime Officers over jobs in the Interlake Steamship Co. fleet on the Great Lakes.
MEBA's flawed defense of its contracts with Interlake and its revived attempt to restore good standing in the American labor community surfaced in a recent letter from MEBA President H. Marshall Ainley to American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations President Richard Trumka.
In his letter, Ainley sought relief from "raiding" sanctions imposed on MEBA by the AFL-CIO in May 2007 and April 2008 in response to two specific MEBA-Interlake contracts. The sanctions were applied under Article XX of the AFL-CIO Constitution, which prohibits one federation union from interfering with the established collective bargaining rights of another.
The Article XX sanctions were imposed on MEBA at the request of the Seafarers International Union of North America. AMO became a chartered affiliate of the SIUNA in November 2003.
Trumka forwarded Ainley's request for "a restoration of rights" under Article XX to SIUNA President Michael Sacco on April 15.
In his letter to Trumka, Ainley said the punitive measures remain in force despite a total payment of $2.5 million from MEBA and its benefit funds to AMO and AMO Plans in August 2008. This payment had "settled the case," Ainley argued.
Fact check: the $2.5 million payment - recommended strongly by a civil court judge in Ohio - was unrelated to the two cases in which MEBA was found by the AFL-CIO Executive Council to have violated the AFL-CIO Constitution by signing labor agreements with Interlake, a longtime employer of AMO engineers, mates and stewards.
The $2.5 million payment by the MEBA interests to AMO and AMO Plans in 2008 ended the "tortious interference" lawsuit brought by AMO against MEBA in Ohio in January 2006. AMO's action in this case focused exclusively on a MEBA-Interlake contract covering the company's self-unloading bulk carriers.
The MEBA-Interlake self-unloader contract was signed in July 2003 while a valid agreement between AMO and Interlake remained in force. As an independent, unaffiliated union at the time, AMO had no standing to pursue Article XX remedies.
By clear contrast, the Article XX sanctions at issue were levied separately on MEBA after AMO affiliated with the SIUNA, and they arose from MEBA contracts covering two vessels operated initially by Interlake subsidiaries.
One of these vessels was the integrated tug-barge Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder, operated under AMO contract by Interlake Transportation Inc. The second vessel was the straight-deck bulk carrier Stewart J. Cort, a fixture for many years in the defunct Bethlehem Steel Corp. fleet; Interlake Leasing III operated the Cort under AMO contract. Both vessels were transferred eventually to the parent Interlake Steamship Co., and the jobs went to MEBA.
Finding against MEBA in the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder case, Howard Lesnick, the AFL-CIO's Impartial Umpire, said MEBA had breached key provisions of Article XX and "unquestionably displaced AMO." Lesnick found "credible" evidence of a "collusive pattern" between MEBA and Interlake.
Lesnick uncovered a similar pattern in the Cort case.
In the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder case, MEBA has thus far failed to comply with the AFL-CIO Executive Council's "direction" to "disclaim and cease representation of the bargaining unit at issue"; in the Stewart J. Cort case, MEBA has defied the Executive Council's instruction to "either terminate its representation of the ... bargaining unit or enter into an agreement with the SIUNA to take alternative action to resolve this non-compliance dispute."
Both the Dorothy Ann-Pathfinder and the Stewart J. Cort Article XX cases remain unsettled, despite Ainley's assertion that the $2.5 million payment to AMO and AMO Plans in 2008 had resolved both matters and despite his latest insistence to Trumka that MEBA would "comply with the provisions of Article XX."
In July 2013, MEBA had the opportunity to comply with the AFL-CIO Constitution and the AFL-CIO Executive Council's instructions but chose instead to sign a 12-year successor agreement covering the two vessels and the Interlake Steamship Co. self-unloader fleet.
In his letter to AFL-CIO President Trumka, Ainley also attempted to draw a parallel between the MEBA-Interlake relationship since July 2003 and an agreement between AMO and Liberty Maritime Corp. in October 2011.
"The AMO raided the MEBA by signing a contract with Liberty Maritime and taking over five vessels that had been under contract with the MEBA for over 20 years," Ainley wrote.
The MEBA-Interlake contract signed secretly in July 2003 upended the collective bargaining relationship that had existed between AMO and Interlake Steamship Co. for much longer than 20 years, but there are more critical distinctions between the two developments.
AMO had a live collective bargaining agreement in place with Interlake when then-MEBA President Ron Davis and a MEBA delegation met with Interlake principal owner James Barker and other Interlake executives at Barker's home in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where Davis and Barker signed the collusive, concessionary MEBA-Interlake contract nearly 12 years ago. There was no MEBA-Liberty agreement in force when AMO and Liberty signed a collective bargaining agreement nearly four years ago.
Moreover, MEBA members employed in the Liberty fleet at the time the company signed with AMO were not coerced into AMO membership as a condition of continued employment, as the Interlake fleet officers were in August 2003. Ruling in a class action grievance filed by AMO against Interlake in 2003, arbitrator Douglas Ray found that Interlake engineers and mates were indeed pressured into signing MEBA pledge cards upon the threat of "termination." *
In addition, MEBA's response to the 2011 AMO-Liberty collective bargaining agreement included a "tortious interference" lawsuit against AMO and two AMO officials - a complaint that was dismissed in December 2014. MEBA's appeal is pending in U.S. District Court in Washington.
MEBA is also awaiting court-ordered arbitration in the Liberty Maritime case, and Liberty's appeal of this order is pending as well in U.S. District Court in Washington.
In an apparent attempt to soften his letter's confrontational tone, Ainley noted that AMO, MEBA and a third union, the International Organization of Masters, Mates and Pilots, sometimes apply "a very effective tripartite agreement" when preparing licensed labor cost proposals for employers competing fiercely for government shipping contracts.
The tripartite concept was developed years ago by AMO. The intent was for the three U.S. merchant marine officers' unions to submit verifiably identical licensed labor costs to employers responding to government Requests for Proposals, or RFPs, thereby passing much of the cost-saving responsibility to employers bidding for the contracts.
The twist here is that, while Ainley invoked the cooperative spirit of the tripartite agreement in principle, MEBA spurned this approach in competition that led last year to Military Sealift Command's transfer of the operation and management of eight Watson-class LMSRs from a company that employs AMO to a company that employs MEBA and the MM&P.
MEBA did not include training in its total labor cost submission to the MEBA/MM&P employer that was awarded the LMSR contract. This drove the company's cost proposal down significantly but artificially, resulting in the substantial loss of AMO jobs on the LMSRs, AMO membership dues revenue and employer contributions to the AMO Pension, Money Purchase Benefit, Medical, Vacation, Safety and Education and Defined Contribution Plans.
These damages were in addition to the staggering, compounding losses suffered by AMO and AMO Plans as a consequence of the MEBA-Interlake relationship since July 2003.
Had MEBA agreed to tripartite terms in the LMSR bidding, it would not have gotten away with omitting the cost of training engineers for the LMSR jobs.
Ainley also cited mutual legislative lobbying on Capitol Hill in Washington as a "stable" aspect of the relationship between AMO and MEBA. But, as Ainley acknowledged, our two unions work in Washington "along with other licensed and unlicensed maritime unions in the industry."
This cooperative strategy among all unions - unrestrained by jurisdictional differences - is driven more by common commitment to a single cause than by cordial links between specific unions. As Ainley put it to Trumka in a rare moment of clarity, labor unites on legislative issues "to protect and promote the interests of the United States maritime industry that are often under attack."
And this practical political partnership is not limited to labor. AMO, MEBA and all other unions work closely with employer lobbyists representing companies that have either diverse labor ties or no union contracts at all.
But the greater point here is that the industry-wide political operation in the capital is immaterial to the immediate issue - whether freeing MEBA from Article XX sanctions would be appropriate under current circumstances.
One fact among many here is that Marshall Ainley got the facts wrong. AMO will document its case in the interest of an accurate and complete record should AFL-CIO President Trumka determine that a hearing by the AFL-CIO Executive Council is warranted.
Meanwhile, AMO remains open to honest, civil talks that could lead to a just, reasonable settlement. We await MEBA's call.
Paul Doell
National President
* In their public statements on this disturbing strategy in 2003, MEBA officials at the time called it "organizing" - an affront to every honorable union organizer in the United States. A union organizing drive begins with pledge cards, proceeds through a representation election and ends with a signed collective bargaining agreement. In the MEBA-Interlake case in 2003, what MEBA referred to routinely as "organizing" began with a signed contract and ended with strong-armed signatures on pledge cards; there was no representation election - the Interlake engineers and mates had not sought MEBA membership, but they had no choice and no voice.