Piedmont Bargaining Update, March 2017

The CWA bargaining team met with the Piedmont bargaining team on March 7, 8, and 9, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.  Over the three days, several counter proposals passed between the two committees, including proposals on Article 12—Vacation, Article 14—Leave of Absences, Article 19—Grievance Procedure, Article 20—System Board of Adjustment, Article 22—Union Representation, and a new article on Medical Examination. 

We had lengthy discussions about the proposals and their positive impacts on our members.  We saw significant progress and movement on a number of our proposals.  We also discussed issues that will help us in developing and structuring our remaining proposals for future bargaining sessions. 

We came away from this round of bargaining with Tentative Agreements on Article 19— Grievance Procedure, Article 20—System Board of Adjustment, Article 22—Union Representation, and the new article on Medical Examinations. 

• In Article 19, improved language will help the union in investigating grievances and filing grievances on contract interpretation issues at a higher level. 
• Article 20 improvements will allow for a separate Contract Interpretation Board for issues that affect all of the stations, so those decisions will apply system-wide. 
• Improvements in Article 22 will make it easier for union representatives to get time off to do union work and represent the members. 
• The new Medical Examination article will allow an employee who fails to pass a medical examination to get his or her own examiner.  If the two examiners do not agree, then a third neutral examiner would be the final decision-maker determining whether the employee has a medical restriction.    

The next round of bargaining is scheduled for April 19 and 20.