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  • November 2018 President’s Report

    Frontier Updates:

    Membership Counts by Title as of 10/31/18

    TitleCount
    Total336
    Cable Splicers09
    Comm. Coordinators I21
    Comm. Coordinators II1
    Comm. Coordinators III7
    Comm. Clerks9
    Desk Techs67
    Garage Mechanics3
    Line/Splicers14
     Network Techs 70
    Power and Bldg Techs7
    Sales and Svc Techs 132

    Resignation

    DateNameTitle
    2/21/18Ken MillerDesk Tech
    10/28/18Joe BrabandDesk Tech

    Retirement

    DateNameTitle
      1/5/18 Ken GuarinoNetwork/carrier
       1/5/18 Don SharonNetwork/carrier
       1/5/18Mark RoseNetwork/switch
       1/5/18 Walt PiskorowskiNetwork/carrier
       1/5/18 Mary Jane LinehanNetwork/switch
     1/5/18Mark BaumanNetwork/switch
       1/5/18  Richard BillsSales and Service tech
       1/5/18 Charles LappleSales and Service tech
       1/5/18 Jeff LeshnerSales and Service tech
    1/5/18Robert Brown Jr.Sales and Service tech
    1/5/18Robert BattagliaSales and Service tech
    1/5/18John LesterSales and Service tech
    1/5/18Jerry FortmanSales and Service tech
    1/5/18Tom TartagliaSales and Service tech
    1/5/18Wordene DayComm. Coordinator II
    1/5/18Mary MaslynComm. Clerk
    1/5/18Sandra StrothersComm. Clerk
    1/5/18Doug PerrineCable Splicer
    3/31/18Mavis LockettComm. Coor. 1
    5/31/18Karl WittmanNetwork/PBX Tech
    10/31/18Kathy DiMariaNetwork/Switch

    Voluntary Severance:

    DateNameTitle
    1/5/18Dave DeRollerSales and Service
    9/30/18Charlie RudatDesk Tech
    9/30/18Michael BoppDesk Tech

    Terminations

    DateNameTitle
    4/28/18Guy MarbleCable Splicer
    4/19/18Marnye KnightDesk Tech
    10/18/18Brian HartSales and Service

    LTD Absences

    NameTitle
    Mike DugoSales and Service tech
    Laura FeathersNetwork/Carrier
    Don MaeskeSales and Service tech

    Frontier 2nd Step Grievance Meetings:

    August 28.2018 Grievance committee in attendance: John Pusloskie, Sue Phillips, Rich Winter and Kevin Blazey. 

    Gr: 7-1483-18 The Company has violated the contract by changing the method of payment from cash to Visa card on employee sales.  As of September 19th, we haven’t’ received a response.

    Gr: 7-1484-17 The Company violated the contract when it hired a contractor to repair the central office ladder.  As of September 19th, we haven’t received a response.

    September 25th, 2018 Grievance committee in attendance:  John Pusloskie, Andy Cimino, Sue Phillips, Carl Ellis, Rich Winter, and Engineering clerk Nancy Diliberto Arena.

    Gr: 3-4163-18 The Company has violated the June 1, 2017 MOA on Engineering clerks work by not moving the work from Pennsylvania as agreed and not routing certain final posting work.  Also discussed was the Company’s intent to automate pre-posting.  It was agreed to hold the grievance in abeyance pending another meeting.

    October 23rd, 2018 No grievances were processed to second step for this month.

    Closed Out:

    None reported

     

    Arbitration Update Frontier:

    • Transfer of bargaining unit work due to M6 Conversion.
    • The National Labor Relations Board has issued a complaint in regards to the Unfair Labor charge failure to provide information M6. The Company provided the final information as of March 21st.  The charge has been settled and the Union is moving forward with the arbitration.
    • The first day of hearing was September 21st at W. Henrietta Rd. We spent two hours of the day trying to reach settlement, which wasn’t accomplished.  The Union put on its opening argument and first witness John Pusloskie, President CWA Local 1170.  The next day of hearing are scheduled for November 29th and 30th
    • Grievance 7-1476-17 Unjust termination James Everts request arbitration 2/2/18.
      • The arbitration has been approved by our CWA Staff Rep and the CWA District 1 office. The case has been assigned to CWA attorney Nick Hanlon and is in process of having arbitrator assigned.
    • Grievance 7-1477-17 Unjust termination Peter Loss request arbitration 2/2/18.
      • The arbitration has been approved by our CWA Staff Rep and the CWA District 1 office. The case has been assigned to CWA attorney Nick Hanlon and is in process of having arbitrator assigned
    • Grievance 7-1479-18 Unilateral change to Long term disability income capping it at $3,000 per month. The grievance was protected for arbitration on May 15, 2018 and is now in the CWA review process.
      • On October 18th, the Union received a letter from Human Resources that they are not willing to settle and the grievance is untimely.
    • Grievance 2-2585-18 Unjust Layoff of Network tech Ernie Magar NCS 8/15/2016. The Local requested arbitration on June 21st, 2018.  Sue Phillips has taken the lead on investigating and presenting this case.
    • Grievance 7-1482-18 Unjust termination of Desk Tech Marnye Knight on April 19th, 2018. The Local requested arbitration on August 15th, 2018 protecting time limits.  On October 16th, the Union sent a letter requesting Marnye Knight be reinstated based on Prudential approving loss of benefits thru April 30th beyond the April 19th termination date.  The Company has rejected the Unions request.
    • Grievance 7-1481-18 On September 5th the Union requested arbitration on the Company failing to provide paychecks on time.
      • John Pusloskie, Andy Cimino and CWA Rep Shawn Leblanc met on October 10th with Frontier HR Manager Tracy Owen to settle the matter.
    • Grievance 3-4162-18 On August 31st the Union requested arbitration on Frontier contractors, management and other employees performing clerical work.
    • Grievance 7-327-18 and 7-328-18 On August 31st the Union requested arbitration on Overtime administration violations involving Lead Man status.
      • On October 10th, 2018 the Grievances were settled with the Company agreeing to provide 12-hour overtime makeups to Sales and Service techs Brian Hart, John Gardner, John Fridd, and Tim Wallace.

     

    Take the Lead Sales Monthly Reports

                            Referrals      Sales        Total Revenue      Annualized Revenue

    YTD 7/31         396                  212                  $311,493                     $153,533

    June                49                    26                    $50,319                       $23,439

    July                 39                    25                    $52,806                       $23,702

     

    Managerial Changes

    Julie Murtagh has been announced as the new Sr. VP of Operations for the East Region.

    Lyle Fell CNOC manager resigned effective April 30th.

    Chris Levandos Sr. VP operations has resigned effective 5/31/18

    Farrah Mollo Lead Corporate attorney has resigned effective 6/6/18

    George Madison has been named Manager replacing Lyle Fell effective July 2018

     

    Commercial NOC Center:

    Monthly Collaboration Meeting October 16th 2018.  For the Union; John Pusloskie, Demiah Smith, Diane Pappas.  For the Company; George Madison, Ross Serafino, The Following items were addressed.

    • Lindsey Fisher Tour not consistent with the schedule
      • Schedule working 4pm to midnight, actually working noon to 4pm.
      • Rad Upgrades – assigned to Tim Gross, He will be doing new software code 5.9 revisions, Next year 6.1 software codes will be assigned to someone else. George Madison- management will decide how to do this.
      • Management putting out daily stats causing morale issues. The Union asked to reconsider this go monthly and talk to employees directly
      • Acting Management- Acting management positions to be for 30 day time periods.
      • Need to work to improve morale.

    Frontier Updates:

    • CWA Attorney Atul Atwar met with Network tech stewards Ron Eygabroad, Carl Ellis and Mike Miceli on October 18th further preparing for Arbitration on November 29th and 30th.
    • November 7th, 2018 Union officers John Pusloskie, Andy Cimino and Doreen Beck met with Engineering Management Joe Aresco, Bill Gould and Nancy Phillips to discuss the Grievance that was held in abeyance in regards to our Engineering Clerk MOA’s. At issue is the following
      • Pre and final posting from Pennsylvania
      • Property Damage tickets
      • Pre-Posting by Engineers

    It was agreed that we would have a follow up meeting on November 27th to discuss further.

    • The Union sent notification to Human Resource manager Tracy Owen on September 7th that we have not been receiving the information on contracting according to the contract and we will be moving forward to enforce the contract. On September 17th we received part of the information that we were requesting.  Subsequently the Company has provided more information.  We met on October 10th to discuss further and the format that we need to receive the information in.  We have started to receive the Contracting information.
    • Call out Settlement agreement update: As of September 10th, 50 techs have received opportunities for overtime makeups, 92 techs in total are to receive opportunities of 12 hours each.  The Company has until December 12th to offer them or payout the techs.
    • The Union filed the grievance at second step along with an information request in regards to the termination of Brian Hart.
    • Working on putting a training program together for Fiber splicing for the members
    • November 7th Andy Cimino and John Pusloskie met with Tracy Owen and Bill Carpenter over the transfers into sales and Service from other departments. It was agreed that the transfers would not be for less than 3 days, up to 20 days with a 5 day reset.
    • Open enrollment for Frontier active employees ends November 16th, 2018
    • Open enrollment for retirees ends November 15th, 2018
    • November 6th, 2018 Frontier announced 3rd quarter results.

     

    Safety Committee

    No report

    Affiliate Report:

    AT&T Mobility:

    ATT declared a force reduction in August eliminating 2200 positions nationwide, which compromised the Sales Support position.  Under the provisions of the job security negotiated in the last CBA, the impacted members were offered jobs in the Stores that they worked in.  We had three members impacted, One Jim Dupre decided to retire, Rob DeRosa and Sherri Borelli have decided to take jobs as Retail Sales Consultants in the stores that they worked in.  They will be afforded New Hire ramp up in regards to sales quotas.

    A nationwide investigation is going on in regards to charge backs.  We’ve had several members disciplined and a charge was filed by 1170 officer Rich Winter with the NLRB over AT&T’s failure to provide information that had been requested and the Company considered non-relevant.

     

    ATT-219-18    The Company unjustly terminated Patti Ross’s health insurance benefits.

                The grievance is still pending as we wait for the Company’s response to Ms. Ross’s employment status.

     

    ATT-221-18    Kelli Pilaroscia was unfairly denied Paid Family Leave and unjust disciplined in the attendance program.  A first step meeting was held and AT&T has denied the Grievance.    A second meeting was held on June 29th with Ben Marcello and Stephen Papageorge with AT&T.  The Company agreed to remove the points, leaving the issue of pay.  We’re waiting on the Company to resolve the pay issue.

     

    ATT – 222-18. Unjust final warning Tim Spaker.  The Union filed a grievance concerning the discipline and unfair investigation. We have also filed a charge with the National Labor Relations board in regards to the Company’s failure to provide information concerning the investigation as of September 13th.  A second step grievance meeting was heard on September 19th.  The Company agreed to reduce the final written warning to a written warning.

     

    City of Canandaigua PBA:

    The Canandaigua PBA filed a demand to bargain with Chief Hedworth on June 14th over the implementation of body cameras.  The Union has requested the assistance of Cathy Creighton for representation purposes on the matter.  If the City refuses to bargain we intend to file an improper practice charge vs. the City.

    As a result of our demand to bargain and subsequent negotiations we reached a signed agreement on August 23rd, 2018.  We were able to get General Order 254 Body warn cameras modified after several negotiation sessions with the Chief and City.  Both sides have reserved their positions in regards to any future changes to the General Order by the Chief.  The Unions position being that it is a subject mandatory for bargaining.  I would like to commend officers Liberatore and Gregorio for their help in getting to a final settlement.

     

    Town of Greece:

    Gold Badge Club:

    A vacancy has been posted by the Chief as of August 31st, 2018 for a detective assigned to task force officer assigned to the United States Drug enforcement agency.  Discussion has come up with regards to who is eligible to fill vacancy.

    Greece Part Time Unit:

    We have received an offer from the Towns attorney in regards to the contract that expired December 31st 2013.  A meeting has been called for November 15th to discuss the offer with the members.

    Town of Greece Crossing Guards:

    Sharon DeLucia termination: Jonathan Johnsen attorney argued the case on September 10th at the appellate division of the State Supreme court.  We are expecting a decision within 30 days on whether the Arbitrators decision to bring Sharon back to work with full back pay will be enforced.

    Greece Lighthouse:

    The current contract expires 12/31/19.

    City of Canandaigua DPW:

    Nothing new to report

    Town of Canandaigua Employees Highway Association:

    On September 19th the Union and the Town agreed on the framework for a new 4-year contract that would begin January 1, 2019.  Some of the highlights are listed below.

    • Year contract ending December 31st, 2022
    • 2% raises on January 1st each year of contract
    • Maintained employee cost sharing at 5%, 10%, or 15% depending on Bronze, Silver or Gold plan. The employees will contribute 15% to future increases from current 10%.
    • New Work boot allowance: The Town will cover $150 per pair of boots two times per 12-month period.
    • Maintained jurisdiction over part time employees which the town proposed to remove.
    • Volunteer firefighters will be allowed to report to fires during work hours without having to utilize their paid time off.

    The Town board passed a resolution on October 15th approving the contract and it was signed on October 31st with the new terms becoming effective January 1st, 2019.

    Town of Henrietta:

    The Union and the Town have discussed the issue of funding the HSA accounts for new hires as it was silent in the contract.  The Union is waiting to receive the Towns Proposal in writing.

    The Town has hired 3 new employees Since August 1st  which the Union has met with and provided an orientation of the contract they are the following:

    Catherine Dubrek – engineering department

    Jackie Kitto – Recreation Leader

    Suzanne Reitschky – Night dispatcher

     

     

    Village of Waterloo PBA:

    • A tentative agreement has been reached as of February 20th. The agreement is retroactive back to June 1st 2017 expiring May 31st, 20121. The agreement provides for the following.
    • Wages: June 1, 2017 – $.80 per hour, June 1, 2018 – $.70per hour, June 1, 2019-$.75 per hour, June 1, 2020 – $.80 per hour.
    • Vacation: increase of two days after 20 years.
    • Health insurance: Increase employee contributions to the following amounts.
      • 2017- 15%, 2018 – 17%, 2019 – 19%, 2020- 20%

     

    Town of Gates:

    The Union reached a tentative agreement on October 9th that includes the following.

    3-year contract

    Wages 2.95% each year.

    New provision to bridge prior time after 6 months of service.

    The Library board passed the contract on October 17th and the Town board passed the contract on November 7th, 2018.

     

    Political Action Committee:

    John Pusloskie met with Members of the MCDC to introduce myself and discuss issues important to members of local 1170.

     

    Other:

    ByLaw committee – Changes proposed still in committee for review.

    CWA Local 1170 Retirement plan for Frontier members:  A list of members who have no beneficiary form on file was put on the website on October 8th.  An email was sent out to all members as well as an update on the tape.  Angela continues to work to contact members to get the forms signed.

    A Mobilizer meeting for Frontier was held on October 11th at the Union Hall.  Over 30 members were in attendance to discuss issues with Frontier and mobilizing issues. 

    Register with CWA Local 1170 to stay up to date on important issues affecting you.