Impasse?
At recent negotiating meetings, the company’s lawyer has expressed to the union that he believes we are at impasse. What is impasse?

Impasse means that the company and the union cannot agree on terms of a contract.  The union does not believe we are at impasse.  There are many subjects that we have only briefly discussed without any back and forth negotiating by the parties. Many of our proposals have been simply “rejected” with no counter-proposal submitted.

As we already know, most of the things we are asking for are things that we already have.  Just Cause and Seniority for Layoffs are two other items we are asking for which are really non-economic issues and are pivotal to our job
Security.

On May 20, 2009, the company submitted to the union a revised last, best and final offer which doesn’t include any language on some of our most basic issues including vacations or holidays, layoffs and recalls. The company said during this meeting that they are now unwilling to negotiate further with the union even though we have made it clear that we have further proposals to submit. We met again with the company on June 17, 2009. We will update you update you on what occurred at that meeting. The NLRB will make the final decision on overturning impasse.

What happens in an impasse situation?
The company can start implementing economic changes contained in their last, best and final offer once they claim we are at impasse. Why?  Because that is one of the labor laws that have been in practice for several years. Then, if the
Union does not believe impasse has been reached, it is up to us to file charges with the NLRB against the company for implementing the economic changes.

Once again, the Union does not believe that we are at impasse. There are still subjects we have not discussed or agreements which are incomplete and do not include further details.  For example, we have agreed on toke observing by the dealers, however, we have yet to negotiate over the request for payroll information related to the tokes. Although the company has implemented economic changes, your union is still fighting and has contacted the NLRB to make them aware of the situation.