Red Alert!

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Calling All Unions. Red Alert! Red Alert!

Alabama Bus Drivers Need Strike Support!

The Network to Fight for Economic Justice (NFEJ) is asking for union to union solidarity with the Alabama bus drivers of Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 1208 based in Jackson, MS.

The ATU organized the University of Alabama bus drivers who work for a private company called First Transit, part of a big British corporation FirstGroup, PLC. Alabama bus drivers make poverty wages of $9.50 per hour. Discrimination and racism in the South, combined with the repression of union activity, result in the lowest wages in the country. Only the unity of workers in a union can put an end to this abuse.

Mario Harmon, Secretary Treasurer of ATU Local 1208, is very appreciative of all the support the NFEJ has provided so far and wanted to thank his fellow union activists. He told us about Dr. Witt sending out “scab vans” to pick up students at bus stops. We are doing a call-in to stop this TODAY!

We are asking unions to do three things to show solidarity:

1. Union solidarity statements to the Alabama bus drivers union. Email support to Union Steward Tia Brown at tb3341@yahoo.com
2. Donate to the Alabama bus drivers strike fund
3. Promote the NFEJ call-in to University of Alabama President Dr. Witt at 205-348-5103 and tell him to “Stop the scab vans!” and “Support the union bus drivers!”

Please write checks out to: “ATU Local 1208 Strike Fund”

Mail to: ATU Local 1208
C/o Mario Harmon, Secretary Treasurer
245 Treehaven Drive
Jackson, MS 39212


Contact the Network to Fight for Economic Justice (NFEJ) at www.wesayfightback.com

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'Good Possibility' CTA Bus Drivers Vote on Strike Monday

Mary Wisniewski
The Chicago Sun-Times


ILLINOIS - The leader of the union representing CTA bus drivers says there could be a strike vote Monday in the wake of CTA service and staff cuts.

"It's a very good possibility," Darrell Jefferson, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 241, said Tuesday.

The bus drivers union has suffered the majority of the 1,057 layoffs the CTA imposed earlier this month to close a $95.6 million budget gap. The transit agency cut bus service 18 percent and L service 9 percent Feb. 7.

Jefferson said the CTA has been violating the union's contract -- for instance, by requiring part-time workers, who are supposedly limited to 32 hours a week, to work overtime amounting to 15-to-16-hour days to make up for the people laid off.

CTA spokeswoman Sheila Gregory said a strike would violate a state law that bars government employees from striking if they are "essential service employees."

Gregory said CTA management plans to meet today with Local 241 officials -- their first face-to-face meeting since the cut Robert Kelly, president of Local 308, which represents L workers, said he doesn't plan to bring up the idea of a strike to his members.

"It would hurt the riding public," Kelly said. "They've suffered enough.