Sigh........

Another regular monthly meeting of Local 282 of the Amalgamated Transit Union comes and goes.
Local 282 is the Rochester division of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU — “What’s ‘ah-two?’”), my old bus union at Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY.
For 16 & 1/2 years, 1977-1993, I drove transit-bus for RTS — my stroke ended that.
I was a public employee; our union couldn’t strike.
Our union is sort of a joke, but mainly because it’s not very well supported.
Bus drivers are pretty much on their own every day, so don’t act much like a union.
The mechanics are more a union — they’re together on the property all the time.
I missed the last two meetings. Last time I forgot, and before that I don’t remember why.
Our union is in question. For the past three years contract negotiations have been stalemated, and were only settled after an International Vice-President from Washington DC got involved.
The International was threatening to trustee our union. Union finances were at issue, as well as the humungous number of pending arbitrations.
At issue was whether our union officials were competent — they seemed to be getting nowhere.
Seems this happened the last time contract negotiations were at impasse. An International vice-president from Syracuse had to get involved.
“Trustee” is to take over our union from Washington DC, and throw our local union officials out.
I strode into the Men's Room before the meeting and met Frank Falzone (“fowl-ZONE”), our union full-time business-agent.
A proposed bylaw change, which would have brought our local into compliance with the International Constitution, to reduce our full-time union employees from two to one, by combining the offices of union president and business-agent into one full-time union official, had been defeated by our membership.
—Although not many had voted; maybe 30 out of 350.
“So I’m wondering if we’re still alive, Frank,” I said; “which is why I came.”
“Oh, same-old, same-old,” he said. “Still here, more-or-less.”
My attendance at these meetings is rather silly. As a retiree I can’t vote.
About all I’m doing is supporting my union by showing up.
Which is why they loved me at Transit; I showed up. —It was a stupid meaningless job with a difficult clientele, but it paid fairly well, and driving large vehicles was fun for a while.
It was so challenging, many employees became attendance problems, but not me. It was possible to avoid madness if ya knew what you were doing.
And there was great joy in slamming a bus down the expressway at 65 mph in the passing-lane.
A few things happened at the missed meetings, apparently.
A union-representative, who advocated for bus drivers in disputes with management, quit, and was apparently replaced.
The part-time union Recording Secretary presented a slew of proposed bylaw changes to affect, more-or-less, the changes voted down.
All passed except one, which our union officials advised against.
But it was the usual peanuts voting contingent; maybe 20.
Local 282 also represents other transit operations, primarily a para-transit, and a small transit operation in nearby Canandaigua.
Canandaigua is in a county not part of the area-wide transit authority.
But mainly Local 282 is Regional Transit Service.
After the bylaw votes, a couple proposed arbitrations were trotted by.
The usual stupid stonewalling by management requiring us to arbitrate.
Some of it was management timeliness — our contract has time limits on certain things.
After that, Frank gave a short Business-Agent’s report, and we adjourned.
No yelling, no screaming; not much blog material.
The best reflection of that was Frank saying “I’m not being negative here......”
A while ago a proposed computer purchase that would have brought our union into the new century was scotched by blowhards loudly claiming they could get the same equipment from somebody’s sister for only $400.

• “What’s ‘ah-two?’” is something my mother asked seeing my ATU button.
• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• ATU is international because it represents transit operations in the United States and Canada.
• “Canandaigua” (“cannon-DAY-gwuh”) is a small city nearby where we live in Western NY. The city is also within a rural town called “Canandaigua.” The name is Indian, and means “Chosen Spot.” —It’s about 15 miles away. —The noninvolved county is “Ontario.”