REGULAR MEMBERSHIP MEETING FEBRUARY 24, 2005       4:00 P.M.

 

The regular 1st shift membership meeting was held on Thursday, February 24, 2005 at 4:00 p.m. with Larry West presiding.

 

The 53 members present paid their respects to the flag.

 

Prayer was held for the membership and for the local.

 

Roll call was taken with Todd Baker, John Ballard Jr., Jerry Fyffe, Dan Johnson, Stan Long, Steve Shope absent and Tracy Kelly and Ed Potter working and Dan Palmer sick.

 

Motion made and seconded to dispense with the reading of the January membership meeting minutes as read, subject to question.

 

Motion carried unanimously..

 

Motion made and seconded to approve the February Executive Board minutes as read, subject to question.

 

Motion carried unanimously.

 

REPORT OF THE CHAIRMAN, KEITH BAILEY:

 

Reported on the status of the grievance procedure.

 

Active last month at 3rd:    217

 

This month at 3rd:   234  

 

Appeal Step:   6

 

Paragraph 99 – 0

 

Zone 1 –  9

Zone 2-  11

Zone 3 -  173

Zone 4 –  41

 

Reported on Employment Status level.

 

Active Employment   1042  

Leaves  -   94

Lay offs –   361

 

Reported on the 2005 Independence week shutdown period will be Mon. July 4, 2005 thru Fri. July 8, 2005.  The Vacation Shutdown Week will be Monday, July 11, 2005 thru July 15, 2005. Currently there are no production areas scheduled to work either week. However, the skilled trades departments 064, 065, and 397 will be scheduled to work over the Independence and Vacation Shutdown weeks.

 

Reported that 2005 Kettering Inventory is scheduled for Tuesday, July 5, 2005 and Wednesday, July 6, 2005.

 

Reported on the GMT 361/371.   The manufacturing quote that the Kettering Operations supplied to GM for this new business was underbid by Bilstein by one third of our bid. Kettering quoted this work at a 1.4% loss to try to get this work. This is disappointing news for our plant, when we can’t get new work even though we quote it at a loss.  We want to thank members Bill Thomas and Dale Shafner and with engineers Greg Coles and Dick Bishop for their hard work and research on this project.  We will continue to look for opportunities to bring work into the Kettering plant.

 

Reported that while he was at the Health and Safety Conference, he received an update that GM will be reducing their schedule for this year, taking out of the market 119,000 for this year.  All assembly plants will be making inventory adjustments all throughout the year.

 

Motion made and seconded to approve the chairman’s report subject to question.

 

Questions were asked and answered.

 

Motion carried unanimously.

 

REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, DAVID HILL:

 

Reported that he cannot report specifics on every case that is resolved at the Conference Board meetings, because of privacy issues.

 

Reported on the problems we are having with Fidelity.  Encouraged members retiring to see benefit reps if they have any problems or questions.

 

Thanked the benefit reps. for all of their hard work during these difficult transition times with Fidelity.

 

Reported that people who are retiring March 1st should not clock in on March 1st.

 

Motion made and seconded to approve the executive secretary’s report, subject to question.

 

Motion carried unanimously.

 

REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT, LARRY WEST:

 

Reported on the American Cancer Society Fish Fry on Friday, March 18th.  This cause is very important and we need everyone’s help to make it a success.  Laura is keeping a list of people who would like to work the event, so if you could volunteer that night, please let her know. 

 

Reported on Scholarship Applications – The 2005 Robert L. Livingston Scholarship and all IUE-CWA Scholarships must be filed electronically. All scholarship information and applications can be obtained by accessing the Conference Board website at www.iue-cwaautomotive.com and clicking on the IUE-CWA Scholarship Information link.   Application deadline: April 29, 2005

 

Congratulated all of the members who are retiring March 1st. 

 

Reported that we have been having problems with people removing bulletins from the Union bulletin boards.  The union will be purchasing new locks for all of the Union boards and in the future, we will be directly controlling the postings on those boards and making sure they remain locked so that the membership gets the information they need.

 

Reported that Larry West was appointing Brad Rice to fill the Executive Board term of Al Phillips, who retired February 1st, pending membership approval.  Reported that second shift wanted to hold the approval vote until next month and he had no problem doing that on first shift as well.  Brad Rice will serve as an interim Exec. Bd member until the vote is taken.

 

Reported on JT Batterburg’s retirement.

 

Motion was made and seconded to approve the President’s report, subject to question.

 

Motion carried unanimously.

 

NO COMMITTEE REPORTS:

 

NO GOOD AND WELFARE: 

 

OLD BUSINESS:

 

Question was asked about how many people clocked in on February 1st that had already scheduled retirement.  The answer was 11. 

 

NEW BUSINESS:

 

Motion was made and seconded to change the first shift membership meeting time from 4:00 to 3:30.

 

Motion carried unanimously.

 

Meeting adjourned at 5:00 p.m.

 

Dave Hill

Executive Secretary