January 3, 2011

Bargaining continued today with your Regional Bargaining team presenting a comprehensive counter proposal on Call Sharing to the Company. Verizon responded briefly with a few questions and then advised us that they would have more questions after they review the proposal over the next few days.

Last week, Chris Shelton, District 1 Vice President, Ed Mooney, District 2-13 Vice President, Dennis Trainer, District 1 Bargaining Chair, Gail Evans, District 2-14 Bargaining Chair, Myles Calvey and Bill Huber from IBEW met with representatives from Verizon including Bob Mudge, President of Consumer and Chris Creager, Senior Vice President of Consumer concerning the recently announced joint venture with Comcast Cable, Time Warner Cable and more recently Cox Cable.

This meeting was requested by US to ascertain the affects this was going to have on our members, as well as negotiations. Their response was that this was a deal between Verizon Wireless and the Cable companies. and that it didn’t have much effect on us. They advised is that the wireline company would still be competing with the Cable companies regardless of the partnering with wireless.

The answers they supplied made absolutely no sense especially after Mc Adam told UBS that he would honor their commitment to build out FiOS only to the numbers it committed to and no more. The deal also includes Verizon and cable companies selling each other products. Honesty is not a trait that exists with in this organization!

We are now waiting on the probe by the Department of Justice into this deal. The D. O. J. thinks the deal has the potential to hurt competition in the wireless and cable industries. Recently the D.O. J. pushed back on the AT&T / T-Mobile deal and the deal fell apart.

Finally, members should have received notice of the corporate profit sharing award bargained for in 2008. A minimum payment of $700.00 with the possibility of more based on the Company’s financial results of 2011. Payment will be made by March 1, 2012. Please read the information mailed to you on deferring this award to your savings and Security plan. Your decision must be done between January3 and February 3, 2012.

From Keith Edwards Local 1105, cwa1105.org
Tape Number: 718-904-1105