December 2023 New England Bi-Monthly Regional Update #1
From Mick Devine, NATCA New England Regional Vice President
Brothers and Sisters,
I hope you all were able to enjoy some time with family over the Thanksgiving holiday. I’d like to send out my thanks to all those members who worked during the holiday to allow the others to enjoy their time with family.
November has come and gone and we successfully navigated our second potential government shutdown. We also worked through our annual national finance meeting where we set the budgets for every region and budget line in the organization.
One of the newer hurdles we had to overcome this year was the substantial difference between budget requests and revenue. This year, we set a record of having our budgetary requests for 2024 exceed projected revenue by over $4 million. The New England budget came in at a raise of $3,000 from this year. So where are we as an organization financially? We are in a pretty healthy spot. This NEB has been able to put approximately $15,000,000 into savings over the last few years. So, the obvious solution would be to dip into savings. We chose not to do that. That $15,000,000 is set aside for emergencies as well as expensive negotiations which are coming up. This board made it one of their goals to set aside a good bit of money to protect us from bankrupting the organization in the rare instance that we had a robust and lengthy shutdown. During the 35-day shutdown, we were running out of money and were having to have conversations of the next steps as we were getting closer than we wanted to not being able to pay for our staff. Additionally, we have three contracts coming up very soon which cost a lot of money to undertake. Since there is nothing more valuable to our members than a healthy and robust contract, we needed to ensure we were financially prepared for the inevitable negotiations. The final negotiations would be break points which are the set of values each facility is graded on to ensure they are properly paid for the work they do.
Regionally, we did not get what we asked for, which was a much higher bump than usual due to our regional RT1 which we will be having the week leading up to the Super Bowl in Manchester, NH. That course is five days long and will be very expensive. As a result of our continued quest to have that class and work within the budget we were given and approved, we had to make some cuts to what we will be doing in 2024. We will not be hosting a second regional class next year and we will not be having solidarity events associated with our facility visits in 2024. We will also be attending only one FacRep meeting this coming year. With those cuts, we will be able to host the regional RT1 and stay within our budget.
Nationally, the NEB has instituted a few cost-saving measures for next year to work within our approved budget. For one, we will be moving two NEB meetings from in-person to virtual. Secondly, we will be sliding one of our in-person meetings to coincide with a national event to only spend once on travel as opposed to two times. We have three major events upcoming this year—NATCA in Washington, Communicating for Safety, and Activism and Training Expo. While expensive, those three events remain an example of NATCA’s priorities—Legislative Activism, Aviation Safety, and reinvestment into our membership and we must continue to host these very valuable events.
I hope all of you have a wonderful holiday season and get some downtime with family and friends and look forward to everything 2024 has to offer.
Labor-Management Relations
From Lisa Fulford, NATCA New England LR Coordinator, A90
Quarter 3 Pre-Arbitration Review
The parties met on Wednesday, November 1st in Burlington, MA to present 7 cases. Prior to the cases being heard before the neutral, the Union was able to settle 3 grievances with management. Out of the 4 grievances that were heard the Neutral sided with the Union on 2 cases and with management on 2 cases. The remedies were agreed upon within two weeks and the grievants were notified of the decisions. The remedies that were requested were granted by management.
Quarter 4 Pre-Arbitration Review
The parties were scheduled to meet on December 11th for Q4 PAR, however, the 7 grievances were all settled last week. The remedies and decisions are in the process of being shared with the grievants.
I am currently in the process of proposing dates for 2024 PARs and will continue to organize and update the LR records for the region.
Finance
From Mike DiFalco, NATCA New England Finance Rep, BOS
Do you know the difference between an Asset List and a Property list? Do you know how long you’re required to retain documents such as bank statements, vouchers, receipts, and meeting minutes? Do you know where to go to find these answers?
Most of this information is contained in the members section of the NATCA website. Once you’ve logged into the members side, select the Documents drop-down and then select Docs and Forms. Alternatively, you can select the Committee’s drop-down, then select Finance, and then select Accounting Forms. These will both take you to the same page.
Here you will find a wealth of information. There are templates you can use for creating or amending documents such as Local Financial Policy, Asset List, Property List, Meeting Minutes, and Local Constitution.
You’ll also find guidelines for items such as Document Retention and filing End of Year tax forms.
These are all items we cover (among others) during your facilities’ financial audit. NATCA’s Finance Committee will audit your building once every three (3) years. However, if you ever have questions on anything finance-related, we encourage you to reach out and ask rather than wait until your next audit, which could be years away.
The Finance Committee is here to help! Dave Provencher and I work together as your Regional Finance Representatives. You can reach us anytime at [email protected] or [email protected].
New England Supports their Local Communities this Holiday Season
Lisa Fulford, A90, and Connie Earle, ZBW, represented NATCA Charitable Foundation (NCF) on Wednesday, November 29th at Homeward Bound. NCF has partnered with Family Promise of Southern New Hampshire over five years by donating to their fundraising events. Homeward Bound is their annual fundraiser which includes silent and live auctions. NCF donated $3,000 to Family Promise, whose mission is to help families secure permanent housing while working full-time and learning about finances in order to be successful on their own.
If you would like to learn more about Family Promise or help support their mission please visit their website: https://familypromisesnh.org/
ZBW has teamed up with the Front Door Agency again this year to give families in need gifts for the holidays. There is a list of 20 kids and their wish lists, so if you are interested in shopping for one or two, please contact Kaitlin Johnstone at 585-430-0184. We are happy to take donations as well. You can donate via Venmo to @ktjstone55.
If you are purchasing gifts, they are due, unwrapped, by December 14th. Thank you for your generosity!
A90 is giving back to the local community this holiday season. They have partnered with Nashua Children’s Home to provide gifts for children living in the home. This year union members will purchase gifts and gift cards for 37 children who reside full-time at Nashua Children’s Home. A90 has partnered with NCH for over 20 years and on average donates $175 worth of gifts to each child.
A90 also helps out Family Promise of Greater Southern New Hampshire through a raffle fundraiser. Family Promise buys the children residing in the home jackets, hats, boots, and gloves. Currently, there are 37 children residing in the building with their families. A90 is selling 10 raffle tickets for a $20 donation. Prizes this year include a $200 gift card to Bass Pro, $25 gift cards to Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts.
If you would like to donate, please Venmo Lisa Fulford (@Lisa-Fulford-1) and she will include you in the raffle.
PWM is once again partnering with the Portland Maine Police Department to help collect toys for children in need this holiday season!
PWM’s 2023 Toys-4-Tots Toy Drop will be held on Saturday, December 9th from 9:00-11:00am (rain date of Sunday, December 10th).
The members at PWM have a goal to collect even more toys than they did at their event last year! If you have any questions or would like to participate, please feel free to contact Steve Schefcik at [email protected].
Announcements and Information
New England will be hosting a full RT-1 class in New England the week leading up to the Super Bowl, February 5-9, 2024. The class will be held at the Doubletree by Hilton Manchester Downtown in Manchester, NH, and will be open to about 40 attendees.
If you will be a new representative next year or think that being a representative may be in your future, you should attend this class! This is a unique opportunity to take RT-1 in the local area without having to travel all the way out to Las Vegas, where the class is normally held.
Sign-ups for RT-1 will be available soon on the NATCA Portal.
