This year we take on the very important task of negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement for the membership of this Local Union.  As we take on this task we are cognizant of the responsibility you have placed in our hands.

Before we take our seats at the bargaining table we must take time to look back and be reminded of the effort and sacrifice of those that came before us and of the many accomplishments they have made to better our economic situation and our quality of life.  The road to get where we are today was not a road called Easy St.  It has been a struggle and the struggle continues as we continue to strive for economic and social justice. 

We face two powerful and rich corporations in the months ahead.  And as rich as they are it is never enough.  It’s not enough for CEO’s, CFO’s, COO’s and others to be paid millions, they also need large  bonuses and incentive pay to come and do their jobs while telling us that we need to pay more for our healthcare so that we can better appreciate what we have.  They claim poverty when we ask for fair compensation so we can retire with dignity, yet there seems to be plenty of money around when it’s time to compensate themselves.  They are very generous with praise and tell us how important we are to the organization, that is until we ask for a slice of the pie. 

Sisters and Brothers, we go to work, we are a part of the success , we have helped create the wealth,  we don’t put our hands in the companies pocket, what we do is claim our fair share for the work we have done.  We make this claim together in solidarity and we expect nothing less than our fair share. 

International President Walter Reuther spoke of the power of the corporations, so let’s move forward with thoughts of those words: 

“Despite that power we have prevailed because we have demonstrated in a very practical way that there is no power in the world that can stop the forward march of free men and women when they are joined together in the solidarity of human brotherhood and when they are joined in a search for common answers to common problems.  We go there again this year in that historic struggle that will never end:  Man’s search to build a better world, a world in which human progress becomes the essential end purpose of all human efforts, a world in which we can continue to win a fuller measure of economic and social justice, in which we can assert the sovereignty of man over machines, in which we can give priority to human rights over property rights and in which we can place in our system of values people ahead of profits."