Mesaba (ALPA) vs. Colgan (NONALPA)

AmazingPilot said:
So then how will defend your original post in this thread of claiming Colgan Pilots work harder than Pinnacle Pilots???
I thought I broke down the staffing issues for you, so I would like to see what you have in response to that?
You keep posting that we need a union at Colgan, things are changing, and that the pilot group committee is useless, but you never seem to defend your points, only reiterate them.
I don't need to call you, since you chose this forum to discuss this issues this is where I will respond, on this website with the rest of my Colgan and Pinnacle peers. There is nothing you can say to me that you can't say to the rest of them.
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Points on how things are changing. They took away the USAIRWAYS Saab from ABE and put it into PIT. They will be doing the ABE to PIT run on that Saab based out of PIT. They are starting to take away from the outstation basing and making them more hub based. A lot of our pilots enjoy the outstationed basing. What do we have to defend this? Our health care package prices were raised quitely back in February. What do we have to defend this? The Colgan Pilot Committee is useless unless the National Mediation Labor Board certifies them. Then they can act as a legal collective bargaining voice for Colgan Pilots ONLY when certified.

Ask what the Skywest Pilot Group/Committee has done for them?

In regards to the staffing issues this is what YOU said in another thread?

http://forums.jetcareers.com/showthread.php?t=40912

AmazingPilot said:
Thanks for looking down at Colgan and all the 450 pilots who work here, because obiviously you assumed that because I or anyone who works at Colgan can't possibly have any expierence or understanding on bigger aircraft.
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So let me ask you, how many pilots do we have?

And airlines usually runs about 5-6 crews per plane.

My source for this is XJET is sending 50 pilots to LAX to run the Delta stuff. They are running 10 planes out of there.

I am sure that the guys flying at the Majors will tell you their staffing numbers. At Continental, there are about 8 Captains and 14 FOs for each 777. 7 Captains 10 FOs for 767/757s (this coming from someone within Continental).

At the 737 at Continental which is similar to 'regional flying' staffing numbers they have 5.22 crews per airplane and could most likely use 7 to be fully staffed with an adequate number of short reserve stints to line holder pilots.
 
Seggy said:
Points on how things are changing. They took away the USAIRWAYS Saab from ABE and put it into PIT. They will be doing the ABE to PIT run on that Saab based out of PIT. They are starting to take away from the outstation basing and making them more hub based. A lot of our pilots enjoy the outstationed basing. What do we have to defend this? Our health care package prices were raised quitely back in February. What do we have to defend this? The Colgan Pilot Committee is useless unless the National Mediation Labor Board certifies them. Then they can act as a legal collective bargaining voice for Colgan Pilots ONLY when certified.
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ABE lost the aircraft because US Air made the decision to, thist has nothing to do with Colgan. The ABE-PIT route was bleeding money, mostly because the airport authority overcharges the major carriers in landing fees.




Seggy said:
Ask what the Skywest Pilot Group/Committee has done for them?

In regards to the staffing issues this is what YOU said in another thread?

http://forums.jetcareers.com/showthread.php?t=4091
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What????
 
ABE-PIT is still operating, with the crew based out of PIT. Colgan chose to change the base on you.

What sort of displacement benefits do you get?
 
Wow. The water just got deep in here, I need to put on my waders. :D

So let me get this straight - PCL's contract states that everyone needs to be on the same senority list. How the heck would they transfer us to the PCL list? If a PCL pilot can transfer to a Saab or Q, can a Saab or Q pilot transfer to a CRJ? It just seems like the Colgan pilots would be the dirty stepchild of this whole deal. So....that raises the question "Should we go union". Well.....

If the PCL pilot group is represented by APLA, and their majority believes the senority lists should be merged and that they should have options in Colgans fleet - then who would ALPA support? The PCL group or the Colgan group? We'd be out numbered by more then double. If the lines were drawn, APLA would loose either way they choose. If they side with PCL pilots, they loose support from Colgan pilots, not a big loss in numbers. If they side with Colgan pilots, then they would lose support on that fence. Smell what I'm stepping in?

I'm sitting on the fence, especially right now. I've got to worry about a PC first. BUT, even in training, we're getting confronted with a ton of information on both sides. Could this have the makings of what happened at CCAir?
 
Airdale said:
Wow. The water just got deep in here, I need to put on my waders. :D

So let me get this straight - PCL's contract states that everyone needs to be on the same senority list. How the heck would they transfer us to the PCL list? If a PCL pilot can transfer to a Saab or Q, can a Saab or Q pilot transfer to a CRJ? It just seems like the Colgan pilots would be the dirty stepchild of this whole deal. So....that raises the question "Should we go union". Well.....

If the PCL pilot group is represented by APLA, and their majority believes the senority lists should be merged and that they should have options in Colgans fleet - then who would ALPA support? The PCL group or the Colgan group? We'd be out numbered by more then double. If the lines were drawn, APLA would loose either way they choose. If they side with PCL pilots, they loose support from Colgan pilots, not a big loss in numbers. If they side with Colgan pilots, then they would lose support on that fence. Smell what I'm stepping in?

I'm sitting on the fence, especially right now. I've got to worry about a PC first. BUT, even in training, we're getting confronted with a ton of information on both sides. Could this have the makings of what happened at CCAir?
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In this situation ALPA merger policy prevails. Whatever they do it would be better than the stapler that happened with Shuttle America, or the mess that was the TWA/AA merger.
 
Seggy said:
Secondly, EVERYONE calm down at the scope clauses, seniority list issues and everything else related to that.

Our biggest concern is to have a collective bargaining voice for the Colgan Pilot group. To obtain that we need to get a union on property. Once that is obtained THEN we move forward and talk about these issues.

I promise you this. With ALPA on property at Colgan, the COLGAN PILOTS will be protected and will have a say on how our pilot roster is fenced from the Pinnacle Pilot roster. ALPA would lose credibility if they unionized a pilot group, then forcibly staple us to the bottom of the list.

If the Colgan Pilots for some reason do turn down ALPA, we have NO protection from ANY issues.

Things ARE changing at Colgan. We NEED to make sure we have protection from these changes.
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Airdale, I am going to quote myself...and make it big for everyone...
 
A couple of things... I'm too lazy to use multi quote. Sorry.


Seggy, be careful about making promises. ALPA has screwed over my pilot group on a few things in the past year. They some times have the greater good in mind, but people get stepped on.

The "normal" staffing model may be >5 crews per plane. We are staffed at 3.4 but are only flying 85 hours a month. Go figure.

Scope is what you make of it. If you put enough fences in place you hardly will know the difference. Kel, I assume you guys have an MEC level grievance in place for the scope issue. It will be interesting to see how that turns out. If it goes to arbitration and is decided in your favor, the Colgan pilots might not get a choice about joining ALPA.
 
I was chatting with a senior Pinnacle captain on my commute home and we got on the subject of Colgan. He mentioned the scope clause and we started talking about seniority integration. It seems that upgrade is so similar at both places that relatively few should get hosed. His personal opinion was a 3-1 integration with 2 year fences.
 
GaTechKid said:
I was chatting with a senior Pinnacle captain on my commute home and we got on the subject of Colgan. He mentioned the scope clause and we started talking about seniority integration. It seems that upgrade is so similar at both places that relatively few should get hosed. His personal opinion was a 3-1 integration with 2 year fences.
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That seems like a rather fair deal, what exactly do you mean by a 2 year fence?
 
...meaning a Colgan pilot could not bid for the CRJ or a Pinnacle pilot could not bid for the Saab for 2 years.
 
Airdale said:
So let me get this straight - PCL's contract states that everyone needs to be on the same senority list. How the heck would they transfer us to the PCL list?
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Guidelines have existed for this for years.

If a PCL pilot can transfer to a Saab or Q, can a Saab or Q pilot transfer to a CRJ?
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The fence protections would keep PCL pilots from going to Colgan routes and it would keep Colgan pilots from going to PCL routes. Basically, what happens is Colgan gets a union and PCL gets protection from being "Go jet-ized."


If the PCL pilot group is represented by APLA, and their majority believes the senority lists should be merged and that they should have options in Colgans fleet - then who would ALPA support? The PCL group or the Colgan group? We'd be out numbered by more then double. If the lines were drawn, APLA would loose either way they choose. If they side with PCL pilots, they loose support from Colgan pilots, not a big loss in numbers. If they side with Colgan pilots, then they would lose support on that fence. Smell what I'm stepping in?
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<sigh> One more time. Pinnacle pilots do NOT want to take Colgan pilots flying away. We just want our contract honored and not to be played against you guys down the road if more flying is secured. What happens if we get a Delta contract while we're still union and you guys are non-union. We get the "We'll give you the jets if you'll fly them for this rate. Oh, and we want to raise your health care premiums too so we don't have to pay as much on our side. Oh? You don't want to do that. Well, they'll just go to Colgan then....." Without the scope protection, there isn't JACK we can do to stop that. We don't want to be whipsawed, and I'm guessing the Colgan guys don't want to be used to whipsaw us. Maybe I'm wrong, though. Maybe there's a lot of guys over there that wouldn't care if we got shrunk or had our contract eroded by those very real threats. If you don't think they're real, ask the guys over at Trans States or the guys that were at Mesa when Freedom started up. We know you guys didn't ask to be bought by our crooked management team, but we're not just gonna lie down and take it.
 
Cruise said:
Ok, here's a little tidbit of information........the Colgan domicle in ABE is going to be changing in the next few weeks. We just found out through the Colgan grapevine that we are losing one of the two Saabs in base. We will no longer be running US Airways out of ABE (claims of lack of profit). This much is fact.

Now, rumot has it that this is the start of many changes to come here at Colgan. This is just the first move away from outstation basing and moving to the "hub" system of crew domicles. The Colgan family is no longer "running the show" as they'd have us believe. Not much more than a puppet government at this point and it's only going to continue slide. Sure, the Colgan's are to remain in their original capacity for at least one year. However, a takeover of this kind is always easier to sell to the little worker bees if changes come slowly and we are lead to believe things are going to remain the same.........it's more or less kool-aid to keep the bees producing honey.

Unfortunately, the Colgan's are pushing to keep ALPA off-property to supposedly maintain the open-door policy that's currently in place. Threats have been made by Mr. Colgan himself in a memo distrubted to all the pilots stating if ALPA is voted in things will change and there will no longer be a "friendship" between management and the employees. From what I've heard, and I have no proof whatsoever, people have been canned for bringing opposing views to the company during this open-door policy. Newsflash! An open-door policy only works unless there are no repurcusions regarding information that is presented.....and I just don't think that is actually in place here. I for one (and I know many others feel the same way) would never openly bring any complaints to the chief pilot or any management type for fear of reprisals. Not a very effective policy as it stands.

All this being said, I've enjoyed my time at Colgan! I think it was and still is (for now) a great place to work. Only time will tell how things change.....it could continue to be a great place or it could become a living hell. But reading everything Kellwolf has to say about the way PCL management treats it's pilot group, it seems obvious to me we need the protection a union will provide.
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http://www.mcall.com/business/local/all-lvia-apr10-cn,0,2312264.story?coll=all-businesslocal-hed

This does not appear to be some grand master scheme to move to a more centalized basing system. The saab is not relocating to PIT, the flights are being cancelled all together. The airport authority is overcharging the carriers in landing fees, and US Airways decided it wasn't worth losing money on.
Once again reading and researching, from time to time, might be more beneficial than just impulse posting one's biased opinions. Perhaps we need to stop blaming Colgan's lack of having a union as being the cause of every undesirable thing that happens here.

p.s. I'll be sure to proofread all my posts from now on, as I would not want to confuse you, so do you best to ADAPT to the situation.
 
AmazingPilot said:
This does not appear to be some grand master scheme to move to a more centalized basing system.
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Then why did they decide to base the Saabs in PIT for the West Virginia EAS service rather than in Morgantown and the other cities we will be serving? I mean we have had outstationed basing for what? Thirty years?
 
Seggy said:
Then why did they decide to base the Saabs in PIT for the West Virginia EAS service rather than in Morgantown and the other cities we will be serving? I mean we have had outstationed basing for what? Thirty years?
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Only one plane is being based in PIT.
The rest are being based from at Clarksburg, Morgantown, and Columbus.
 
AmazingPilot said:
http://www.mcall.com/business/local/all-lvia-apr10-cn,0,2312264.story?coll=all-businesslocal-hed

This does not appear to be some grand master scheme to move to a more centalized basing system. The saab is not relocating to PIT, the flights are being cancelled all together. The airport authority is overcharging the carriers in landing fees, and US Airways decided it wasn't worth losing money on.
Once again reading and researching, from time to time, might be more beneficial than just impulse posting one's biased opinions. Perhaps we need to stop blaming Colgan's lack of having a union as being the cause of every undesirable thing that happens here.
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Thanks for the information. And, for the record, I NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THE ABE PLANE GOING TO PIT........get YOUR information straight before you make accusations.



AmazingPilot said:
p.s. I'll be sure to proofread all my posts from now on, as I would not want to confuse you, so do you best to ADAPT to the situation.
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Proofreading is much apprieciated by everyone! ;)



You know, after reading all your posts regarding this matter, it seems to me you are taking the company stance rather aggressively. Sure you're not management trying to make yourself look like a line pilot? I'm asking because troll-type behavior isn't appreciated around here.
 
<General note on the thread progression>

Everybody relax a little. I don't think anyone is trolling, I think that there is primarily some miscommunication going on, and emotions are running a little high because of the subject matter. As long as everyone stays on-topic and avoids personal attacks I think this can continue to be a good discussion. Just remember that it is most unlikely that everyone will end up in agreement on a topic like this, so allow for differences of opinion.
 
Seggy said:
Then why did they decide to base the Saabs in PIT for the West Virginia EAS service rather than in Morgantown and the other cities we will be serving? I mean we have had outstationed basing for what? Thirty years?
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Cruise said:
Thanks for the information. And, for the record, I NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THE ABE PLANE GOING TO PIT........get YOUR information straight before you make accusations.

You know, after reading all your posts regarding this matter, it seems to me you are taking the company stance rather aggressively. Sure you're not management trying to make yourself look like a line pilot? .
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Seggy made the comment about the airplane/planes being relocated to PIT.
I wasn't making any accusations towards you cruise, rather I was responding to both Seggy and yourself. I think that may have been miscommunicated.

The article link I posted was an attempt to address this issue, as US Airways made the decision to pull the plane out of ABE. http://www.mcall.com/business/local/all-lvia-apr10-cn,0,2312264.story?coll=all-businesslocal-hed

http://www.nj.com/business/expresstimes/index.ssf?/base/business-1/1176350860128100.xml&coll=2




Maybe I'm just playing devil's advocate, but I think that during the current conditions at Colgan being as they are, we all need to be very clear and specific in the points that we make. My aggressive stance is in respond to the misinformation that is being shared, that's all.
 
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