transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:01] Welcome to Classes of Mail. Before you listen, you should know that Alan Giegax is not in any sense an official spokesman for the Post Office, the NALC, or anybody else. His opinions are inherently his own, and should probably be disregarded. Same for his guests. Any information you hear on this podcast could be wrong and should not be relied upon for any reason. Enjoy the show.

Speaker 2:
[00:47] Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Classes of Mail. My name is Alan Giegax, and I don't want to waste any time getting to my guest. I'm here with David Grosskopf. Say hello.

Speaker 3:
[00:57] Hello everybody.

Speaker 2:
[00:59] Awesome. Guys, I got up at 4.30 in the fricking morning to do this interview, because Dave is one of those jerks who lives on the Eastern time. And so I'm interviewing him at nine his time, six my time. I had to get ready for work, but it's worth it to have one of the finest guests that Classes of Mail ever has, David Grosskopf. So thanks for coming on, man. I really appreciate it.

Speaker 3:
[01:22] You're welcome.

Speaker 2:
[01:23] All right, so the idea that I had for this topic comes from carriers who, you know, we file these grievances, and the goal of the grievance ultimately is to stop management from infracting the contract again, from breaking the contract. But we also want to make carriers whole for whatever it is that they've lost. And in many cases, that's impossible. You know, we wait until after the carrier has been wronged, after the wrong has been committed, and we have this expression, obey now and grieve later. And the delays that we're experiencing in this process, they exacerbate the harm to the carrier. And that's what I want to talk about today. So let's go over an example. We'll start with the most extreme, because that would be a friend of mine, like with the removal. You've had carriers removed, obviously, in Buffalo, it happens. What do you try to, what do you do, how do you handle it, like the effort to try to make a carrier whole when they've been removed? Or more to the point, what happens to the carrier while they're removed that they can't be made whole for?

Speaker 3:
[02:38] Right, so when, you know, we get to it, I handle, just so you're aware, I handle all the removals, the discipline removals in my branch. I believe as leader of branch three, you know, that's my job. I should deal with the most difficult cases that the branch has. So the very first thing that I'm trying to do, I just want to back it up a step.

Speaker 2:
[03:00] Please.

Speaker 3:
[03:01] Is, again, is get, you know, there's that saying, justice delayed is justice denied, period. So for me, a big part of this is getting that grievance filed, getting it through the lower steps, getting it up to me at Formal A as fast as we can, you know, to try to take a look at this. Cause in most cases, you know, management's just going through, you know, the rigmarole at Informal A. They're really not gonna do anything, right? So they're not even gonna really start to get serious until the branch president walks in the door. So I want that thing as fast as I can get it. Then I get ahold of my counterpart, and I start to have a discussion, you know, with them about, you know, what we can do here, what I think I see in that case file, and immediately set that meeting up to meet with them. Because again, you don't want, you know, a delay of a month or two, because, you know, if that thing gets impassed, it's going to sit at step B, then it's going to sit at arbitration. And, you know, once that thing gets impassed, or a decision's made at step B, that carrier's not receiving money anymore, you know, according to the J-Cam, right? So that's my whole mindset, is to get in there, meet with management, attempt to see if we can come to some type of resolution. And if we can, to expeditiously put that position together, you know, and move it to step B, hoping, you know, we can get a resolve there.

Speaker 2:
[04:26] So, what percent, or does it ever happen that a removal is settled at informal or formal A?

Speaker 3:
[04:33] In my branch, the answer is yes.

Speaker 2:
[04:35] Okay, cool.

Speaker 3:
[04:36] I do have some, you know, not, I don't want to say it happens all the time informally, but I'm aware that there are times where, because the stewards will call here asking for advice.

Speaker 2:
[04:46] Right.

Speaker 3:
[04:46] You know, hey, management's looking to move on this, what can we do? We get it done. I do get, you know, there was a period there where they weren't agreeing with me on any removal. And we were going to arbitration and, you know, knock on wood. We were very successful in the overwhelming majority of those. So now they're a little more serious when they sit down with me. And they're like, all right, let's see what we can do here.

Speaker 2:
[05:11] Right.

Speaker 3:
[05:11] So the point there is you have to, with a lot of things, you have, you have to beat them. It's not enough to talk to talk. It's not enough to walk to walk. You have to get into the arena. You have to beat them. It's the only thing they understand is they've lost for the fifth time in arbitration, the sixth time, the seventh time, the eighth time, you know?

Speaker 2:
[05:33] Yeah, so let me ask you about that, because we have a supervisor at my station who, her whole job, essentially, is to issue discipline, do investigative interviews, mainly attendance. And every discipline that she issues, because she's bad at it, gets turned over. And so I asked her at one point, like, does this tell you something about the discipline that you're issuing? And no, it is completely lost on her. But it sounds like with management, like if they're paying a carrier for four months for not working at all, like with back pay, that maybe eventually they start to notice. Is that your experience?

Speaker 3:
[06:07] Yeah, that's exactly what happens, is there's that prolonged period from the decision and or the impasse at step B until that thing gets scheduled, you know? And then depending on, again, how the advocates want to close, they could close orally at the hearing where that's due in 30 days, or they may extend the time frames to submit briefs, where usually what we do here is another 30 days, then the arbitrator's got 30 days from the date to receive the brief. So like you're saying, there could be six, seven, eight, nine months, even more involved in a back pay issue, and now management's having to do 80-38, 80-39s, and it creates more work for them. And then they don't do that right, and then we got to grieve the back pay issue. It's never ending hell.

Speaker 2:
[06:53] Right. So the meat of the episode is what's happening to that carrier during this nine months, or three months, or however long it is. Updates, going to recent.

Speaker 3:
[07:05] The short answer is they're stuck hanging out there. They're stuck without pay, they're stuck without... You know, and you know, you can, for example, I'm not sure if they do this around the country, but when they issue removal here in Western New York, they put all this back pay stuff in there, and employment stuff in there. I mean, you could go out, and you could get another job in that time to bring in pay. Again, probably the chances of you getting a job that equals this one pay wise is pretty slim. But then the other issue with that is, if we win any money that the employer owes you is offset by that money that you've made. And in my opinion, that's absolutely ridiculous. You're the ones that violated my rights. You put me out of work without pay. You should have to pay that amount. I shouldn't, you know, due to my own needs of my family or whatever the deal is, that I got to keep food on the table. That shouldn't be an incentive for management to offset what they owe you.

Speaker 2:
[08:10] Yeah, I would agree with that. If I'm going to hustle and go make for myself, that doesn't undo the harm that management has done to me. And in other cases, you know, if a carrier doesn't get that income replaced, which, of course, most of the time they don't, then there's all these follow on effects that they might lose their car, they might lose their house, they might lose who knows what. And is there any way to make a carrier whole for that kind of harm?

Speaker 3:
[08:35] We do tell, I do tell my carriers, if you are late on a bill, if you default on something, I want to know about that immediately, because there's, again, there's that period between when that thing's in pass at step B until that arbitration, and I'll put some boilerplate language in there from a remedy standpoint, so my advocate can enter that when we get to that point, you know, in a hearing, for example.

Speaker 2:
[09:00] Okay, so an arbitrator would consider that as like additional damages to the carrier.

Speaker 3:
[09:05] We've done it before here, absolutely.

Speaker 2:
[09:06] Ah, that's excellent. Okay, so the other aspect of the delay that I wanna talk, well, actually, let me congratulate you in that, you know, the whole idea behind the episode is that there's this irreparable harm that's done to a carrier when management delays this process. And it is very encouraging to hear that you have found ways to still try to repair that as well. And so that's fantastic. And I know some of the ill that we're gonna talk about, you have ways to repair those as well. So-

Speaker 3:
[09:37] There's a thing, Alan, in arbitration, it's called status quo ante. The object of that arbitration is to return the harmed individual to the position that they were, had the harm not taken place. That's what you have to remember, like when we're talking about different ways here to skin the cat with a remedy. Anything that happened that shouldn't have happened because of management's action, that's free game, go after it.

Speaker 2:
[10:06] Right on, yeah, that makes perfect sense, that's the way it should be. So on that note, when a carrier gets issued discipline, let's say they get a seven day suspension for attendance, that gets grieved, that may wind up going to impasse, and then it's gonna sit for months, months and months, waiting to be adjudicated. In the meantime, that discipline is still in the carrier's file, and management can use that to now issue a 14 day suspension, and then even a removal, and while that seven day is still waiting to be adjudicated, if that seven day gets removed, now these later disciplines are built on feet of clay, how do you address something like that?

Speaker 3:
[10:50] It's, I'll tell you, it's difficult, because in my opinion, arbitrators look at this two ways. The not so much way.

Speaker 2:
[11:00] Right, right, the unfavorable way, yeah.

Speaker 3:
[11:03] The unfavorable way is most arbitrators, when there is underlying discipline that's unadjudicated and management relies on it, you have some arbitrators that will throw everything out. They'll say, hey, you took the risk when you cited this stuff, it no longer exists. The mere fact that you did that is a violation of just cause. There are some arbitrators out there that will say that, right? And then you got, sorry.

Speaker 2:
[11:34] Yes, some. That's the catch, yeah.

Speaker 3:
[11:37] Correct. Then you got the flip side of that, because there is an arbitration decision, the FASER decision by a national arbitrator. And what FASER basically said is that it doesn't mean that management cannot not cite the unadjudicated discipline as a past element, but it does so at its own apparel. And that cigar number is 03910. So basically what FASER is saying is, just like you mentioned, Alan, hey, if management issues that letter of warning, and then they go, you know, 714 removal, you know, they better make sure that none of that underlying discipline, you know, is knocked out, or I'm going to reduce that by that level. So that would then be, you know, a 14 day or the 14 day might be a seven day. But there is a national level decision on that. And that's why it's difficult for us, you know, to go with that first scenario where they just throw the entire thing out. Because if management is smart, they'll point to the faster decision and say, hey, this has already been decided.

Speaker 2:
[12:50] Right. And if I could put my evil management hat on for a sec, the idea of issuing the discipline, it is supposed to be corrective. And so management might make the argument that, hey, we issued this carrier, the seven day suspension. And even though, you know, that's been adjudicated, it clearly was not corrective. And so further discipline is warranted. And what a mess.

Speaker 3:
[13:15] It's a slippery slope for both sides when they're citing that unadjudicated discipline.

Speaker 2:
[13:20] Right, right.

Speaker 3:
[13:21] There's no rock solid, you know, footing there.

Speaker 2:
[13:24] Yeah, yeah, that, man, that. And so management essentially gets to eat the fruit of this bad discipline or awaiting this decision. And the entire time that they're waiting for a decision to come back from step B or from an arbitrator, they're getting their way.

Speaker 3:
[13:42] Correct. They're getting their way from the disciplinary standpoint. But what I always used to do as a steward, you know, again, if this was, in my opinion, something that was egregious, management knows that it's not going to stand and they want to dig their feet in and they want to go all the way to arbitration. Well, that's cool. But Dave Grosskopf, the steward, well, you know what, I haven't seen your OSHA logs in a while. Maybe that emergency exit is blocked or whatever the deal is, I would make them pay with other things. And then when they would say to me, what's the problem? What do you mean what's the problem? The problem is you're not objectively looking at this. And if you want to hold everybody the letter of the law, well, guess what, as a steward, then I'm going to hold you to the letter of the law.

Speaker 2:
[14:28] Right. Yeah, that's it. Give it right back to them. Okay. So to talk more about management getting their way in the meantime, a problem all over the country is changes to start times. So you may have go from 730 to 830, management used an invalid basis to change that start time. Carriers almost universally want to start earlier. And so we'll file a grievance, six months later, we win the grievance, we get the start times back to 730. But for that whole six months, management got the later start time. How do we address something like that?

Speaker 3:
[15:05] Based on what you're telling me here, the first thing is, as part of that remedy, I would argue out of schedule pay.

Speaker 2:
[15:12] Yeah, absolutely, of course.

Speaker 3:
[15:13] That's contained in the J-Cam, Article 84B, Elm 434.6. We're gonna argue, hey, you improperly changed that. We're entitled to that out of schedule pay for the period that you did that. Number one. Number two, like I just mentioned earlier, if, for example, you're, you know, cause this happens to a lot of parents. They've got daycare. It starts at a certain time. You keep shifting that start time around. If that has incurred you extra cost because of the employer constantly shifting that start time, that I take that darn, you know, daycare bill, and I throw it in there and be like, listen, because they did this, this cost me, you know, an extra $200 that quarter, because I had to now adjust my time to get my child to daycare.

Speaker 2:
[16:03] Right, right. In the law, they call that the but for, that but for management's changing of my start time. I would not have incurred this extra expense. So if you want that status quo ante, you're gonna reimburse me for that expense. So that brings up, it dovetails perfectly into the next topic, which is Article 8 violations, where when an overtime carrier gets violated, when they're not given the overtime they should have gotten, the remedy is really straightforward, and it's very easy to make them hold, because they just want that money. But at the other end of the spectrum, the non-ODL carrier who didn't want to work overtime and gets inappropriately forced, that's a violation too. And some places, I'm sure you've heard, some unions or some branches don't even, they say, oh, they, yeah, they don't even file. Oh, the carrier got the overtime, they're hold too. But absolutely not. A, they had their rights violated, but B, they may have something they can't get back. Their kids recital, a soccer practice, something like that. So I presume, David, you file for the non-ODL carriers.

Speaker 3:
[17:07] We do file for the non-ODL carriers. And we've been on this for quite some time. In Buffalo, the cigar number is 26095. And this was in 2004 that we filed the case for a non-ODL carrier being forced. And what we argued was that they're due that standard, you know, 50% more for being, you know, working, quote, over time, right? Being forced in. We also argued, like you're saying, in this case, the individual missed something to do with the family. So we additionally argued that for every minute that individual was improperly forced, that they get an equal to administrative leave to be used at their convenience down the road. And that's what that cigar number 26095 says. It says, for the reasons noted above and discussed, it is the conclusion of the arbitrator that the service violated Article 8 of the national agreement when it mandated the agreement to work eight hours of overtime on March 13, 2004, when OTDL cares were available and not maximized to the 12-hour limit. As a remedy, the service is directed toward the grievance, an additional 50% pay for the day at issue and eight hours of administrative leave to be used at the grievance convenience.

Speaker 2:
[18:35] That is awesome.

Speaker 3:
[18:37] And if that's Dave Grosskopf, my convenience is certainly going to be the day before a holiday. Yeah, exactly. I'm gonna make that as miserable for them as they made it for me.

Speaker 2:
[18:48] Yes, no doubt. Yeah, that's fantastic. Going after those aggressive grievance settlements is key, A, to make the carrier whole, and B, to make management think twice about violating. So do you find that these kind of additional remedies, this additional remediation, does have a... Does that slow management down?

Speaker 3:
[19:11] A hundred percent. They hate that administrative leave payout because it's difficult for them to input in their system, to keep track of. It's obviously not good. Well, you're walking in the day before a holiday going up. You forced me for eight hours back in March. Well, guess what? June 3rd, I might need that day off, and here's my administrative leave on a nice day.

Speaker 2:
[19:36] Yeah, exactly, because that arbitration settlement that you read, it didn't have any kind of caveat that like, oh, as long as the board is full, or as long as, no, you're taking this day. Oh, that's beautiful.

Speaker 3:
[19:47] And that's our argument, Alan, is there is no caveat on that because you know what? The employee didn't have a caveat.

Speaker 2:
[19:54] That's exactly right.

Speaker 3:
[19:55] Management didn't say to me, hey, we need to force you on this day. Oh, I can't do that day because I have my kid's soccer game, but this day is okay. Management didn't do that. They made me miss my child's soccer game.

Speaker 2:
[20:05] So that's it.

Speaker 3:
[20:07] All's fair in love and war.

Speaker 2:
[20:08] Yes. All right. So all of this is fantastic. The people who are listening are getting an idea of how to help undo the damage that management has done. But of course, the best way to stop a carrier from being harmed is to prevent that harm in the first place with proactive grievances, where as soon as you see this problem coming, I mean it says in the J-Cam that we're supposed to work together to stop things from becoming a grievance. So what sort of proactive grievances are you filing in Buffalo that you see like, oh management, like I'll give you an example. Management says, hey, starting tomorrow or starting next week, if you're not out of the office within 45 minutes, we're going to start issuing discipline. And some branches will say, well, it's not a grievance yet, but once they issue the discipline, then we can grieve the discipline. So where do you stand on issues like that?

Speaker 3:
[21:04] That's an improper order. Where does it say I got to be out of the office at any point at any time?

Speaker 2:
[21:08] That's it. Right. And at that point, you can grieve the improper order.

Speaker 3:
[21:13] Right.

Speaker 2:
[21:13] So what sort of proactive or preventive grievances are you filing in Buffalo?

Speaker 3:
[21:21] We haven't had any many lately, but I mean, but over the years, since I've been president, we've done this a bunch. And I'll give you a very simple one because it helps carriers on their route. You know, we, whatever you want to call it, chuck and run, stop and drop with your parcel, basically not going up to the door, knocking on the door, waiting for the customer, filling out the third. Management would give new carriers instructions, just leave it, just leave the package. Well, that's an improper order because that's not what the handbook says. So, a real good way, number one, to enforce a contract, and number two, to get under their skin, is every time they have a stand-up talk, and they're saying something improper like that, hit them right away, walk up to them and say, hey, listen, that's improper. This is what the handbook says. Please have another stand-up talk and reiterate the proper policy. If they do, fine, problem solved. If they tell you to pound sand, guess what? Now my steward needs time. Now we're going to go into the procedure, and now I'm going to run the thing up to step B because I want a precedent-setting decision. I'm not going to play games with, yeah, we won't do it or whatever the deal is. I want to make sure because that confuses carriers. It confuses them about their work rules. It shaves time off of the route, which hurts them during route adjustments. So there's a real snowball effect when an improper order is given out there.

Speaker 2:
[22:47] Right, and by proactively protesting that order before anything bad even happens, you're laying a foundation. And I've certainly seen arbitration decisions where the arbitrator will lock in on the willful disregard that management has shown. We told them in advance, this is a problem, this is what's going to happen. They violate anyway, and now it's even easier to get that escalated remedy.

Speaker 3:
[23:12] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[23:13] Right on. So is there anyway, my last question on here, it's kind of a pie in the sky, but is it possible when management issues, when we grieve something against man, let's say, what would be a good example? I mean, termination would be the best example, but maybe something smaller, like start times. Is there any way to get like a stay or an advance where somebody can step in and say like, well, let's hold off on this until the grievance is settled?

Speaker 3:
[23:46] Yeah, the short answer is yes.

Speaker 2:
[23:48] Okay.

Speaker 3:
[23:49] Number one. Number two, the NALC has employed this in the past. It's called Injunctive Relief.

Speaker 2:
[23:55] Okay.

Speaker 3:
[23:56] Okay. And I'll give you an example. In November of 2019, I believe this was under President Rolando's tenure. And you may have heard of this, management started this whole caser-streeter thing. They were literally going to turn upside down how letter carriers did their job function, right?

Speaker 2:
[24:18] If I may describe that briefly to the listeners, so there was an idea to separate our job duties and have a person whose title is a caser, and they would come in really early in the morning, and they would case up four, five, six, however many different routes. And then you had the other half of the carrier job, a person who is a streeter, and they would come in, and the mail would be already ready to go to take out to the street. And so they're essentially dividing our job into two separate positions. Okay.

Speaker 3:
[24:48] Right. So President Rolando, again, he attempted to negotiate through that, could not get the Postal Service to come around on that. So that workplace initiative, we wanted to try to block, and that's the injunctive relief. Okay? And Fred went as far as going all the way into the courts.

Speaker 2:
[25:10] Into actual court.

Speaker 3:
[25:12] Into the actual court.

Speaker 2:
[25:13] Right.

Speaker 3:
[25:13] To get a judge to sign an order to stop management from doing this. Because basically, the argument was, you're throwing everything a letter carrier does into chaos here, right? And we have very, and the NALC had very good arguments. The problem with the injunctive relief is, now you're in a court of law. Right. It's an agreement procedure.

Speaker 2:
[25:36] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[25:37] You're in a court of law, that standard is very, very high.

Speaker 2:
[25:43] It's not something that a steward is going to be able to do. You need a turn.

Speaker 3:
[25:47] Yeah, listen, Dave Grosskopf is not doing this. Right. So yeah, us lay folks, we're not running in there and doing this. There's a couple of things there. There's two main arguments. And number one is you have to establish jurisdiction. And then there's another caveat that we have to get over. And the bottom line was the court came back and ruled against us, saying that the NALC, the court lacked jurisdiction to preserve, you know, arbitrable process, meaning, hey, you guys got an Article 15 procedure. We're not going to stop this, because it doesn't meet the very high standards, you know, of the court. You're going to have to fight this out, you know, in your own grievous procedure.

Speaker 2:
[26:36] Right.

Speaker 3:
[26:37] And the point is that, you know, there is something there for us to do, but it is very, very difficult to do. I mean, even other unions, you know, they try to use injunctive relief, but a lot of times, they're unsuccessful, you know. You're not successful more times than you are successful.

Speaker 2:
[26:57] I mean, the idea of obeying now and grieve later, it is referred to as the iron rule. And so, yeah, it is tough to get around something that's an iron rule.

Speaker 3:
[27:08] You're doing something illegal, unless your safety severely is in jeopardy, we have to do what we're told to do.

Speaker 2:
[27:18] Right, right. Yeah, we have those standard caveats that if it's unsafe, unethical, illegal, and then I add impossible, then you can disobey, but that's pretty much it. Dave, another enlightening, fantastic episode. Before you get out of here, I gotta give you plugs. Behind you, on your screen, is a big concerned letter carrier's bullseye, 2026. So David Grosskopf, there's no way you're not already aware, but he is running for national trustee on the Concerned Letter Carrier's Ticket. David has my firm endorsement for trustee. I absolutely support your candidacy. If people want to support you, either by endorsing you, or by giving you actual monetary support, which is of course what you most need, how do people find you?

Speaker 3:
[28:10] For the first one, if you want to endorse or support, you can just go to concernlettercarriers.com, hop on there, click on there. You can be an endorser and or a supporter. Myself personally, usually the first of every month, I put a post on my personal Facebook page, and I list all mine. I've been doing this routinely. I list all my qualifications, my leadership highlights. There's a Venmo, there's a Cash App, there's Zelle, it's all on there. Anything helps. Again, we're trying to get out as candidates around the country to see and talk to as many people as we can. We're doing that on our own dime. I don't receive a penny of travel reimbursement, for example, from the Concern Letter Carriers. So this is something that we're doing as candidates because we believe it's important, and obviously traveling all over the country like we do, it's not cheap.

Speaker 2:
[29:09] Yeah, definitely. On that note, are you going to be in Las Vegas for the rap session?

Speaker 3:
[29:13] I will be. As a matter of fact, Thursday morning, I leave for the COP. Then I come back for a week, and then the following week there, I will be in Las Vegas for the Region 1 rap.

Speaker 2:
[29:24] All right. I will see you there.

Speaker 3:
[29:26] Awesome.

Speaker 2:
[29:26] Thank you so much for coming on, and listeners, thank you very much for listening, and I will catch you all next time.