September 6, 2013
Dear Flight Attendants,
Your entire Negotiation Committee along with AFA staff negotiator Paula Mastrangelo are heading to our nation’s capital next week to meet with Alaska Airlines management at the National Mediation Board offices. We anticipate our first task at hand will be to sign tentative agreements on Section 14 (Vacation), Section 16 (Sick Leave), and Section 32 (Attendance). We believe you will be pleased with the enhancements in these sections.
Once those sections are TA’d we plan to immediately dive back into the few sections remaining which are of high interest to flight attendants: Sec.3 (Scope), Sec.5 (Definitions), Sec.21 (Compensation), Sec.22 (Expenses), Sec.23 (Insurance), and Sec.29 (Profit Sharing & Retirement). We recognize you are anxiously waiting for an update on the progress of these sections. These sections will amount to hours of work between both AFA and the Company, and your patience is appreciated as our assigned federal mediator Victoria Gray has requested a limited communication policy while these sections are being proposed back and forth. Likely offers in these proposed sections will change and adjust frequently so we have been advised to limit communication during this time until more concrete information is available.
In the meantime feel confident that your Negotiating Committee has your best interest in mind as we negotiate these important economic sections. We are your voice in the negotiation room but you are the power source behind us. Now more than ever it is important we all remain strong and united.
In solidarity,
Your Negotiating Committee – MEC President Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Tracy, Karina Cameron-Fetters, Jake Jones and AFA Staff Negotiator Paula Mastrangelo
“Five Bases, One Voice”