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Meet Our Local Chairpersons

We’re excited to introduce our first group of SEA Local Committee Chairpersons for the current LEC Officer term. They will be transitioning into their roles over the next few weeks and officially start their terms on September 1, 2026. Below you’ll find brief biographies that highlight their backgrounds and experiences as they prepare to support our Members at Council 19.

Kiersten Larson | Local Communications Chairperson

Kiersten began her career as a Flight Attendant with Alaska Airlines in 2008. Over the last few years, she’s been involved with Government Affairs, Mobilization, and Communications. In addition to Union work, Kiersten is an active children’s rights advocate, reflecting her ongoing commitment to standing up for those who need a voice.

Kiersten was motivated to step into the role of Council 19 Seattle Council Representative because of her passion for advocating for her fellow Flight Attendants and ensuring their voices are heard at every level. She aims to build on her advocacy background by keeping Members informed, engaged, and empowered. Outside of work, Kiersten loves spending time with her husband, two cats, and lovingly harassing her adult children.

Jerry Sinclair | Local Communications Vice-Chairperson

Jerry was born and raised in the Burien-Tukwila area and began his airline career with Air Cal Airlines, later American Airlines, in 1984. He joined Horizon Air in 1995, transferred to Alaska Airlines in 2001, and became a Flight Attendant in 2003. Since 2012, he has served in various Union roles, including committee work and two terms as Local Executive Council Representative for Council 19. 

In his free time, Jerry enjoys the outdoors, caring for his dogs and rescue cats, and working in the yard.

Andrew Stinson | Local Government Affairs/Human Rights & Equity Chairperson

Andrew has been a Flight Attendant with Alaska Airlines since 2015. Before coming to Alaska, Andrew graduated with a bachelor’s degree in restaurant and hotel management and worked as a chef at Snoqualmie Casino in the banquets and catering department. Andrew’s goals in his new role as Council Representative are to engage with our Members by continuing to fly and to continue to build solidarity with other labor organizations.

Andrew is heavily involved in many local labor organizations, such as the Pierce County Central Labor Council, the Washington State Labor Council, and Pride at Work Pierce County. When Andrew isn’t advocating for Flight Attendants, he keeps busy by spending time with his and his partners’ families. 

Tracy Pettit | Local Membership Engagement Chairperson

Tracy started flying for a different airline that was shut down because of Covid (and probably other industry-related issues). Along with other AFA Government Affairs volunteers, she fought to get the Payroll Protection Program into law. That bill allowed folks to keep their jobs, and those who became unemployed, like Tracy, to stay above water. This experience cemented for her the importance of Union power and solidarity.

In 2022, Tracy started flying for Alaska and started doing Union work as soon as she could. Her goal for Membership Engagement and our local council is to participate more frequently in the larger labor movement, to hold management accountable to their promises, and to ensure every Flight Attendant has the resources to be informed, supported and empowered to advocate for themselves.

Outside of Union work, Tracy has a dog who just turned 10! She spends a lot of time in Juneau, Alaska with her partner and his cat. Tracy likes to read, play games, and make art.

Local Committee Appointments – July 2026

During this week’s LEC meeting, our LEC held interviews for our first group of Local Committee Chairperson and Vice-Chairperson positions. We want to thank everyone who expressed interest and willingness to serve. After careful consideration and deliberation, the following candidates have been appointed:

  • Local Communications Chairperson: Kiersten Larson
  • Local Communications Vice-Chairperson: Jerry Sinclair
  • Local Government Affairs Chairperson: Andrew Stinson
  • Local Human Rights & Equity Chairperson: Andrew Stinson
  • Local Membership Engagement Chairperson: Tracy Pettit

These newly appointed Local Committee Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons will carry out their respective roles for Council 19. Over the next few weeks, they will transitions into their new roles with their official term beginning on September 1, 2026. They will serve for the current LEC Officer election cycle which began on July 1, 2026 to June 30, 2029.

If you have any questions, please reach out to your LEC President at sea.lecp@afaalaska.org. 

Local Committee Interviews – July 2026

With local elections wrapping up and SEA LEC Officers taking office on July 1st, one of the first order of business will be to conduct interviews for local committee chairpersons for the upcoming term. This process will take place over the next several months with the first set of committee interviews and appointments to be held next month. During the upcoming July LEC Meeting, interviews will be conducted for the following positions:

Please note: The SEA LEC will determine if a committee requires a Vice-Chairperson role and will appoint from the pool of candidates interviewed. We encourage all those interested to submit their resume and Expression of Interest (EOI) to be considered.

General Qualifications

Qualifications for all Local Chairperson positions include: 

  • Current Alaska AFA Member in good standing
  • Previous experience as a Committee Member is preferred.
  • Previous committee-specific training preferred.
  • Strong ability to lead and coordinate a diverse team in a collaborative environment.
  • Ability to attend meetings as required, both via videoconference and in person.
  • Strong computer skills, including a good working knowledge of Google Workspace (email, calendar, Drive, and other applications) and Microsoft 365.
  • Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to write membership communications, respond professionally to internal and external emails, prepare reports, plan meetings (including scheduling, logistics, and agenda preparation), and take minutes.
  • Ability to meet deadlines, delegate responsibilities, and follow up on assigned tasks.

Duties and Responsibilities

Details about each committee’s duties and responsibilities are available on the respective committee pages of the AFA Alaska + Hawaiian Volunteers page. Additional information regarding Local Committee Chairperson duties and responsibilities is available in the link below:

Duties and Responsibilities

Term of Service

Successful candidates will serve for the upcoming LEC Officer election cycle. Their official term will begin on September 1, 2026 and conclude June 30, 2029.

Expressing Interest and Interview Scheduling

The LEC will interview eligible candidates during the July regular LEC meeting on Friday, July 24. If you are interested in interviewing, please plan to bid around this date and adjust your schedule accordingly. All interviews will be virtual via Google Meet videoconferencing.

Please submit an expression of interest and your resume using the online form below. The submission deadline is 5pm PT on Friday, July 10. After the submission deadline, an LEC representative will contact eligible candidates for next steps.

>> Click here to submit an expression of interest form <<

Please note that a Google account is required to submit the expression of interest form. If you don’t have a Google account, you can create one for free at https://accounts.google.com/signup.

November Committee Update

In this issue….

  • Inflight Service Committee Update
  • Membership Committee Update
  • Mobilization Committee Update
  • EAP Committee Update
  • Reserve Committee Update
  • Scheduling Committee Update
  • Uniform Committee Update

Inflight Service Committee

A few reminders from your ISC Committee:

  • Please remember to comp crew members dead head meals instead of swiping. To comp the meal from the pre-ordered meals list, tap on the crew member’s name and scroll to the DH Crew and tap.
  • Use B2B to report juice shortages in FC and MC. Management needs to hear from us when we need more supplies.
  • During November it is possible that you will be catered with both Starbucks and Stumptown coffee. Please use the Starbucks first.

Membership Committee

We have many Seattle Flight Attendants that are delinquent or in dues arrears. Please makesure to keep up on your union dues.  Missed dues deductions will not come out of future paychecks, payments for missed deductions must be paid directly to International Membership.

If you are an active member and do not have enough money on your 20th paycheck to auto deduct union dues, you will owe dues for that month.

When a Flight Attendant is out on leave and coordinating sick leave or vacation, they are considered active and will owe dues. Depending on what other deductions you have, coordinating minimum TFP might not be enough to cover your union dues deduction. If this is the case you will have to pay your dues directly to International Membership.

Here is a link to payment options when you miss an auto deduction https://www.afacwa.org/payment_options. Flight Attendants that are delinquent would not be eligible to vote for a TA.

We will be holding a membership meeting on December 19th around our Solidarity event. More information about this will come out shortly!

If you have questions, you can reach out to our Membership Chair and Council Secretary, Adam Clarey at adam.clarey@afaalaska.org.

Mobilization Committee

The Mobilization Committee continues to be busy supporting the Negotiating Committee by getting information out to our flight attendants and building solidarity. Save the Date for a system wide Informational picket on December 19th. There will also be a membership meeting on this same day.

 We’re always looking for more Mobilization Volunteers. If you’re interested, sign up at https://contract2022.afaalaska.org/mobilization/volunteer/signup/

Reserve Committee

Your Council 19 Reserve Committee will be conducting a joint in person base sit along with the Scheduling Committee on November 15th from 10:00AM-6:00PM in the north satellite village. Please come say hi, and meet your local Reserve and Scheduling Chairpersons and have all your Reserve and Scheduling related questions answered. We look forward to seeing you there! 

Please continue to file tickets at https://support.afaalaska.org  for contractual concerns. You can direct general inquiries to our monitored email (sea.reserve@afaalaska.org). We try to reply and provide assistance within 24 hours, but keep in mind that we all fly full schedules. 

We continue to see a lot of out of order assignments. As a reminder,  LTFA order must be followed in all cases, even for ER conversions and APSB assignments. You can only be assigned out of order relative to other FAs who are the same type of Reserve classification (AM/PM/ER) who are good for the same number of days. If you believe you were assigned out of order please file a ticket at https://support.afaalaska.org. 

Additionally, your local Reserve Committee was successful in getting a bulletin issued to Crew Schedulers clarifying the Reserve monthly maximum LOA (118.2 TFP) and so far we are seeing less issues related to FAs being illegally scheduled beyond 118.2 flown reserve TFP. 

Lastly, we are getting reports that the PPP (productivity premium program) calculator is not working properly. We have recently been informed that Crew Pay believes the issue has been resolved and is working properly at this time. If you believe your calculator is still incorrect you can email FA Crew Pay (fa.crewpay@alaskaair.com) for an accurate year to date count if you have PPP related inquiries. 

Fly safe and see you out there!

Scheduling Committee

Thank you for continuing to reach out to the Sea Scheduling Committee and submitting AFA Support tickets so we can assist you with scheduling issues as they occur. We’ve included a few important year end reminders. 

Know Before You Go:

We would like to give a few recommendations as we move into the Fall/Winter months, the holiday season, and possible weather related operational issues. We suggest that FAs review the following sections of the contract: 10.R. Reassignments, Section 10.S. Pre- Cancellation, and Ground Commuter Policy (Section 28.G.) (AFA SLOA 2020-05-20) 

The Scheduling Committee has created several Flowcharts to assist you in understanding sections of the CBA. 

They can be found in the Scheduling section on the AFA Website. 

AFA Website > Main Page > Committees > Scheduling > Tools and Resources (right hand side) 

Record Improvement – End of year 480/960 TFP totals and Point Reduction 

We traditionally tend to see sick leave drop in November and December as FAs are trying to achieve their 480/960 TFP totals and also qualify for the point reduction (record improvement) for not calling in sick in November and December.

Record Improvement – Point Reduction  – end of year Nov/Dec 4 points or less  (Section 32.G.4. 480 TFP  [§13.D.6.] [§16.L.4.] [§21.D.6.] [§23.B.1. – B.4.] [§23.C.6.b.] [§23.C.7.a.] [§32.G.4.]  960 TFP  Longevity PTO (Section 14.A.5.) 

Sit Pay Adjustment Form

We continue to get questions regarding pilot sit pay adjustments. This is currently a manual process. The requirement is for the Flight Attendant to submit the form (Sit Pay Adjustment Form) for Crew Scheduling to adjust if applicable. 

The form can be found on the FA Website: 

Administration > Pay & Benefits >Sit Pay Adjustment Form

If preferred, there is a QR code which can be found in Bulletin Bundle #2023-0067

***** Helpful hint: whenever there’s a change to your trip in Crew Access (JCTE)  you will see a shaded triangle in the top Right corner of the Trip.  You can expand that window and it will provide additional information.  Typically when there’s a pilot adjustment it will show there.  

Your Council 19 Scheduling Committee will be conducting a joint in person base sit along with the Reserve Committee on November 15th from 10:00AM-6:00PM in the north satellite village. Please come say hi, and meet your local Scheduling  and Reserve Chairpersons and have all your Scheduling and Reserve related questions answered. We look forward to seeing you there! 

Uniform Committee

  • Please remember to use your uniform Allotment ASAP. Any leftover funds will not roll over. 
  • Please continue to report any quality issues for garments to alaskaservice@unisyncgroup.com. It is helpful to include photos of defects and of the tag inside

World Kindness Day: November 13 

One constant among our workgroup is that of kindness, woven into our innate nature, continually making an appearance throughout all our days. For this, we have much to be proud of alone as an integral foundation. This kindness glows in abundance with positive light onward to every corner we touch, to every soul we meet, bestowing an impact that ripples on to all others. We simply have the best work force.

Remember to practice kindness within all social media dwellings, too. Company policy has set forth a social media policy that we all must adhere to, for review please refer to their guidelines. Kindness, so simplistic in thought, but so sincere in nature, toward all, forever lights our way…with indelible impact, highlighting once more our very nature…. 

The wisdom of kindness gleams on; for there is always a hand that needs help, a kind word that needs to be spoken, a word of wisdom that needs to be heard, a kindness to be shown…the radiance of which shines on to profound depths.

In Solidarity, 

Your Council 19 Committee Chairs and Officers

To view this communication in a PDF version with graphics, see below.

Council-19-November-Committee-FINALDownload

Government Affairs Special Edition 

In This Edition…

  • Election Day
  • Washington State Labor Council 
  • Why Voting Matters
  • Washington State Voters Guide

Election Day

This November 7th is Election Day. For those of you who live in, or are new to Washington, this is a vote-by-mail state. The website https://www.vote411.org/washington is a great site that provides all of your voter information including how to register to vote for new residents. This site also provides links to other states for those who live outside of Washington. 

Voting Endorsements

We all have different political beliefs, and nobody should tell someone else how to vote, but one thing stands strong…. we all want to propel our professions, and our workplace rights. Supporting candidates that support our professions, our unions, and who are “pro-labor” is essential. If you would like information on what candidates are endorsed and/or supported by the Washington State Labor Council, you can visit: https://www.wslc.org/union-members-only-election-information/

Why Voting Matters

​​At its core, voting is the cornerstone of democracy. It’s a mechanism through which we, as citizens, actively participate in the decision making process Here are some key reasons why voting matters:

  • By casting your vote, you contribute to the selection of leaders who will represent your interests and values in government. 
  • Voting allows us to hold elected officials accountable for their actions and decisions. It’s a way to voice approval or dissatisfaction with their performance.
  • Your vote directly influences the development of policies on issues that affect your daily life, from education and healthcare to the economy and environment.
  • Voting fosters a sense of community and shared responsibility, as it brings people together to collectively decide on the direction of their society.

The above was taken from www.caprw.org

Washington State Voters Guide

You may not have received your voters guide via mail, but they can all be accessed online. Select your county to view local candidates at: https://www.sos.wa.gov/elections/data-research/election-results-and-voters-pamphlets/2023-primary-election-voters-guide

In the end, the most important thing is that you exercise your right to vote. 

If you have any questions about the process, current events, or any of the candidates, please reach out to your Council 19 Government Affairs Chairperson, Melinda Jorge at melinda.jorge@afaalaska.org or any member of the Council 19 Government Affairs Committee.

In Solidarity, 

Your Council 19 Government Affairs Committee

See Below to view a PDF version with graphics

Government-Affairs-UpdateDownload

That’s a Wrap on Government Affairs Focus Month!

As Government Affairs Committee Focus Month comes to a close, we want to sincerely thank everyone who tuned in, asked insightful questions, and shared resources throughout September. Whether you watched a quick video on the van or started a conversation about voting in the crew lounge, your engagement made a difference. We started this month […]

Human Rights & Equity Committee Meeting Recap – 3rd Quarter 2026

On Wednesday, September 23, 2026, our AFA Human Rights & Equity Committee Chairpersons met for their regular quarterly meeting to advance ongoing activism, promote workplace equity, and champion meaningful policy improvements across our workplace. Your representatives attending the meeting were Nyachan Chuar (ANC), Soon Kim (HNL), Bruni Agosto-Pinal (pmHA LAX/SEA), Aaron Miller (PDX), Erika Daniel […]

MEC Town Hall Video and Q&A Recap – September 23, 2026

Whether you joined us live or are ready to watch on your own schedule, the full recording of our September 23 MEC Town Hall is now available! Catch up on the discussions and hear directly from our MEC Officers and AFA panelists. Watch the video anytime on our AFA Alaska + Hawaiian YouTube channel using the link below. (Note: […]

Hotel Committee Meeting Recap – September 2026

In September, our Hotel Committee participated in two meetings: the standing monthly meeting with Crew Hotels on September 14, and a Quarterly Business Review (QBR) with the company’s hotel procurement vendor, API, on September 23 (pmAS) and September 24 (pmHA) in Seattle.  Representing you at these meetings were Dori Marron (ANC), Jarod McNeill (SEA pmAS), […]

Register Now: Reserve Webinar – Wednesday, October 21

This message is for pre-merger Alaska Flight Attendants When Crew Scheduling calls at 3 AM with a change to the trip you self-assigned, do you know your contractual rights? Understanding what management can—and cannot—do on reserve is your strongest line of defense. Join our Reserve Committee for “Is This Legal?”, the second installment in our three-part pre-merger […]

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