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Safety Is Not a Union vs Non-Union Issue

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I am starting this reply in a new thread as I think the orginal is getting somewhat off track.

ryerke said:
I recall on more than one occasion getting trailers out of Medford that had been dropped by Portland drivers that had incorrect or missing placards. I would like to think that DOT or State Patrol had been watching. Not likely.
Maybe your local needs to pass out a copy of Title 49 so that you can be at least as good as we are.
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ryerke, I don't doubt that you have gotten trailers that were not/missed placarded. I think every driver in the system at some time as gotten at least one.

This issue is not a non-Union vs Union one. This has been a problem system wide since I have been at Oak. I seriously doubt that any driver that cares about safety would intentionally drag one of these unmarked time bombs down the road.

This is severe problems that Oak has made a feeble attempt to correct but some every time it gets shrugged off about two weeks after a big crackdown.

First off there is a billing problem. The P&D driver picks HazMat up and it is not entered/billed into the Qualcomm as HazMat. If it is entered as HazMat it goes to the top of the pile to be entered. When it just sits in the to do box the trailer maybe loaded and down the road before anyone knows there is HazMat on board, except for the dock hand that cross-docked it. Some of these people have not been trained properly. The trailer get to the exchange point and by the time next driver picks it up it is finally in the system. He then gets a message kicked back that he has HazMat on the trailer.

Or say the P&D entered it as a pallet instead of a tote bin. In some cases a pallet wouldn't have been required for a automatic placard. There has been more than once I have seen a bill listed with one pallet and a weight of 5500 pounds. Damn big box on that pallet. I think you get my idea. The biggest problem I see is the P&D driver failing to make sure it is entered properly. Then again this is not a Union/non-Union thing. It is some one not doing the job right because they have not been trained right or are too lazy or incompetent to care.

Then there is the dock issue. IIRCC the company policy is that before a trailer is sealed a dock foreman is to review the loading and the paperwork. If there is HazMat loaded he is to see that the proper placards are in place. Either this rule is not being followed or again they have not been properly trained.

Another big problem is loads that have a mix of crap on them, one or more being in bulk or requiring placards for that class, and a few of a different class that would require a "Dangerous" placard. Most of the time the Dangerous is being flown but not the class of the bulk product.

I for one have brought this up to the (lack of) Safety more than once and it is never followed up on, or just shoved under the ever growing stack. After awhile I have learned to just cover my own butt, making sure that everything is in order, and charging them accordingly. Somehow though the money issues never surface when management is involved. I have a classic example of this how Central was willing to hang me but when they figured out it was management error the problem magically disappeared. (With my thanks to Larry B., former Portland Line Dispatcher)

From your past posts I take it that you were with Dead Oak before the strike.. You have to admit some of the "replacement" workers they have had really didn't/don't belong in a truck. And you got to agree with me that the brake dragging/locked up until the tire blows out video is a classic. :biglaugh:

I could go on typing about this until the keyboard wears out but I am sure that you understand the point I am trying to make. Again I want to stress I am not making this a Union/non-union thing. It is a safety issue and all any of us want to do is to come home to our family and friends at the end of our shifts with a clear conscious that we did our best.

PS: Ed, the wooden shoes have dry rot.
 
Not every trailer dropped in medford coming out of Portland is dropped by a Portland driver, either.

Corning drivers drop break their triples their on their way south, Eugene comes through there with Portland trailers at times, and even Auburn extra board drivers.

Which is not to say it hasn't ever happened that a Portland driver possibly forgot to check his placards. Just that I and other Portland line drivers have had MANY issues over the years with trailers coming out of the south mis-placarded, unplacarded, or missing some of the needed placards.

We have griped and griped and griped about the HazMat issues over the years, and it has rarely gotten better for very long. We seem to have a corporate attitude of complecency and not giving a crap that has just gotten worse and worse over the years.

Perhaps if everyone bothered to give a damned, from the top to the bottom in this company, we wouldn't have had those past issues, nor be in the position we find ourselves in now. A handful of drivers can't change the entire system if the top of the command structure simply doesn't care. And just talking about it doesn't change things, either. Talk is cheap... action is where it counts, and we have seen darn little of that from the Glass Palace in recent years.

David and Ed gave up on this company a while ago, and those of us who have been here awhile know it, and have seen the direct evidence of it...
 
as red and shift have said. The quality of druver isn't union/nonunion. It is about the guys who have worked at Oak Harbor for 10 plus years, who know the freight and the customers that Oak Harbor is missing right now. Yes we can al be replaced but at what cost?
 
Union or not, we are all Americans trying to make a life for ourselves. U guys up North stay strong. I hope we can work together again.:beerchug:
 
OHFLCaliDriver said:
Union or not, we are all Americans trying to make a life for ourselves. U guys up North stay strong. I hope we can work together again.:beerchug:
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We have not had problems as in nounion/union employees other than the few that just don't see that fact that nonunion does benefit from the union as well. If we (the union members) are not here to fight for what we belive then it wont be worth working @ joak harbor. They will lower wages, benefits, and pretty much bend over the employees when, and however they wish.
Word gets out! Remember when ohfl went through a phase of hiring, and just before the empolyee was to be put on the bord they were let go? Or two years ago when they hired 5 or 6 drivers, and layed them off at the end of the same week? Then they could not get any one to apply? Readway was doing that for awhile, and discovered that word got out, and they could not get any one to apply.
People want long term jobs! Not to be abused, and let go!
 
For both companies, there were reasons for this. Some were let go due to findings on their background check that didn't match their given information. Others were involved in accidents. Few didn't know what they were getting in to.
 
The point is, that this company has often been it's own worst enemy when it comes to hiring. They hire too many, then have to lay them off. They stick brand-new P&D drivers out in the yard to hostle with little or no training, push them beyond their limits, and then fire them when they have an accident because they are on their 90-day probation.

Their new driver training program has always been a joke. They push our yard hostlers way too hard, and it really is a wonder we haven't had a fatality in the yard yet in Portland.

Safety, training, HazMat... these have always been handled in an incompetant and lackadaisacal manner in this company, and the I blame top management for not making this a higher priority over the years. It isn't like we haven't told them about our concerns over the years.

Indifference has been the corporate mentality for quite a while at Oak harbor, and it comes from the very top and seeps downwards.

The only reason we haven't had more accidents and problems I credit to the high caliber of drivers and dock workers we have working here...
 
shifterknob said:
Not every trailer dropped in medford coming out of Portland is dropped by a Portland driver, either.

Corning drivers drop break their triples their on their way south, Eugene comes through there with Portland trailers at times, and even Auburn extra board drivers.

Which is not to say it hasn't ever happened that a Portland driver possibly forgot to check his placards. Just that I and other Portland line drivers have had MANY issues over the years with trailers coming out of the south mis-placarded, unplacarded, or missing some of the needed placards.

We have griped and griped and griped about the HazMat issues over the years, and it has rarely gotten better for very long. We seem to have a corporate attitude of complecency and not giving a crap that has just gotten worse and worse over the years.

Perhaps if everyone bothered to give a damned, from the top to the bottom in this company, we wouldn't have had those past issues, nor be in the position we find ourselves in now. A handful of drivers can't change the entire system if the top of the command structure simply doesn't care. And just talking about it doesn't change things, either. Talk is cheap... action is where it counts, and we have seen darn little of that from the Glass Palace in recent years.

David and Ed gave up on this company a while ago, and those of us who have been here awhile know it, and have seen the direct evidence of it...
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The reason that I specified that it was dropped by a Portland driver is that I knew it had been dropped by a Portland driver. There was a period of time that it was a regular occasion. My point was merely that you can point out the mistakes that non-union drivers make but it remains a fact that all drivers make mistakes at some time.
I suppose that if Oakland had signed cards two days before the incident that is portrayed in Red's avatar happened then it wouldn't have happened. Is being a union member a magic bullet that keeps bad things from happening?
 
Nope. Just pointing out your mistake that it wasa union driver. As was said earlier, being in the union doesn't make you more safe.

But for a long time, there was lot of turnover down in the California terminals, especially Sac and Oakland, and there were many accidents that happened because of new and inexperienced drivers.

I still blame this company's management, because our training and safety programs are a joke, and if you can be at all honest, you would have to admit that too.

It's not a union versus non-union thing, and it never was... it's a poor management issue...
 
ryerke said:
...I suppose that if Oakland had signed cards two days before the incident that is portrayed in Red's avatar happened then it wouldn't have happened.
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Actually I changed the avatar not too long ago. To me it signifies the path the company is heading down. It has nothing to do with who was driving or where the driver came from or if he was in the Union or not. My old one was getting dated and the person whose picture was on it is a lame duck in the crapper and needs more help that "Joe the Plumber" could give him. Here is a look at it if I changed it before you came around.
LiveVideo.com photo: bush peso

ryerke said:
Is being a union member a magic bullet that keeps bad things from happening?
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As I said more than once safety is not a Union/non-union thing. Wasn't it you that was making comments about spelling and punctuation in a different thread? Maybe you need to work on reading comprehension.:smilie_132:

PS: Ed, the wooden shoes have dry rot.
 
what do you think the replacement guys are gonna think when this is over either way most if not (hopefilly) all will be let go since this has started ohfl has intentionally over staffed thioer operation they are even telling these people that they will have to join the union when this is all over but when we return they will have no need for them or for some of us either maybe they will let us follow the work hahahaha i dont think this company is worth relocating for just my oppinion though
 
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