The lifetime maximum benefit for the Railroad Employees National Early Retirement Major Medical Benefit (ERMA or GA-46000) Plan will increase from $175,700 to $182,700 beginning Jan. 1, 2022. At the end of 2001, labor and management had agreed on various procedures to adminis [...]
In response to an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) to protect workers from coronavirus that was issued earlier this month by OSHA, National Labor Relations Board General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo issued a memo to all field offices concerning COVID vaccine mandates and collec [...]
The U.S. House of Representatives in the waning hours of Nov. 5 passed H.R. 3684, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), also known as the bipartisan infrastructure framework, by a 228-206 vote. The bill provides $1.2 trillion in funding for infrastructure, with a [...]
Recently, Amtrak, Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern announced that they will require their employees, including those represented by SMART Transportation Division, to be vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus. It is anticipated that many of the remaining, if not all Class I r [...]
Local 904 (Evansville, Ind.) S&T Brian Hall reports that the local has opened a GoFundMe page to support CSX yardmaster and Local 1963 (Louisville, Ky.) member Jason P. Melton and his family after his 13-year-old son tragically took his own life on Sunday, Oct. 17. Melton [...]
CLEVELAND, October 15, 2021 — The Transportation Division of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD) and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) are jointly taking on Union Pacific Railroad (UP) over a [...]
October marks the beginning of Medicare’s open enrollment period for the 2022 coverage year. If you already have Railroad Medicare and want to make a change to your Part D coverage or plan, you can do so between October 15 and December 7, 2021. Any changes you make during ope [...]
In addition to the retirement annuities payable to railroad employees, the Railroad Retirement Act, like the Social Security Act, also provides annuities for some spouses of retired employees. Payment of a spouse annuity is made directly to the wife or husband of the employee [...]
Terri Poole Taylor Kerns, 52, of Local 1971 (Atlanta, Ga.) lost her life to COVID-19 on Friday, September 10. Diagnosed with COVID-19 on August 24, she was hospitalized Sunday, August 29 with severe chest pains. After suffering from cardiac arrest, she passed in the early hou [...]
Local 313 (Grand Rapids, Mich.) member Chris Larson, a member of our union for seven years, wrote to the office of SMART-TD President Jeremy Ferguson asking the extent that members can go to support and show solidarity to an ongoing labor action by another labor union against [...]