Amit Bose, who served as deputy administrator for the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) during the Obama administration, was appointed to the same post last week by President Biden. “We’re excited to be working with Amit Bose,” said SMART Transportation [...]
January 22, 2021 — The Rail Unions comprising the Coordinated Bargaining Coalition (CBC), negotiating together in the current round of National Negotiations, have issued the following statement: The CBC and the nation’s Rail Carriers first met concerning the November 1, 2019, [...]
Under the Railroad Retirement Act (RRA), a “current connection with the railroad industry” is one of the eligibility requirements for both the occupational disability and supplemental annuities payable by the Railroad Retirement Board (RRB). It is also a factor in determining [...]
President Joe Biden made good on a promise to support workers and the labor movement on his first day when he fired National Labor Board General Counsel Pete Robb within 24 hours of taking office. Robb, a former union buster with a virulently anti-union record, refused Biden’ [...]
SMART was stunned and horrified by the attempted coup at the U.S. Capitol building two weeks ago, which was encouraged by Mr. Trump and resulted in the murder of a U.S. Capitol police officer. Despite this attack on our beloved country, healing is coming soon. Today, Joseph [...]
To address the growing safety concerns of our membership, we have implemented a universal Safety Condition Report that is now available on the SMART-TD website for all members to use. This form will become the primary tool to report and collect data concerning unsafe working [...]
The SMART Voluntary Short Term Disability Plan (VSTD) has temporarily suspended the elimination period for COVID-19 disabilities. Previously, the waiver of the elimination period began in the month of March and extended through May of this year and then was once again extende [...]
SMART-TD shares with the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. the dream that men and women should be judged not by the color of their skin, their nationality or religious beliefs, but by the content of their hearts. Below is a link to Dr. King’s speech, delivered on Aug. 28, [...]
Federal Railroad Administrator Ron Batory in a Jan. 14 letter to union leaders denied a request from the SMART Transportation Division (SMART-TD) and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) to issue an emergency order to safeguard passenger rail travelers [...]
On January 8, 2021, Arbitrator Wendell Bell issued his arbitration award regarding the process and procedure in arbitrating the Carriers’ (UP, BNSF, NS & KCS) attack on the Crew Consist Moratoria. The arbitration, known as a “Procedural Public Law Board,” had the pu [...]
