AMFA National - Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association

Participants for AMFA:
    Lee Rhame - Local 11 Airline Rep
    James Kinnerk - Local 18 Airline Rep
    Mike Nelson - Local 32 Airline Rep
    Carla Foster - Appearance Technician Rep
    Floyd Looney - National Director

Participants for Southwest Airlines:
    Mike Ryan – VP, Labor Relations
    Jim Sokol - VP, Maintenance & Engineering
    Tony Lowery - Senior Dir Maintenance
    George Tompkins - Director, Employee Resources
    Mark Lyons - Manager, Employee Resources
    Keith McCormick - Manager, Employee Resources
    Christina Bennett - SWA Legal Counsel
    Mike Hunter - Manager, Production Appearance
    Sam Moser - Planning Manager, Finance

The Negotiating Committee is providing this update to the AMFA Membership at Southwest Airlines. This is the only officially authorized source of negotiating communications by your Committee.

The Negotiating Committee and the Company resumed negotiations in Dallas on Tuesday & Wednesday, December 1st & 2nd. The entire two days was spent with proposals and counter proposals in an attempt to come to a tentative agreement on Article 5. The Negotiating Committee feels that the first day and a half was virtually a stand still. For every 2 steps forward we took 4 steps back. The company is still requesting more productivity and efficiencies in the scheduling and moving of Techs between bid locations and AMFA is trying to protect some bid locations from movement.

When Jim Sokol finally arrived during the afternoon session on December 2nd, he hit us with a curve ball that no one was expecting with the proposal of the" pay for performance" angle, similar to what auto mechanics employ. This could be a good or bad thing for the Techs. We will have to do some research to figure out if it is a viable proposal, and if so, how would we protect seniority and create a fair work environment for all our great Techs and how the pay scale would be set up. What the down time rate, vacation, floating holiday, and sick rates are. This would not be a short negotiation with all the things that would have to be solved.

We will resume negotiations, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, January the 11th thru 13th, in Dallas. The start time is scheduled for 1 PM on Monday. Future dates to continue discussions will be secured at these meetings.

The Negotiation Committee would like to thank Bob Cramer from Baltimore, Mike Young, New Local 32 Airline Rep, PHX, and Dane Crisp, from Dallas, TX. These were our observers who participated in this negotiating session. Their input was very helpful and welcomed. We know that they will communicate with other members from their locals on how the Union is working to protect their jobs and contract language.

Sincerely,
Your Negotiating Committee