by Stephen Lysaght, APWU President of East Bay Area Local #47, Walnut Creek, CA
Mark Martinez, USPS Bay-Valley District Manager
As most of our members are painfully aware, Clerk duty assignments are being abolished and reposted on an unprecedented level in the history of our Local. It has been happening in the majority of our offices and throughout the Bay-Valley District, as I have learned from our brothers and sisters in the San Jose and SalMont Area Locals.
The culprit is District Manager Mark Martinez, who has taken it upon himself to micro-manage every Clerk in every Post Office. He has determined Clerk staffing and scheduling in each office, and has ordered Postmasters and Officers-in-Charge to abolish duty assignments without regard to the actual numbers of employees or seniority, and repost others so all bids are identical: SSDAs (Sales, Services & Distribution Associates) with no principal assignment areas. Rather than utilize career Clerks to receive and process mail in the mornings, PSEs are being so assigned. Several managers told us they disagree with these actions, but were threatened with discipline if they did not comply.
What is particularly reprehensible is that Postmasters and OICs have told employees that the Union was fully aware, having been informed in advance of these actions. They did so because District managers lied to them, telling them they met with me in advance of the abolishments and repostings, Letters issued to employees indicated the APWU was “cc’d”. These are lies and deception! The Union was not informed or consulted about any abolishments or bid repostings, and we were not provided copies of the letters issued to employees until we learned of their existence and demanded them.
It is obvious that Martinez wished to deflect employees’ righteous anger away from management and toward the Union. As I have written previously, it is not the Union that abolishes, reverts, or reposts duty assignments – it is the employer. The Union would never agree to abolish or revert a viable duty assignment, or repost one unless it was made more attractive (i.e., changing split SDOs to consecutive) or required by the Contract because of changes made to it.
The Local has filed countless grievances against management’s gross violations of our Contract and LMOUs (Local Memorandums of Understanding), and we have initiated an Unfair Labor Practice Charge against Martinez with the National Labor Relations Board.
It has been reported to us that Martinez has said he will “break” the Unions. We know better. Our members will not go down without a fight. If your duty assignment was abolished or improperly reposted, we need you to write a statement for your Shop Steward or the Local officer handling the grievance for your office, detailing your duties and previous schedule.
If any supervisor, manager, postmaster, or Officer-in-Charge held a standup or advised you that the Union was
advised and/or consulted about these actions, we need you to similarly write a statement describing what was said, by whom, and when.
We need you to stick with the Union, and help us stick it to Martinez!
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Background on Mark Martinez from a news release at the time of his appointment in March 2014:
As the new lead executive for the Bay-Valley Postal District, Mark Martinez takes over one of the largest, most diverse, densely populated areas in the country, an eight-county, 8,000 square mile area, bounded by Oakland/East Bay, San Jose and south past Salinas to King City, and along the coast from Big Sur to Santa Cruz.
Martinez began his Postal Service career as a mail handler in 1980 in Santa Barbara, CA, and was a letter carrier in Lompoc. He has been a manager in the Postal Service for 30 years.
Martinez was the district manager of the Nevada-Sierra Postal District prior to being selected as the lead executive for the Bay-Valley District. He also served as the district manager of the Mid-America Postal District that comprised areas of Missouri and Kansas. In addition, he served as Postmaster of San Luis Obispo, Bakersfield and Las Vegas, NV.
As Bay-Valley District manager, Martinez has administrative responsibility for all postal operations at 191 Post Offices, two mail processing facilities in Oakland and San Jose, and one Network Distribution Center in Richmond. The district has 9,706 employees who process and deliver annual mail volume of 2.3 billion pieces to more than two million addresses, with a population of more than 5 million people. Martinez is responsible for an operating expense budget that exceeds $866 million.
We want you to know some of your stewards in San Francisco NDC have conflict of interests in performing of steward duties; personal own interests versus steward duties. Stewards who cooperate with management receive personal own privileges, such as: (1) eight hours union time automatically, don’t even need to report to supervisor to get his or her union time (2) steward are watching TV, and playing dominoes on the clock, during the work hours, no problem whatever steward wants to do, management is turning a blind eye on stewards, (3) steward can request and get annual leave and/or sick leave anytime (4) Stewards should have been working on grievances not watching sports and playing dominoes on the clock. In return, management gets reciprocal benefits from steward(s) such as: (1) steward doesn’t voluntarily file contractual violation grievances, (2) management receives advice from steward regarding grievances, stewards should have known better than that management is opposing party regarding grievances (3) stewards automatically grant grievance extensions, even untimely requests by management (4) management gets favorable grievance settlements (5) stewards turn a blind eye to contractual violations, such as: supervisor performing bargaining unit works on a daily basis, but APWU stewards are turning a blind eye on it. APWU stewards often make very bad grievance settlements, for examples: grievance settlements do not address grievant’s concerns/issues, contractual violations, settlement letters don’t contain the remedy union and/or grievant is seeking, often employee gets very bad grievance settlement. Our local APWU stewards are useless, so we have to file our own petitions, file EEO to resolve our issues with supervisors. SF NDC, APWU stewards are totally out of touch with the employees and don’t care about employees’ concerns, and contractual violations as long as they get their own personal privileges from his/her supervisor and MDO(s), so that many members are quitting and planning to quite more from the union. We are strongly believed that our union dues are being wasted and are being neglected by our own local SF NDC stewards for their own personal privileges from management. – See more at: http://www.postal-reporter.com/blog/oakland-apwu-local-strikes-back-at-abusive-postal-supervisor/#comment-65080
another poser……calling this dope a manager when he has no university education. garbage in, garbage out. losing a billion a month over and over again…..and expecting a different result with the same thugs who think they are in the same league with professionals managers from Exxon, Boeing, or Goldman Sachs. did this fanook stay in a holiday inn last night lol?
Im going huff an a puff an blow the union down!!!!
Unfortunately for Mr. Martinez, he doesn’t have the authority to pick his nose unless headquarters tells him to.
Anybody being intimadated/encourage by management to retire against their will? get a lawyer. A hostile work place, an bullying ain’t going fly.
David Stowe,who was just promoted to San Francisco District Manager from Plant Manager at the PD&C is a bigger douchebag than Martinez.
So what else is new? if you aren’t a born liar and a creep,you will never be in management in the Postal Service.
this guy is a bully that thinks he can scare people into doing things his way .he came to our office and told us how everything was going to change an that we would all have subs on our routes soon well we still ave the same one and no changes ,
working our days off when you onlky get a day off everyother week is breaking the backs of loyal long time emploees..in his dreams we will all quit so they can bring in under paid non union workers with no benefits and work them like dogs until they drop ..
well I for one am not going anywhere I can follow your stupid rules and my customers love me sp screw with me and we will see who wins in the end ..when your long gone and we are still there ..
he cant answer a smple question from the carrier because he has lost whenever he once knew ,,hes going to change all our routes and make them more efficient oh really well come on in and do that and see how wrong your are and how many grievences you,ll have slapped on you for violating the contract …hes a rude little man with little man complex ..and he should not be in charge of anything or anyone ..i,m sure once hes screws up everything he will be moving on to some other place ..it galls me these peopel are making so much more money than those of us who have our bodys breaking down everyday due to the incress in mail volume and parcel count..they really dsont know the toll this career takes on the body.
I love for all of them to have to work at least one week a year in every office doing various jobs and see how long they last without crying ..i love my job I,m proud to work for the postal service I do a good job and i,m rewarded for all of that with a paycheck that keeps decreasing in size while I do the same wor its just wrong
Just another example of an unskilled Manager destroying the PO.
If it’s true and Martinez told Mgmt to abolish those jobs without notifying the union, then he should be removed from the USPS. Employees like Martinez that have to resolve to underhanded and ‘back-door’ tactics to make a name for themselves ae the scum of the earth!!!!
this is part of the new “management style” that has been in place the last few years and they dont want career people for any job in the PO they only want PSE’s, RCA’s & CCA’s. they can control and intimadate them unlike us, so if they offer early outs with a bonus and no one bites they are determined to “encourage” us to retire. its a changing work force thats not in career’s favor.
Good luck with that, every time a … like that does something like this, all it does it cost them MONEY, and everything usually goes back the way it’s supposed to have been done. See it all the time, they get the power, but they forget there are guidelines to go by, not his way or the highway. All I can say, is keep filing those grievances and the free MONEY will come your way, and if they don’t pay you after you are awarded money, file another grievance, they hate those evermore
Well done Mr. Martinez (NOT)
I agree with you Mailman, my vote was a No! So I’m just watching the result of their yes or non vote. The anger and disbelief of these once hopeful clerks, causes me to shake my head.
he doesnt relize the union will break him,hopefully soon
This dude has a real rude awakening coming. Stay tuned for the next episode to be aired. He chose the wrong area of this country to bring against him. His worse enemies are coming out of the wood works. Let the fireworks begin.This could be a potential class payback for the Motor Vehicle fighting so hard against the status Quo.
I’m a city carrier and always have been in a smaller city where we don’t do processing, so I don’t know the details very well about the clerk and mail handler jobs being affected. However, I have reams of experience with DM’s like Martinez in my 30 years. He is just the type who will be an Area VP one day and has his beady little eyes toward D.C. He’s certainly kissing all the right ass with his threats of busting the union, which, it goes without saying, he has no authority to do.
I hope you folks can reign this piece of shit in. Of course if you’re successful and he packs his bags, they’ll just give him a raise and transfer him somewhere else to fuck that district up. The upper level management is on a planet of their own, with no sense left of reality about how the mail process actually works. I hope your next contract is better than the one you’ve got.
I hope this ass clown can sleep at nite knowing to distroy the unions is only distroying this country. Some day his grandchild will ask him papa why is this country distroyed. dear sweet child it was me and other ass clowns like myself that contributed to the distruction of the great usa that was once….had. so as a worker I first should congradulate on your prize.
this guy is a total douchebag. i guess he’s so angry because his hairline is reseeding so badly….fk him!
You dumb APWU members drank the Goofy Guffey Kool-Aid and ratified the worst contract in organized labor history that allows management to revert full time bids and replace them with part time NTFT bids and a two-tier wage scale with more non-career employees replacing regulars,now you are seeing the results of your stupidity!And hows that 50 mile excessing rule that doesn’t exist in your contract working for you?
He is bought and paided for by the management, look in his eye’s he is looking for a job after the post office, he already has insider information on how the post office will go private and what slice of the pie he will get. He and others at the top, don’t give a dam about the workers.
Typical management appointment. Who decided that this bozo should be in charge of
almost 10,000 employees. Bozo has obviously proved that he does not have a clue if
he really believes that he will Break the Union. Time will tell and believe it that
the clowns actions will be overturned and he will be banished to the basement in
some obsolete facility somewhere in the Bay area.
time to retire to Bear Valley an enjoy it.
That’s my advice to Marty the man handler Martinez from the valley.
He has some good ideas, give him a chance and watch productivity go up!