One of the reason's I started reading daily Kos was because Teamsterpower's posts here have circulated among some progressive net saavy Teamsters, me being one of them. I was intrigued by the positive response of some of the other bloggers to the Teamster campaign to organize school bus drivers working for First Student.As it would happen, in April of this year we launched a campaign to organize a group of 425 bus drivers in Savannah that are employed by First Student and drive buses for the Chatham County school system.
The organizing campaign was a partnership between My Local (Local 728 based it Atlanta) and the Teamsters International organizing department. The vote was taken on September 11 and resulted in a total slam dunk with 340 workers voting for the union and 20 against. The victory celebration was caught on film by the local T.V. station (check it out here here.
One of the most interesting things about this campaign was the notable absence of an aggressive anti-union campaign by the company. The capitol stragies approach along with the alliance with the british unions has cleary paid off and any of you that have done anything to assist the efforts of the First Student workers really deserve a pat on the back because you are having an effect. check out the Teamster website or schoolbus workers united for updates. I really feel that this campaign embodies everything that is good about unions because I know for a fact that every group that the Teamsters have organized have significantly improved their working conditions and have made significant gains in terms of wages and benefits.