Grievances Report 2022 Surpassed the List

By Jose Ochoa, Executive Vice President

The year 2022 was one of our busiest. Your Stewards and Branch officers responded to management numerous violations with a storm of grievances totaling a whopping 6,575.

Thank you, Stewards, for your persistent and firm Contract enforcement, you are the Branch’s fearless warriors!

Good news, the Berkeley Post Office, has been improving the work environment since we got new management. Let’s hope it doesn’t change and go back to the inept, bully and disrespectful toxic postmaster. Nobody should work in an environment of disrespect, intimidation and fear in any post office.

Fortunately, the old dinosaurs roaming the extinct Bay Valley District that were ignoring and/or rewarding inappropriate management behavior are also becoming extinct and the new District is starting to hold this postmaster “accountable” for unacceptable behavior. Unlike the old district that just kept moving this abusive individual from one office to another, over and over again expecting a different result.

Let’s begin the New Year by following the JCAMNational Agreement specifically article 8.5G “The parties agree that with the exception of December, full-time employees are prohibited from working more than 12 hours in a single work day or 60 hours within a service week. Furthermore, the employee’s tour of duty shall be terminated once he or she reaches the 60th hour of work. Reminder, if you have physical imitation conditions you must follow your doctor’s restrictions as written. You can’t volunteer to ignore those restrictions for any reason. No supervisor or manager has the authority to tell you to work longer. You have the right to refuse those instructions. If this happens to you immediately notify your Steward or call the Branch office.

Union Quotes

In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as 'right to work.' It is a law to rob us of our civil rights and job rights. It is supported by Southern segregationists who are trying to keep us from achieving our civil rights and our right of equal job opportunity. Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining by which unions have improved wages and working conditions of everyone. Wherever these laws have been passed, wages are lower, job opportunities are fewer and there are no civil rights. We do not intend to let them do this to us. We demand this fraud be stopped.

During the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century, Philip Bell Downing successfully filed at least five patents with the United States Patent Office. Among his most significant inventions were a street letter box (U.S. Patent numbers 462,092 and 462,093) and a mechanical device for operating street railway switches (U.S. Patent number 430,118). Downing also enjoyed a long career as a clerk with the Custom House in Boston, Massachusetts, retiring in 1927 after more than thirty years of service.

Born in Providence, Rhode Island on March 22, 1857, Downing came from a prominent background. His father, George T. Downing, was a well -known abolitionist and business owner, while his mother, Serena L. deGrasse, had family roots in New York City, New York dating back to the mid -1600s. Philip Downing’s grandfather, Thomas Downing, had been born to emancipated parents in Virginia. He also had success in business, establishing Downing’s Oyster House in the financial district of Manhattan in 1825. It quickly became one of the city’s best -known dining and catering establishments. In addition, Thomas Downing played an important role in founding the United Anti -Slavery Society of the City of New York in the mid -1830s.

One of six children, Philip Downing spent his childhood in Providence and Newport, Rhode Island, as well as in Washington, D.C., where his father was manager of the U.S. House of Representatives’ dining room. Census records indicate that Downing moved to Boston around 1880. Shortly thereafter he married

Evangeline Howard, and had two children, Antonia Downing and Philip Downing, Jr.

On June 17, 1890, the U.S. Patent Office approved Downing’s application for “new and useful Improvements in Street -Railway Switches.” His invention allowed the switches to be opened or closed by using a brass arm located next to the brake handle on the platform of the car. It also allowed the switches to be changed automatically in some cases.

A little over a year later, on October 27, 1891, his two patents for a street letter box also gained approval. Downing’s design resembled the mailboxes that are now ubiquitous, a tall metal box with a secure, hinged door to drop letters.

Until this point, those wishing to send mail usually had to travel to the post office. Downing’s invention would instead allow for drop off near one’s home and easy pick -up by a letter carrier. His idea for the hinged opening prevented rain or snow from entering the box and damaging the mail.

More than twenty-five years later, on January 26, 1917, Downing would receive another patent (U.S. Patent number 1243,595), for an env elope moistener, which utilized a roller and a small, attached water tank, to quickly moisten envelopes. The following year saw another successful application (U.S. Patent number 126,9584) for an easily accessible desktop notepad.

Philip Downing died in Boston on June 8, 1934. He was 77.