Several of our UTU Engineer members have contacted me recently with concerns about the Union Shop provision contained in Article XI of BLE's recently implemented 2003 Local/National Agreement. Apparently some local BLE officers have suggested that any engineer who does not become a BLE member within a specific time frame will forfeit engineer seniority under the Union Shop rule. Whether this is a misguided recruiting effort, or simply the result of ignorance of the Union Shop concept on the part of those local BLE officers, this is to assure UTU engineers that such assertions are completely false.

Section 2 of the new BLE Union Shop rule clearly stipulates that "[T]he requirements of membership provided for in Section 1 of this Article shall be satisfied if any employee shall hold or acquire membership in any one of the labor organizations national in scope organized in accordance with the Railway Labor Act and admitting to membership employees of a craft or class in train, yard, engine or hostling service…" That same paragraph further clarifies the matter by confirming that "…nothing contained in this Article shall prevent any employee from changing membership from one organization to another organization admitting to membership employees of a craft or class in any of the services above specified."

The above language is in all pertinent aspects identical to the Union Shop provisions that have been contained in UTU agreements on this property for many, many years. BLE is to be commended for finally confronting those "no bill" engineers whom for many years reaped the benefits of the collective bargaining process while their co-workers picked up the tab. This new rule now requires union membership (good news), but it does not require BLE membership (more good news).