Washington’s pro-Big Labor officials handed the unions their third reprieve from transparency rules since taking over in November 2008. This time the focus was on the Form LM-30, which was intended by the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA) to require labor organization officers and employees and their spouses and minor children to publicly disclose certain financial interests held, income received, and transactions engaged in to prevent any conflicts of interest. The proposed changes would accomplish the following:
• Return to the pre-2007 practice whereby union officers and employees were not required to report compensation they received under union leave and “no docking” policies established under collective bargaining agreements or by custom and practice of the workplace. • Exclude union stewards and similar union representatives, such as a member of a safety committee or a bargaining committee, from having to file Form LM-30. • Create an administrative exemption whereby union officials would generally need to report only loans – such as home mortgages – from bona fide credit institutions if the terms of such loans are on terms more favorable than those available to the public. • Limit the reporting obligation with respect to interests in and payments from employers that compete against employers represented by the official’s union or that the union actively seeks to represent, modify the scope of reporting with respect to payments from certain trusts and unions, and exempt union officials from reporting payments they receive from trusts or, as a general rule, from unions. • Hold union officers and employees to the same reporting obligations under the LMRDA.
Two Democrat Senators are attempting to secure another taxpayer-funded bailout for Big Labor, this time in the form of a $34 billion rescue plan for the failing Teamsters pension fund. Government handouts to Big Labor (funded by taxpayers) are likely to continue. As the American public animosity is growing against free-spending elected officials, unions are planning to spend furiously to keep their “bought and paid for administration” in place. In an interesting move, there is discussion of unions pooling their spending for key midterm elections later this year.
