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Dissidents group isn’t ‘small’
The RPO board’s arrogant referral to the RPO Community Supporters as a “small group” is just as ridiculously inappropriate as calling the New York State delegation to Congress small! In both cases, these small groups represent constituencies that are immensely larger; that’s how representative democracy works!
DAVID PERLMAN, BRIGHTON
Time to reform ’employment at will’
While many people are unaware of its existence, the employment-at-will doctrine allows employers to do what the title implies: hire and fire employees at will, with a few limited exceptions. It is incredible that a workplace legal principle from the Reconstruction era has survived basically unscathed into the 21st century, with little modification.
The doctrine was devised in 1877 by Horace Gray Wood. Incredibly, as an intellectual basis of the doctrine, Wood analyzed master and slave relationships in formulating a lasting policy for arbitrating employer and employee relationships. Do we really want to base our employer-employee relationships on an archaic and repugnant plantation mentality originating from the Jim Crow-era South? Of course, we should not, and that’s why this long-standing policy cries out for reform. In the current era of lavish tax breaks for corporations, we continue to see companies lay off and under-employ taxpaying Americans in a greed-driven race to the bottom.
In the last few years we have seen laws that take away employee rights, passed through movements substantially financed by multi-billionaires such as Charles and David Koch. The employment-at-will doctrine has been a willing accomplice in the assault on the American worker. The employer has no duty to articulate just cause when dismissing an employee – no cause at all is just fine under American law, except in certain defined cases of discrimination. “No cause” firings should be unacceptable and illegal in the 21st century, but unfortunately, this practice is allowed to continue.
Many “right to work” laws are being passed by states other than New York. In my opinion, these laws are best characterized as a right to work for a lot less pay, no benefits, and few, if any, employee protections under law. I guess this is what is meant when it is said that right-to-work states are business friendly. With friends like them, the taxpaying American worker needs no enemies. One again, the employment-at-will doctrine aids these abuses.
We in New York can do something to change this policy, which has become a festering wound impeding employee well-being and, in the long run, hampering a strong and sustained economic recovery. If there are problems in the employee selection process, it is up to the employer to fix them. It is much easier to hire carefully than to correct the damage done by those already hired. The slash-and-burn approach to employee firings and layoffs should be unacceptable and illegal in the modern era. We have great universities and colleges within New York State to tackle these issues; the U of R, RIT, Syracuse University, and Cornell are just a few of the outstanding institutions in our area that strive to change our workplaces for the better.
It is long past time to reform the repressive employment-at-will doctrine. Let’s get to work.
MICHAEL BERTOLONE, GREECE
Bertolone is past executive vice president of the Monroe County Law Enforcement Association.
Fight fracking
Although the media reports the contention on both sides of the fracking issue, we do not hear the proven implications of the effects of fracking on the environment and public health.
The gas industry has told us repeatedly that the practice is environmentally benign, but I ask readers to take a day trip to Pennsylvania just across the border to see the manifest destruction of state forest and Bureau of Land Management land. The hundreds of thousands of truck loads of water off to be mixed with carcinogens and neurotoxins to mitigate drilling have taken an incredible toll on Pennsylvania’s environment. In Greene County, Pennsylvania, Whitely Creek can be lit on fire because of methane coming up through the bedrock that has been tapped via fracking.
Fracking wastewater is in the millions of gallons per well, contains neurotoxins, carcinogens, and can often be radioactive. This water is either recycled, injected in deep abandoned wells, or is sent to municipal wastewater treatment plants that are only equipped to filter human pathogens, yet they still release the water into streams and rivers to be utilized downstream for the next towns’ water supply, including drinking water.
Another means of disposing of the toxic salty water is spraying it on roads to de-ice them, which ends up in our wells and watersheds.
And if fracking is safe, why has it been singled out in the 2005 energy bill to be exempt from environmental law? I urge people to get involved in the movement to prevent hydrofracking in New York State.
SCOTT TOPEL, MENDON
Consider abortion’s toll, too
In “Seeing the Toll of Violence” (Feedback), Doug Hoener rightly reminds us that in the wake of the shootings in Newtown, we need to open our hearts and minds to a wider discussion of how violence is impacting our children and culture.
Mr. Hoener points to the hundreds of thousands of children who are subjected to cruel neglect and abuse every year at the hands of adults. While the number of reported incidence of violence against these small victims certainly baffles the mind, the number of pre-born children who succumb to the fatal violence of legalized abortion is above 1.2 million each year in the United States alone.
By framing abortion within a discussion of “choice” or “women’s equality,” some people, including our own governor, have been lulled into the false sense that the killing of tiny human beings is something other than barbaric, or at the very least something every women should embrace. As Governor Cuomo and others move to greatly expand abortion access in New York as part of his so-called “Women’s Equality Act,” New Yorkers have an opportunity to reverse this trend of heinous violence by telling him and our legislators that enough is enough.
We must no longer be willing to stand silent while children die violent deaths at the hands of abortionists.
KELLY BRUNACINI, RUSH
Brunacini is executive director of Feminists Choosing Life of New York.
This article appears in Feb 13-19, 2013.
Mr Perlman:
Since the self-styled RPO Community Supporters group censors any poster to its website who dares to suggest that supporting the RPO does not necessitate supporting Remmereit, or who asks embarrassing questions, perhaps you can supply a verifiable headcount of Supporters so that the public can determine for itself whether that membership is large or small.
On the topic of “representative democracy”, we know that the RPO board was elected by a majority of the ballots cast by eligible voters to represent the competing interests of their constituency, i.e. all RPO members. As someone once said, “that’s how representative democracy works”.
What we do NOT know is just what constituency elected the RPO Community Supporters to represent them and how that election took place. Again, any information you can provide that sheds light on the validity of the RPO Community Supporters’ claim to represent anyone other than themselves will be most welcome.
Mr. DeLoye:
With regard to supplying a head count of supporters, I cannot give you verifiable figures for the simple reason that we have been prevented from participating in a fair election. However, there is ample evidence that we command considerable support. For example, on January 10th we publicly announced a press conference at which Arild Remmereit was to speak and we made no attempt to selecte the people who attended. There was standing room only for the 225 people who showed up and it was obvious to all that a substantial majority of those present were opposed to the RPO Board. Maestro Remmereit received an enthusiastic standing ovation and as speaker after speaker made points in his favor, the spontaneous applause was ample proof that an overwhelming majority of those in the room felt that we were representing their opinions. In essence, our position was endorsed by a voice vote!
A further indication of our strong following was at the annual meeting of members held on January 23rd in Hatch Hall. Severa times during this meeting, there was an opportunity for the members to express their pleasure or displeasure at what they heard and once again, there was no doubt that the supporters of our position far outnumbered those who approved of the Board’s actions.
I draw your attention, by the way, to the fact that the Board didn’t announce Remmereit’s firing until the day AFTER the annual meeting. Some interesting conclusions can be drawn from this which are beyond the scope of our current discussion.
With regard to representative democracy, you say that we know that the RPO board was elected by a majority of the ballots cast by eligible voters. I think that any fair-minded person would conclude that the election you refer to was far from fair. First of all, the ballot contained only names of nominees chosen by the board’s Governance Committee which meant that the membership had no chance to vote for people that supported our position. Even if a substantial majority had chosen to express disapproval by leaving their ballot blank, it would have had no effect on the outcome. The Board’s candidates had to win! There is a striking resemblance of this situation to that of “elections” held in countries ruled by dictators!
So you might ask why we didn’t put up our own candidates. The answer to this is very simple. The deadline for submitting alternate candidates is fixed by the bylaws at October 31st. Our desire to submit an alternative slate arose only after Remmereit’s contract was summariarly terminated and this didn’t occur until November 28th, well past the deadline.
The only thing that the RPO Community Supporters group is asking is to be able to face the membership with a fair election in which there is a competing slate of candidates. Such an election would be a referendum on the current board’s actions and qualifications to lead. I am quite certain that if this occurred, we would win by an overwhelming majority. It escapes me why the current leadership is so stridently opposed to holding a new election in which competing visions for the RPO can be submitted to the membership for a fair vote. This is really all that we are asking!
You say any information I can provide that sheds light on the validity of our claim to represent anyone other than ourselves will be most welcome. I take it that you’re saying that we represent no one but ourselves. If this is what you mean, all I have to do is to find one person who claims we represent him or her and you should be satisfied. I feel confident that we can do much, much better than that and I’m confident that in a fair election, we would come up with a substantial majority of members who would vote to make a significant change in the current RPO Board. Why can’t we try?
Mr. Bertolone writes with an “upstanding moral” tone about the rights of workers and at will employment being an evil system. How convenient to point out slavery as it’s basis, as anyone who may disagree , could be called a “Racist” as many do that disagree with our President. Does his morality include the freedom to choose who we associate with, and what we do with our own bodies? Using “laws” that are all enforced by government guns, to force someone to retain an employee is immoral! But what does he care, since he is involved in Law Enforcement and can take the moral high ground as the one wielding the government gun that would be pointed at employers, if his proposal were adopted. Keep America free! Free to choose what we do with our own bodies and free to choose our associations!
“Keep America free! Free to choose what we do with our own bodies and free to choose our associations!”
Free to work for nothing -volunteer for everything.
Please help Charles and David Koch remain on their yachts, while we work three jobs!!!!!
@bernstein @TOPEL: What hampers a “strong and sustained economic recovery” in the former-Empire State is an ideology that ties up employers with red tape and union goons, while giving free rein to Luddite ignoramuses whose only goal is to stifle innovation and emerging industries.
yo – j.a.m.
You sound very progressive – if you hate NY so much, you’ll probably like Mississippi – no “union goons” as you call them, not many labor laws to speak of, few workers’ rights – sounds like your version of paradise. And they’re really business friendly – they would let them pay less then minimum wage if the nasty feds would let them get away with it.
If you agree to move down there , I will pay your one-way bus fare. Think about it and get back to me.
@bernstein — LOL. In case you haven’t noticed, rational people have been voting with their feet for at least a generation.
I gather you intend to be the last one out. I’d remind you to switch off the lights, but by that time New York State probably will have outlawed all forms of energy.
Headline: “Meteor strikes Russia; Liberals blame global warming and law-abiding gun owners”
@j.a.m.: Where exactly is that headline?
Troll Whisperer – j.a.m.’s headline is found in the same newspaper that carries stories about Newtown being a government plot, and stories about Obama turning the US over to the UN, and of his being a Muslim, a communist, a fascist and being born in Kenya.
Hey, nothing to do with any of the topics above, but did anyone else see the aurora on Saturday night? From 7 – 8 before the clouds rolled in, saw it due East from a light-unpolluted part of Webster. No luck finding any mention in the regular news. Anyone else see or hear about it?
Luc de Nord – Auroras appear in the north, never in the east. And the Saturady displays never made it south of cental Canada.