Verizon offered unions representing 38,000 wireline employees 2 percent wage increases the next two years and a $1,000 lump sum payment in the third year as part of a three-year contract offer, the company said in a news release Monday. Opening labor talks, Verizon made the comprehensive offer to the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers at the outset "to encourage a substantive and productive dialogue," said Robert Mudge, wireline operations executive vice president. Verizon said the proposed pay increases were contingent on signing an agreement by Aug. 1, and would add to an average annual salary and benefit package of $130,000 for Verizon associates in the east. Pension-eligible associates could choose between continuing to earn benefits under a traditional pension plan with some limitations and forgoing a 401(k) company match, or opting for an enhanced 401(k) plan currently offered to management (including a bigger company match) with a frozen pension benefit, the release said. Verizon called the combined pension and 401(k) benefits for employees hired before Oct. 28, 2012, a structure "from another era." Noting Verizon associates' healthcare costs were above the national average and calling cost control "essential," the carrier proposed an increase of $8.10 per week for individual healthcare premiums and said "other reasonable cost controls" were needed to keep the wireline business competitive. Mudge said fiber deployment had positioned Verizon for growth, but the company's "cost structure has not changed nearly fast enough to align with today's market realities and consumer needs." Verizon said it seeks more flexibility to manage the workforce "consistent with customer demands." Tami Erwin, president of Verizon's Consumer and Mass Business unit, said, "We need contractual changes that position us to compete with new and emerging technologies." The last contract negotiations lasted 15 months in 2011-12, the release noted. IBEW representatives had no comment. CWA issued a statement Tuesday from Dennis Trainor, District 1 vice president, that said: “Verizon’s claims about the pay increases they put on the bargaining table yesterday are simply a smokescreen designed to hide the harsh reality of their concessionary demands: deep cuts to pension benefits, skyrocketing increases in medical costs, and the complete elimination of job security. Despite $9.6 billion in profits in 2014 and $44 million in compensation to their top five executives, Verizon wants to eliminate middle-class jobs and let customer service deteriorate. Their proposals would slash thousands of jobs and leave our remaining members with a diminished standard of living at the end of any new contract."
The Senate squeaked through a procedural motion on standalone Trade Promotion Authority on June 23 with 60 votes in favor and 37 opposed. The move paves the way for final passage of the legislation the following day, said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., on the Senate floor before the TPA vote. Senate passage of the underlying TPA bill will allow leadership to deliver that legislation to President Barack Obama for his signature after weeks of political wrangling.
The FCC will ask the Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC) to work on additional cybersecurity issues when the rechartered CSRIC V convenes June 24 for its first public meeting, Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Simpson said in a Monday blog post. CSRIC voted in March to adopt recommendations on adapting the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Cybersecurity Framework for communications sector use (see 1503180056). The CSRIC report drew wide praise from industry stakeholders, including in comments published earlier this month (see 1506010055). That report was one of CSRIC IV’s “biggest achievements” and “I expect the new CSRIC to build on these efforts by developing recommendations on how communications companies can improve information sharing about cyber risks within the private sector,” Simpson said. The FCC also expects CSRIC V to develop recommendations on reducing the frequency and impact of “misrouted” 911 calls, improving Next-Generation 911 and emergency alert systems, and enhancing communications infrastructure reliability, Simpson said. “I also expect that members will examine the challenges associated with prioritizing emergency communications during disaster-related infrastructure outages,” he said. The CSRIC meeting is set to begin at 1 p.m. at FCC headquarters.
The FCC will ask the Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC) to work on additional cybersecurity issues when the rechartered CSRIC V convenes June 24 for its first public meeting, Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Simpson said in a Monday blog post. CSRIC voted in March to adopt recommendations on adapting the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Cybersecurity Framework for communications sector use (see 1503180056). The CSRIC report drew wide praise from industry stakeholders, including in comments published earlier this month (see 1506010055). That report was one of CSRIC IV’s “biggest achievements” and “I expect the new CSRIC to build on these efforts by developing recommendations on how communications companies can improve information sharing about cyber risks within the private sector,” Simpson said. The FCC also expects CSRIC V to develop recommendations on reducing the frequency and impact of “misrouted” 911 calls, improving Next-Generation 911 and emergency alert systems, and enhancing communications infrastructure reliability, Simpson said. “I also expect that members will examine the challenges associated with prioritizing emergency communications during disaster-related infrastructure outages,” he said. The CSRIC meeting is set to begin at 1 p.m. at FCC headquarters.
Entravision promotes Jose Villafane to president, Entravision National Sales, new position ... NFL hires Jordan Levin, ex-Microsoft, as senior vice president-chief content officer, new position ... Haier hires Kevin Dexter, ex-Samsung Electronics America, as chief operating officer ... RF Code hires Dave Duncavage, ex-Metal Oxide Technologies, as vice president-operations ... Roku hires Steve Louden, formerly with Expedia, as chief financial officer ... Lobbyist registrations: Comcast and Disney, Bridge Street Group, effective May 1 ... Inmar, digital platform firm, Waldo Law Offices and Washington Health Strategies Group, effective Jan. 1 ... Kentucky Broadcasters Association and NAB, Newberry Advisors, effective June 1 ... Viacom, Bridge Street Group, effective May 2.
Trulia hires Selma Hepp, ex-California Association of Realtors, as chief economist ... NFL hires Jordan Levin, ex-Microsoft, as senior vice president-chief content officer, new position ... Haier hires Kevin Dexter, ex-Samsung Electronics America, as chief operating officer ... RF Code hires Dave Duncavage, ex-Metal Oxide Technologies, as vice president-operations ... Roku hires Steve Louden, formerly with Expedia, as chief financial officer ... Lobbyist registrations: Comcast and Disney, Bridge Street Group, effective May 1 ... Inmar, digital platform firm, Waldo Law Offices and Washington Health Strategies Group, effective Jan. 1 ... Viacom, Bridge Street Group, effective May 2.
House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., believes the early “missteps” of FirstNet are now “behind us,” he plans to say in his opening statement during Tuesday’s FirstNet oversight hearing. He will tout what he considers progress from his last FirstNet hearing more than a year ago but worry about the findings of a recent GAO report. “But that is not to say that there aren’t additional challenges,” Walden will say.
CEA was among 120 groups from various industries expressing support last week for Senate legislation designed to thwart a repeat of the West Coast ports slowdown (see 1502230029) that the groups said “had a significant and costly impact on the U.S. economy.” Companies “are still reporting on the impacts to their business from the year long ordeal,” the groups said in a letter to Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Ohio, sponsor of S-1519, the Protecting Orderly and Responsible Transit of Shipments (PORTS) Act. Once the West Coast ports labor impasse was resolved in late February with an interim contract agreement, a “big group” of industry associations and companies “started the process of banging heads together” on a “longer-term fix” to assure the crisis never happens again, said Sage Chandler, CEA vice president-international trade, in a recent interview (see 1504070001). Though the groups in their letter to Gardner expressed “support” for the collective bargaining process, “we do not believe the negotiating process should threaten the interest of the national economy,” they said. Gardner’s bill would amend the National Labor Relations Act to give state governors “a mechanism under federal law to mitigate the destructive impact of port labor disputes on the economy in their state and nationally,” they said. It also would “explicitly include slowdowns as a trigger for Taft-Hartley emergency powers,” not just work stoppages or outright strikes, they said. “We believe this approach correctly reforms the Taft-Hartley process to promote government action in response to the great harm these disputes cause our national economy. Most importantly, the bill clearly defines and expands situations in which Taft-Hartley can be invoked, preventing legal ambiguity from causing inaction.”
House Republican leadership aimed to begin the vote on Trade Promotion Authority and Trade Adjustment Assistance shortly after 11:00 a.m. on June 12, but an emergency Democratic caucus meeting pushed back the votes until closer to 1:00 p.m., said House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., in a release. President Barack Obama personally urged lawmakers to vote in favor of the legislation during that meeting, said a number of trade experts. International Trade Today went to publication before the June 12 votes began.
Following spying concerns that emerged after former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden “revealed extensive U.S. government surveillance,” the U.S. tech industry as a whole underperformed, resulting in an economic impact far greater than the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation's initial $35 billion estimate, ITIF said in a news release Tuesday. That affected the cloud computing sector and the industry as a whole, ITIF said. In a report released Tuesday, ITIF cataloged a “wide range of specific examples of the economic harm that has been done to U.S. businesses as a result of unreformed government surveillance practices,” and “proposes a series of reforms designed to improve security, protect transparency, and increase cooperation and accountability in the global technology ecosystem,” the release said. “The U.S. government’s failure to meaningfully reform its surveillance practices has taken a serious economic toll on the U.S. tech sector and the total cost continues to grow each day,” said ITIF Vice President Daniel Castro, who co-wrote the report. “Foreign customers are increasingly shunning U.S. companies, and governments around the world are using U.S. surveillance as an excuse to enact a new wave of protectionist policies,” which is bad for U.S. companies, workers and the economy as a whole, Castro said. “Now that Congress has passed the USA Freedom Act, it is imperative that it turn its attention to reforming the digital surveillance activities that continue to impact our nation’s competitiveness,” he said. In its report, ITIF recommended policymakers “level the playing field for the U.S. tech sector” by implementing reforms like transparency about surveillance practices, opposing government efforts to weaken encryption or place backdoors in software, strengthening mutual legal assistance treaties with other nations, and combating anti-competitive practices by other nations, the release said. “Congress must decide how many American jobs it is willing to sacrifice in pursuit of intelligence gathering and find a better balance between economic interests and national security interests,” Castro said.