Interesting twist or nothing meaningful?

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In what can only be described as a surprise move, Mercury Marine issued the following statement tonight:

In light of the uncertainty surrounding the voting by Mercury employees on the company’s “best and final” offer made earlier to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, Mercury and the IAM Midwest Territory have agreed to meet to bring clarity to the communications regarding the unchanged “best and final” proposal.  (Source: Mercury Marine and union will talk – WFRV)

The move occurs after voting ended abruptly this afternoon.

Voting ended abruptly by order of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Midwest Office.

In spite of delivering a vote on a proposed labor contract by the midnight deadline Saturday night, union workers were prompted by local union leaders to continue voting throughout the weekend and into Monday.

“We were planning on presenting the outcome to Mercury hoping they would have a change of heart,” said union worker Fred Toth Jr. “The (Midwest) union resisted the second effort for a vote, not the company.”

It also sounds as though it was upper levels of union leadership, that is to blame for the fiasco.

On Monday afternoon, Toth blamed IAM Midwest union leadership for letting the entire local membership down.

“The company allowed us out of work to begin circulating the petition. We got nothing but trouble from the union leadership who threatened to have us fired or walked out of the plant,” Toth said. “The whole thing – letting us vote with only two hours to the deadline was a ploy for the union leaders to save face. Everyone knew there was a midnight deadline. This wasn’t a game to us.”

Toth said local union official Mark Zillges and chief union negotiator Dan Longsine worked hard to get a deal done so workers could vote again.

“It was their superiors above them, including Russell Krings (business representative for the IAMAW), that failed to help us at all,” said Toth. “They even led us to believe there were bylaws preventing us from voting on the same contract.”

Here’s Mercury’s take on situation.

Fleming agrees that time constraints weren’t the only issue, adding that the IAM leadership’s reluctance to allow the membership to vote in a timely manner before the deadline was a relevant factor.

“We realize why the employees want to take action to save their jobs, but let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that time was the problem here,” Fleming said. “Union members asked for an opportunity to vote and the union wouldn’t let them. And when they gave its approval for a second vote that requires many hours to accomplish it was two hours before the deadline.”

Fleming believes the confusion over a second vote resulted when union leadership moved up the vote a week prior to the Aug. 29 deadline. The company repeatedly told union officials and union workers that the proposal was the “best and final offer.”

“We had initially asked for one vote to tell us their answer, which I think would have made it clearer to employees that there would be no second vote,” Fleming said. “And then (union leaders) stopped its membership from voting after that. And now Mercury is being stuck with this no matter what the union did. And why won’t Mercury change its plans, schedules and agreements.”

As for rumors being circulated regarding a decision having been made before the intial vote.

Fleming said the rumors that Mercury Marine had planned to move its operations to Stillwater, Okla., regardless of the outcome of the vote are untrue.

“We’ve said over and over prior to and during negotiations that not one decision had been made yet and that’s the absolute truth,” Fleming said.

For those hoping that a belated “yes” vote would change the decision to move manufacturing to Oklahoma, don’t bet on it.

Even if the union leadership had delivered a “yes” vote to the company this week, Fleming said it was “highly unlikely” that the company would accept the belated union vote after the deadline.

Same goes for the meeting referred to in the statement released tonight.

“We’re talking,” Mercury communications director Steve Fleming said Monday night.

He declined to elaborate on the significance of the situation but indicated that “talking” did not mean negotiating at the bargaining table. (Source: Mercury Marine, union seek clarity on 2nd vote – Green Bay Press-Gazette)

Still sounds like game, set, match.  Manufacturing jobs going to Stillwater courtesy of the union vote on August 23rd.

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Why 2nd vote was too little too late

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Mercury Marine held firm to it’s deadline of 11:59 pm last Saturday for the union in Fond du Lac to accept the proposed contract changes.  For all the rhetoric put out by the union leadership they had a fair chance, but in the end blew it.

The company said the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Lodge 1947 should not have waited until 10 p.m. Saturday to launch a second vote on a contract proposal that expired at midnight.

“There was an entire week in which the union should have allowed its members to have a second vote, rather than wait until two hours prior to the deadline,” company spokesman Steve Fleming said.

As the company pointed out there was another community involved and further delay wouldn’t have been fair to them.

“People should be reminded that there was another town, that we are very compatible with, in Oklahoma anxiously awaiting the results” of the vote, Fleming said.

“Frankly, it would be unethical to tell Stillwater that there was a schedule and a set of conditions for negotiations and then throw it all out the window because the union in Fond du Lac chose not to allow its members to vote” in a timely fashion. (Source: Mercury says 2nd vote too late to save jobs – Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal)

Plain and simple Mercury Marine was more than fair to the union during this entire process and gave them ample time following the vote to re-consider that decision.  The union dragged it’s feet and didn’t ensure a 2nd vote was completed and tabulated by the deadline.

That’s why it’s laughable what the union leadership had to say in calling off the vote this afternoon.

In a news release Monday afternoon, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers stopped short of saying that a second vote on a proposed labor contract was canceled. That vote was to continue until 6 p.m.

But “Mercury Marine failed to contact the union by noon today. Therefore, there is no last, best and final proposal on the table for the union to vote on,” according to the union’s District 10 headquarters. (Source: Mercury Marine union vote apparently called off – Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal)

It’s laughable because as of 11:59 pm Saturday there was no company proposal to vote on.  And once the deadline passed Mercury had no further obligation to contact the union.

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House to approve audit of Federal Reserve?

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The measure now has support from Rep. Barney Frank.

Rep. Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, has endorsed a bill calling for an audit of the Federal Reserve.

The support from the powerful Massachusetts Democrat comes after the measure, introduced in late February by Rep. Ron Paul, has won hundreds of co-sponsors on both sides of the aisle.

Frank’s office had previously declined to comment on the bill, which had been idling in his committee for months, but the congressman publicly backed it when pressed on the issue at a recent town hall meeting held during Congress‘ month-long summer recess.

“We will subject them to a complete audit,” Frank said, explaining that he has been working with Paul, a Texas Republican, on the bill and expects it to pass as part of a broader financial regulatory overhaul in October.

Frank said he and Paul are working to make sure the audit does not appear as if it would influence policy.

“We don’t want to have the audit appear as if it is influencing monetary policy, because that would be inflationary,” Frank said.

He said the audit would make public a list of what the Federal Reserve “buys and sells” but that such information would be released several months after the fact, so as not to affect the markets.

An audit would provide some transparency and would be a good thing.  The bill calls for a first audit by the end of next year.

“I think it’s the financial crisis obviously that’s drawing so much attention to it, and people want to know more about the Federal Reserve,” Paul told FOXNews.com, warning about the consequences of continuing to give the body more authority. “If they give them a lot more power and there’s no more transparency, that’ll be a disaster. “

The bill would call for the comptroller general in the Government Accountability Office to audit the Fed and report those findings to Congress. The first audit would be ordered by the end of 2010.

The GAO’s ability to conduct such audits now is severely restricted.  (Source: Frank says House will likely approve audit of Federal Reserve – Fox News)

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Erpenbach not running for Governor

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One less contender on the Democrat side in the Wisconsin governor’s race.

Democrat Jon Erpenbach will not run for governor and will instead seek re-election to the state senate.

With Gov. Jim Doyle not seeking re-election, Erpenbach, of Waunakee, had considered a run for the office. But Erpenbach said he would be unable to commit to it fully because he needs to spend time with his two teenage children.

“It’s going to be huge,” Erpenbach said of the 2010 governor’s race. “This is going to take a tremendous amount of national attention from both sides and it’s going to take someone who can be extremely focused and not have other issues that they’re going to be dealing with.” (Source: Waunakee’s Erpenbach says he won’t run for governor – Wisconsin State Journal)

It’s still early but at this point only Lt. Governor Barbara Lawton has committed on the Dem’s side in what is a wide-open race.

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