Courage to Speak Truth

ODOT Local 730 members in South Eastern Oregon stood together against a bully boss and prevailed. Transportation Maintenance Specialists from the Jordan Valley and Basque Station crews had the courage to speak up when a new manager arrived and failed to treat them with common respect. The new manager who was still in the probationary period eventually returned to his prior position.

Crew members reported that from the first day he made it clear that he was friends with several layers of management and would not be removed from this job. He attempted to intimidate these employees by taking them for one on one drives in his agency assigned pick-up to tell them how it was ‘going to be’. They were warned not to go talking to the Union, “if they thought they had problems now, just talk to the Union”. Nor were they to talk to their friends in Safety. During one of several one on one drives, a member was told that the agency was looking to decrease the size of the crew by one or more positions. This employee was warned that a person talking to the Union could be ‘downsized‘.

These Union Members chose to unite and showed the courage to stand up to this intimidation. With the help of the Burns Maintenance Crew shop steward, Tom McCulloch, TMS2, and SEIU 503, OPEU Bend area organizer Sara Routt, these folks found their voice and clarified their concerns. They talked with the District Manager and made these concerns known. The District Manager made several trips to the area to hear these employees, on all shifts.


There has been a discussion on this blog of Member Organizing. This is a good example. These folks of the Owyhee Watershed reached out to other ODOT Local 730 Members and the Union. When an attempt was made to divide them they chose to talk to each other and had the courage to speak to the upline manager. It is that simple. These members understood better than anyone what their issues were and they worked to resolve them. My hat is off to them.

This same kind of work is being done in other places around our agency. In the opposite corner of the state, the North Coast highway maintenance workers on several crews have raised concerns about decisions being made and apparent agency policy violations for several years. These members felt that they were not being heard or taken seriously. When they could not get help locally they reached outside the area and brought their concerns to Salem.

It was not easy. Several of their issues had been on-going for years. Some of the crew members were not comfortable talking about them. They did not like it, but they wanted to just get the work done and go home. Crews had been divided by rumors and stories told by managers. Some did not talk to each other when they saw each other in the grocery store.

Again, these crews reached out to the Union and other ODOT Local 730 Members. Local 730 officers Bart Cotta, Statewide Chief Steward and Kermit Meling, Vice President, along with SEIU 503 organizers Colleen Sullivan and Troy Barnardt helped them clarify what the issues were. Bart asked them to think about what they wanted the future to look like. Keep a record of the past but Look to the Future.

There is currently an audit taking place in this region. Change is coming.

Oregon is our State. ODOT is our agency. Sometimes it takes courage to take responsibility for our worksites. Our brother and sisters in these areas have shown us how.
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