IN RE: DIANE ANSELMO and HOFFA UNITY SLATE,
Protest Decision 2001 EAD 299
Issued: April 9, 2001
OEA Case Nos. PR031314MW and PR031412MW
Diane Anselmo, a member of Local 2000, filed a pre-election protest pursuant to Article XIII, Section 2(b) of the Rules for the 2000-2001 IBT International Union Delegate and Officer Election ("Rules"). She alleges that Local 2000 member and vendor Jose Ibarra improperly used union resources in violation of Article XI, Section 1(b)(6) of the Rules. The Hoffa Unity slate's pre-election protest, which its representative characterized as a supplement to the Anselmo protest, alleges that Ibarra has solicited and received funds from non-IBT members to send campaign literature via e-mail, and that Ibarra has not complied with the CCER provisions of the Rules governing financial reporting by independent committees.
Election Administrator representatives Laurie Schwefel and Michael Nicholson investigated the protest.
Findings of Fact and Analysis
1. Ibarra is a Northwest Airlines ("NWA") flight attendant. In 1998, Ibarra was retained by Local 2000, the representative of the NWA flight attendants, to establish a bulk e-mail system for the local. He completed this task in 1998, and ceased providing services to the local for this purpose at that time. Since a new administration was elected at Local 2000 in December 2000, Ibarra has again been providing services to the local concerning e-mail and other computer matters.
Ibarra is a union activist. As part of his activism, he maintains his own bulk e-mail list. Attached to the protest are e-mails sent by Ibarra in March 2001 that solicit support and campaign contributions for certain Local 2000 delegate candidates. These e-mails are campaign contributions, and are governed by the provisions of the Rules concerning such contributions. Ibarra sent the messages to those on his personal bulk e-mail list.
Anselmo alleges that Ibarra has improperly used Local 2000 resources by copying e-mail addresses from the e-mail list he developed for the local union onto his personal bulk e-mail list. As proof of this, she points to the fact that a number of individuals who have received Ibarra's personal e-mails never gave their e-mail addresses to Ibarra. From this, she concludes that Ibarra must have supplemented his own list with Local 2000's bulk e-mail list.
Further, the investigation revealed that a hyperlink exists on Local 2000's website that can be used to send e-mails to Local 2000's executive board, and that this hyperlink contains a link to Ibarra's personal e-mail address. Ibarra thus receives copies of e-mails to the Local 2000 executive board, each of which contains the sender's e-mail address. Ibarra says that his address is on the website hyperlink in order to allow him to perform his current functions with respect to the local's website and bulk e-mail list, and that he does not place the e-mail addresses of those sending e-mails to the executive board on his personal bulk e-mail list.
Ibarra says that he has never copied e-mail addresses from the Local 2000 bulk e-mail list onto his own bulk e-mail list. To test this claim, we asked Ibarra to provide our investigators with a print-out of his bulk e-mail list, which we then compared to the list maintained by Local 2000. That examination showed that the Local 2000 list was significantly larger than Ibarra's list, and that it contained a large number of addresses that were not on Ibarra's list.
Further, in response to the protestor's claim that Ibarra may have obtained the Local 2000 list he originally helped develop in 1998, our investigator spoke with Alexander Huff, the former president of Air, Ltd., the entity that owned the server on which the local union's mailing list was maintained during the period in 1998 when Ibarra developed the list for the local. Huff advised that the e-mail addresses on the local union's bulk e-mail list were not viewable except by accessing the database on the Air, Ltd. server. According to Huff, neither Ibarra nor any other person or entity was ever granted access to the server for this or any other reason.
Finally, we examined e-mails sent to the Local 2000 executive board via the hyperlink on the website discussed above. The e-mail addresses of the majority of those responding via the hyperlink were not on Ibarra's e-mail list.
All of the above is consistent with Ibarra's position as stated to our investigator: that he has not taken e-mail addresses from Local 2000's e-mail list and placed those names on his own list, a list he concededly uses for campaign purposes, and that he has instead collected e-mail addresses from those who have sent e-mails to his personal account, as well as e-mail addresses of third parties provided to him by NWA co-workers and others. Nothing found in our investigation supports Anselmo's claim that Ibarra improperly took e-mail addresses from Local 2000, and thus improperly used union resources to support candidates in elections governed by the Rules. We accordingly DENY Anselmo's protest.
2. We also find insufficient evidence that Ibarra has violated the reporting or other provisions of the Rules by raising or expending funds to support his bulk e-mail campaign activities. Definition 22 of the Rules defines "independent committee" as "any person or entity not controlled by a candidate or slate who/which has accepted any campaign contribution, as defined by these Rules, or who/which has made any expenditure, where the purpose, object or foreseeable effect of the contribution or expenditure is to influence the election of International Officer candidates." Article XI, Section 2(a)(3) requires the filing of CCERs by independent committees when either the amount of campaign donations received or campaign expenditures made exceeds $1,000.
The Hoffa Unity slate points to Ibarra's March 8, 2001 mailing, in which he admits receipt of donations to subsidize his bulk e-mail activities. Since Ibarra's e-mails are addressed in part to the election of International officer candidates, he would be required to file CCERs as an independent committee if and when the amount of his campaign expenditures made or campaign donations received reaches the $1,000 independent committee reporting threshold established by Article XI, Section 2(a)(3) of the Rules. Neither have to this date reached that level. If either does, Ibarra must file a CCER as an independent committee.
Further, our investigation revealed that the contributions received by Ibarra to date have been limited to contributions from IBT members.
Accordingly, we also DENY the Hoffa Unity slate protest.
Any interested party not satisfied with this determination may request a hearing before the Election Appeals Master within two (2) working days of receipt of this decision. The parties are reminded that, absent extraordinary circumstances, no party may rely upon evidence that was not presented to the Office of the Election Administrator in any such appeal. Requests for a hearing shall be made in writing, shall specify the basis for the appeal, and shall be served upon:
Kenneth Conboy
Election Appeals Master
Latham & Watkins
Suite 1000
885 Third Avenue
New York, New York 10022
Fax: 212-751-4864
Copies of the request for hearing must be served upon all other parties, as well as upon the Election Administrator for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 727 15th Street NW, Tenth Floor, Washington, DC 20005 (fax: 202-454-1501), all within the time prescribed above. A copy of the protest must accompany the request for hearing.
William A. Wertheimer, Jr.
William A. Wertheimer, Jr.
Election Administrator
cc: Kenneth Conboy
2001 EAD 299
DISTRIBUTION LIST (BY AIRBORNE EXPRESS):
Patrick Szymanski
IBT General Counsel
25 Louisiana Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20001
Bradley T. Raymond
Finkel, Whitefield, Selik,
Raymond, Ferrara & Feldman
32300 Northwestern Highway
Suite 200
Farmington Hills, MI 48334
J. Douglas Korney
Korney & Heldt
30700 Telegraph Road
Suite 1551
Bingham Farms, MI 48025
Barbara Harvey
Penobscot Building
Suite 1800
645 Griswold
Detroit, MI 48226
Betty Grdina
Yablonski, Both & Edelman
Suite 800
1140 Connecticut Ave. NW
Washington, D.C. 20036
Tom Leedham
c/o Stefan Ostrach
110 Mayfair
Eugene, OR 97404
IBT Local 2000
2850 Metro Drive
Suite 225
Bloomington, MN 55425
Diane Anselmo
5300 Windsor Avenue
Edina, MN 55436
Jose Ibarra
939 14th Street
San Francisco, CA 94114
Todd Thompson
209 Pennsylvania Ave. SE
Washington, DC 20003
Laurie Schwefel
7807 West Verona Court
Milwaukee, WI 53219
Dennis Sarsany
1829 Eddy Street
Chicago, IL 60657