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Court orders new Retirement Board election Local 18 won a huge victory last month when Superior Court Judge Dzintra I. Janavs granted our petition to void last year’s Retirement Board election and ordered that a new election be held. You will remember that the election was for three seats on the Retirement Board, which manages the assets of the fund and is responsible for the secure future of each and every member. Local 18 represents the overwhelming majority of plan members, and yet none of our three candidates won a seat on the board. We suspected that there had been irregularities, and further investigation showed that a significant number of members had never been given the opportunity to vote, that some members’ votes had not been counted, and that the secrecy of the ballot was not respected. The City Attorney investigated our claims and reported to the Board of Water and Power Commissioners that our claims were valid. The Board still refused to call a new election. At that point we took the issue to court. “The evidence in this action is overwhelming that there were serious fundamental irregularities in the election process,” Judge Janavs wrote. “No reasonable person could conclude otherwise. The evidence also indicates that the margin between losers and winners was so small that the outcome of the election may have been affected.” When we first decided to challenge the elections, we were ridiculed by MEA and EAA leaders. One told us that we were “a bunch of whiners too stupid to vote.” The judge disagreed: “Active contributing members of the Plan were disenfranchised by the choices made. In the absence of a showing that the outcome of the election was not affected, the election must be declared null and void.” We fought to have our members’ democratic rights restored, and we won. Now it’s up to the membership to use their right and make sure they are represented on the Retirement Board. In Unity, BRIAN D’ARCY, Business Manager ps: Since the judge’s decision, the City Attorney has filed exceptions to our proposed order, and the President of the Commission is threatening to appeal. Apparently, none of the elite believe in democracy, at least when it comes to members of Local 18. |