Stay Classy Teamsters Local 727

[worldwide]

Teamsters ordered to stop picketing funeral homes

A judge ordered one of Chicago's most politically powerful labor unions to suspend picketing against 16 funeral homes last week after receiving reports that striking Teamsters had, among other things, disturbed a child's funeral.

SCI Illinois Services, Inc., one of the nation's largest funeral home chains, asked a district court to intervene after striking funeral directors and drivers with Teamsters Local 727 allegedly harassed grieving families.

"We are grateful that the court agreed to issue this temporary restraining order, and we are hopeful that it will help protect grieving families who are experiencing the most difficult times of their lives," Larry Michael, managing director for SCI Illinois Services, Inc., said in a release. "While we recognize and respect the Teamsters' right to lawfully picket, we have been shocked and saddened by their attempts to make grieving families the target of the cruel and outrageous attacks."

The company testified in its filing that union members blocked grieving family members from leaving its parking lot, used bullhorns to shout obscenities at workers and mourners, and unleashed a German Shepard on a dead woman's daughter and husband.

The funeral home was eventually forced to call the police when picketers allegedly disrupted a child's funeral with laughter. The officer asked the Teamsters to leave, but protesters returned when he drove away.

Union members walked out of SCI funeral homes after heated negotiations because the company asked to cut its ties to the Teamsters pension fund. The company filed a racketeering lawsuit against the union in 2011 alleging that it tried to illegally boost SCI’s pension contributions to the pension fund. After confronting the union with the information, union members allegedly vandalized three SCI funeral homes.

Teamsters Ordered to Stop Picketing Funeral Homes | Washington Free Beacon

 

[Harry Manback]

Wow, that's right on up there with Westboro Baptist Church.

 

[Anonymous 10]

I bet TOS endorses this

 

[superballs63]

If i'm at a funeral and you try to block me from leaving, I WILL drive over you, my truck is bigger than you.

@holes

 

[HubBub]

I see nothing in the article but the company's allegations. Also, they weren't ordered to stop picketing, they were ordered not to threaten or block people coming and going. Maybe some people were being idiots, but this article is crap.

 

[worldwide]

I see nothing in the article but the company's allegations. Also, they weren't ordered to stop picketing, they were ordered not to threaten or block people coming and going. Maybe some people were being idiots, but this article is crap.

Agreed, this is only the news article but the Teamsters have not come out with their version of their side. There are pictures online of local 727 picketing outside a funeral home so it is a fact that occured. It's not too much of a stretch to envision some members being, as you said, idiots. The only thing I saw online was that a Teamsters spokesman denied the allegations but I wonder how/why a judge had to order them to stop doing something they claim they weren’t doing in the first place?

The appellate court ordered the Teamsters on July 25 to “refrain from conveying any actual or veiled threats against any person, also, refrain from obstructing, hindering, impeding or blocking any person’s entry to or exit from any funeral site or any facility containing a funeral site.”

Regardless, even staging a quiet picket line outside a funeral home during a funeral is the epitome of low rent. You can have differences over a contract but there is a time and place for everything and outside a funeral home is neither.

The Teamsters have been on strike since July 1 after rejecting the company’s offer of nine percent raises for all union members over the next two years.

 

[East coast navy]

If this happened. It would have been the top of the nation news. I'm not buying all of it. Might be some picketing, but a dog. Come on sounds like a company playing hard ball to me.

 

[PiedmontSteward]

Agreed, this is only the news article but the Teamsters have not come out with their version of their side. There are pictures online of local 727 picketing outside a funeral home so it is a fact that occured. It's not too much of a stretch to envision some members being, as you said, idiots. The only thing I saw online was that a Teamsters spokesman denied the allegations but I wonder how/why a judge had to order them to stop doing something they claim they weren’t doing in the first place?

The appellate court ordered the Teamsters on July 25 to “refrain from conveying any actual or veiled threats against any person, also, refrain from obstructing, hindering, impeding or blocking any person’s entry to or exit from any funeral site or any facility containing a funeral site.”

Regardless, even staging a quiet picket line outside a funeral home during a funeral is the epitome of low rent. You can have differences over a contract but there is a time and place for everything and outside a funeral home is neither.

The Teamsters have been on strike since July 1 after rejecting the company’s offer of nine percent raises for all union members over the next two years.

I believe they have every right to picket outside a funeral home unless an actual service is on-going. We haven't heard the local's side of the story and this has been making its round on right-wing sites for the last few days.

 

[East coast navy]

I believe they have every right to picket outside a funeral home unless an actual service is on-going. We haven't heard the local's side of the story and this has been making its round on right-wing sites for the last few days.

I agree. It's wrong to do while a service is going on. But any good union worker at that service would feel their pain. I would.

 

[stink219]

You mean to tell me that public opinion may not be on the side of the strikers on this?

 

[Wally]

Well, with the judges orders and the "body of evidence", I guess you could say this is a "dead issue"! Will there be "stiff" penalty's if they don't obey? Close the lid on this one...

 

[hondo]

Funeral Industry Giant SCI Committed Unfair Labor Practices, Labor Board Says | International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT)

Funeral Industry Giant SCI Committed Unfair Labor Practices, Labor Board Says


September 27, 2013 Chicago Region of the NLRB Plans To Dismiss All Charges Filed Against Union


(Chicago) — Region 13 of the National Labor Relations Board has found merit in several unfair labor practice charges filed against funeral industry giant Service Corporation International (SCI), which has locked out 59 funeral directors and drivers at 16 Chicago-area funeral homes.
The Regional Director of the Board also intends to dismiss each and every frivolous charge filed against Teamsters Local 727 by the company.

 

[Ouch]

Im not buying all of it either. On that note union or not you have to be human. I mean there comes a time when you have to choose right from wrong and having a lack of respect for the deceased and there loved ones is wrong. There comes a time in life where you have to askyourself, is this right?

 

[hondo]

Funeral Giant SCI Continues Mistreatment Of Chicago-Area Workers
http://teamster.org/news/2014/07/funeral-giant-sci-continues-mistreatment-chicago-area-workers

In its most recent proposal — which it refuses to give to the union in writing — the company is demanding to:

• Eradicate job security
• Significantly limit authority of the arbitrator in any disciplinary decision
• Dismantle seniority rights
• Eliminate guaranteed employment for full-time drivers
• Retain unilateral ability to slash health care benefits at the company’s discretion