MAST, KCFD and why Unions need CPR

Local reports have had a hard time relaying all of the tension involved in the recent vote that kept Firefighters Local 42 as the union for MAST employees.

The International Association of Firefighters absorbed MAST workers a year and a half ago.

For the most part it's a boring story that's only exciting when someone gets a beatdown while electioneering too fervently but to an outsider it may suggest that the overall downhill slide (membership, influence and revenues) of Unions is apparent even at the local level . . . The fact that MAST workers weren't able to hold on to their own Union clearly isn't a good sign if the three or four pissed of e-mails I've received are any indication. Their point is well taken: MAST has a different culture, identity and history than the KCFD so they need their own representation but the sad fact is that even in a Union town there is little support for that kind of thinking or yet another Union for the city to negotiate with . . .