WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden has named Ira F. Jaffe to chair the three-member Presidential Emergency Board addressing the rail labor dispute, Reuters reports.
Also named to the board were Boston College professor David Twomey and independent arbitrator Barbara C. Deinhardt.
Jaffe has served on five previous emergency boards — four involving rail disputes and one involving the airline industry — and has been selected for those boards by Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He works full time as an arbitrator and mediator, having presided over more than 4,500 disputes; serves on more than 60 permanent panels, including several involving government service; and is an Adjunct Professor at George Washington University Law School.
Twomey has served on nine emergency boards, having been named by five Presidents: Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. He has also served as an arbitrator for contract disputes involving CSX Transportation and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen; Norfolk Southern and BLET; CSX Transportation and SMART-TD (the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers-Transportation Division), and Union Pacific and SMART-TD.
Deinhardt’s background includes three terms on the Foreign Service Grievance Board, a period as chair of the New York State Employment Relations Board, and time as the chair of the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board.
The panel has 30 days beginning today to investigate the dispute between unions and railroads and make recommendations for a settlement. After that, there is a 30-day cooling off period for two sides to try to reach an agreement based on those recommendations.
Need to know their track record for how they voted before with all the peb they have been on. Not sure if it will be union favorable as many talk. Never has been beneficial for us that work on the rails. The company continues to get wealthy as we continue to grind and lose out.
Being a BLE retiree I been thru the circus too many times, union leadership has different priority the those on the road
Not only lacking diversity, but their resumes read like they have the actual working knowledge and experience to deal with both the railroads and the unions!
someone messed up , appointing those with actual historical railroad labor relations experience not those selected for the “diversity” checklist nonstarters