Q: How did the GCIU originally come to merge with the Teamsters Union?
A: In 2004, the GCIU was faced with dwindling membership as a result of plant closures. North America’s last dedicated publishing and printing union was down to only 70,000 members and GCIU President George Tedeschi decided to merge with the IBT and agreed to a merger agreement with Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa. The merger and merger agreement was put to a vote of the GCIU membership and a majority of the 35,500 members who voted approved the merger and merger agreement. On January 1, 2005, the merger between the GCIU and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters took effect.
At the time Tedeschi said, “We know that by becoming an IBT conference, the GCIU will have a powerful new alliance for organizing and negotiating decent wages and benefits for our members.”
Q: What was the result of the merger?
A: As part of the Merger Agreement, the Graphic Communications Conference (“GCC”) was created as part of the IBT. Tedeschi — and later GCC President Kurt Freeman — ran the GCC conference. The IBT agreed to allow the GCC was to keep the GCC Teamsters dues monies in order to provide resources for the GCC to grow. But Tedeschi and Freeman never took advantage of the power of the Teamsters, either politically or for the purpose of organizing new members. As a result, the GCC continued its decline financially and organizationally leaving it with less than 17,000 dues-paying members today.
When Teamsters General President Sean M. O’Brien took office last year, he sought information on why the GCC Conference was so weak and ineffective. What he found was disturbing. Instead of focusing on improving membership, it had a pension in crisis and no strategies to counter rapidly consolidating industries. Freeman and his cronies were literally missing in action.
Q: Why did Kurt Freeman decide to terminate the merger agreement with the Teamsters?
A: Freeman and his expensive D.C. legal team reacted negatively when they were called to account by Teamster leaders for standing idly by while the GCC conference hemorrhaged members, money, and influence in the industry. The critical and declining state of the GCC demanded changes, but Freeman and his team were apparently only concerned with maintaining their salaries and control of the GCC treasury.
Freeman wanted to maintain the status quo and not make any changes to the GCC, so, immediately following the close of an arbitration hearing on May 19, 2023 and even before briefs were filed or a decision issued by the Arbitrator, the GCC unilaterally withdrew an order requiring the Merger Agreement that created the GCC to stay in effect and then declared, in writing to General President O’Brien, that the Merger Agreement had been terminated. The reason for the GCC’s actions were obvious; approximately 1,500 members of GCC Locals in Boston, New York, Iowa and Montreal had already voted to directly affiliated with the IBT under the Merger Agreement. That’s why the GCC terminated thew Merger Agreement on May 19, 2023.
Q: Were GCC members allowed to vote on terminating the Merger Agreement with the Teamsters?
A: No, GCC members were denied their democratic right to vote on terminating the Merger Agreement. Unlike when the GCC membership were all allowed to vote on the merger and Merger Agreement with the Teamsters in 2004, members were denied the right in 2023 to decide whether the Merger Agreement should have been terminated.
Q: If the GCC is no longer part of the Teamsters, what’s the GCC’s future?
A: Freeman and his cronies rushed to change the name of the GCC to the “PPPWU.” They have already planned a convention in Las Vegas at the Flamingo Casino on August 28-31 where a small group will attempt to create this new union with the same leadership team. This new “PPPWU” union has no money, will provide no services to members, and will continue its decline as Freeman and his crew wring every last dollar out of its modest treasury. It is clear that the GCC is incapable of surviving on its own. Once they rename your union, they will obviously attempt to shop your organization around for another merger partner.
Q: What can GCC members do to stop this power grab and change the direction of the GCC?
A: Sign authorization and membership cards when asked to do so by IBT Organizers. This will permit the IBT to file a petition with the NLRB to allow you to vote for IBT representation with your employer.