URPBPA LEGISLATIVE ALERT
Please Forward to ALL your California Friends and Relatives
Next Monday, August 15, at 1:00PM the California Assembly will be voting on AR-18.  ALL 
Californians should call, email and fax our California State Assemblymen before Monday 
and ask that they vote in favor of AR-18.  The AFA will be lobbying Sacramento Thursday, 
Friday and Monday and they have said that our calls, emails and faxes will help them 
considerably.
 This resolution if passed will call on the U.S. Congress to support federal legislation calling for a 
six-month moratorium on pension plan terminations as Proposed by Congressman Miller in H.R. 
2327.
 H.R. 2327 has been stalled in committee and if AR-18 is passed it would show Congress that the 
State of California is in favor of passing pension relief legislation.  As you recall, United Airlines 
lobbied heavily against this bill in Sacramento in July before the Assembly’s summer break.  We 
need to show our support for this resolution and neutralize United’s lobbying efforts. 
You can look up your California Assembly member and his contact info at: 
 http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/yourleg.html
We had a tremendous response in July, please continue your effort now, we need to have this bill 
passed.  Here is a copy of AR-18 if you have not seen it:
 BILL NUMBER: HR 18  - Relative to airline industry employees' 
retirement benefits. JUNE 30, 2005
INTRODUCED BY   Assembly Member Mullin    (Coauthors: Assembly Members 
Coto, Jerome Horton, Jones, Karnette, Leno, Levine, Torrico, and Yee) 
    WHEREAS, United Airlines has used the bankruptcy court to default 
on its pension obligations, leaving thousands of United Airlines 
employees and retirees to face retirement with dramatically reduced 
pensions they worked decades to earn; and 
    WHEREAS, It appears that by placing their pensions in a trust 
outside the scope of the bankruptcy proceedings, only certain 
executives at United Airlines had their pensions protected; and
   WHEREAS, United Airlines executives have yet to fulfill their 
promise to return $100 million a year in concessions to help the 
irline, but have nevertheless proceeded to make new and deeper cuts to 
their employees' financial security; and
    WHEREAS, As part of the bankruptcy proceedings, United Airlines 
will undergo restructuring based in large part upon wage and benefits 
concessions from the line workers of United Airlines; and
   WHEREAS, In the fall of 2004, when plans by United Airlines to 
dissolve its employees' pensions became clear, Representative George 
Miller, Representative Janice Schakowsky, and Senator Edward Kennedy 
were joined by 113 other Congressional Representatives and 22 Senators 
in urging the airline not to terminate the employees' retirement 
security; and
   WHEREAS, While United Airlines was negotiating with employee 
representatives regarding wage and benefits packages, it was 
simultaneously brokering an arrangement with the Pension Benefit 
Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) that would result in the termination of all 
employee pension plans; and 
   WHEREAS, Despite a legislative request that it not seek to terminate 
its pension obligations, United Airlines continued to pursue such a 
termination through a request to the bankruptcy court to eliminate its 
pension obligations and have the PBGC, a government agency, assume the 
airline's pension obligations; and  
   WHEREAS, The PBGC was created by the Employee Retirement Income 
Security Act of 1974 to encourage the continuation and maintenance of 
voluntary private pension plans, provide timely and uninterrupted 
payment of pension benefits, and keep pension insurance premiums at a 
minimum; and  
   WHEREAS, Representatives Miller and Schakowsky sought leave to file 
an amicus brief with the bankruptcy court asking the judge to examine 
whether United Airlines' request to be relieved of its pension 
obligations was necessary in order to emerge from bankruptcy or whether 
the request was merely an attempt to evade its responsibilities under 
the collective bargaining agreement, but their motion was denied; and  
   WHEREAS, United Airlines' employees already have agreed to over $3 
billion in cuts to wages and benefits to assist the airline in emerging 
from bankruptcy; and  
   WHEREAS, Federal legislation introduced by Representative Miller 
calls for a six-month moratorium during which companies currently in 
bankruptcy would be prohibited from shifting billion-dollar pension 
debts to the government, and this provision would be retroactive to 
encompass United Airlines employees; and  
   WHEREAS, This legislation would provide Congress with additional 
time to formulate a solution to this pension crisis and prevent it from 
worsening and devastating the lives of tens of thousands of American 
workers; and 
   WHEREAS, Federal legislation, also introduced by Representative 
Miller, would prohibit a company from making payments into the 
executive pension plan if the workers' pension plans are under-funded 
and would require companies that ask bankruptcy courts to erase their 
debt to rank-and-file pension plans to first reveal the status of their 
executive pension plans to ensure parity in how employees and 
executives are treated; now, therefore, be it 
   Resolved by the Assembly of the State of California, That the 
Assembly respectfully requests the President and Congress of the United 
States to declare their support for, and to enact, federal legislation 
that would aid in the protection of hard-earned retirement benefits for 
all non-executive and non-management employees in the airline industry; 
and be it further
   Resolved, That the Chief Clerk of the Assembly transmit copies of 
this resolution to the author for appropriate distribution.