https://www.change.org/p/reform-railroad-retirement-system
11 replies (most recent on top)
@vm I think you're missing the point here. Just because Vena wasn't hired until this date, does not in any way mean that his influence wasn't a contributing factor in the layoffs before his official hiring. How many calls do you suppose were made to Vena in regards to PSR strategies? How hard do you think it would be to dig up those calls. How hard do you think it would be to dig up emails between Fritz, Vena, and possibly other executives before his official hiring. You have to remember that Fritz publicly stated in a townhall session that the UP would not be doing PSR because he stated very clearly that "it seemed to only benefit the shareholders!" Then unsurprisingly a short time later, the UP started down the PSR path and that was in 2017. Then about two years later, Fritz announced that he was bringing in a "veteran of PSR" and the spawn from he11 Vena himself was at the UP making very large personnel cuts. This is all very easy to find information by the way. The townhall I'm referencing was made in January of 2017 I believe, so go check that out if you can. Once the cuts were made, the railroad business went to sh!t in a hurry, Vena had left to Arizona to be on the board of directors for FedEx, and Fritz for the remainder of his time was trying to correct the problems that were caused by Vena and his decisions made at the UP. So in a nutshell, Vena may not have been there physically but he was in fact the biggest influence on the UP going down the PSR path of destruction. Fritz is the one that paid for Venas mistakes with his job. I'm not defending Fritz, but he was at least trying to correct the problems that Vena caused before he was removed by the board in favor of Vena. If you don't believe that, then ask why Soroban got rid of their UP shares? Soroban is the one that wanted Vena there very badly, but then sold off all of their shares a short time later? Ok why? Vena and PSR is the root of every problem at the UP. Vena will always be haunted by PSR. Any railroad that attempted PSR, had someone very familiar with Vena at their company. Just an idea, but try having more than just dates when presenting an argument on here. Having actual facts of current and past events will help when making points. Youre not going to please everyone, but a rational people tend to not argue when a good point has been made. On another note, is the name calling really necessary? There's really no need for that.
@vm hope this helps....
https://www.railwayage.com/freight/former-cn-ops-chief-vena-new-coo-of-union-pacific/
@ne You’re a dum--ss. PSR was started in October 2018 BEFORE Vena was hired. The 10,000 cuts associated with it occurred in October 2018. And were effective Nov 1 2018.
For the record, Vena WAS here when the biggest majority of the jobs were lost. Fritz became the CEO in 2015 and Vena showed up in 2019. Do you really believe that Vena wasn't an influence on Fritz before that? Fritz started cutting jobs as soon as he became the CEO, although in much smaller increments. Vena showed up and there was massive cuts systemwide. Now that he's the CEO, he has to be very careful. He just can't do massive cuts like before. In other words, he painted himself into a corner. He can't do massive cuts like before because of the government hearings that were triggered by them. Now you have this whole merger BS that's starting to fall apart because of the merger application that got denied and the continued stock price thats dropping. Sorry but Vena was around when all of the cuts took place. There's no way that the cuts at the UP weren't influenced by him. The other thing to remember with all of this is that Fritz wasn't asked to leave. He was forced out by Soroban. Fritz was trying to correct the problems at the UP due to the PSR dumpster fire! Soroban took exception to it and got rid of him for Vena. He was fired for doing what was right for the company, and not the investors!
@md Vena became COO in 2019, so yes he was around. And he immediately implemented PSR and the cuts associated with it. Vena made cuts until the operating ratio touched 55%, took his bonus and left. Then when Fritz was asked to leave a couple of years later, Vena came back as CEO and resumed his mission.
@ev For the record, Vena was not here when those 10,000 jobs were eliminated. It was Fritz.
I think the best word to get out would be for all that have been affected Vena and his so-called PSR scheme to voice their frustrations on any social media that they have available. Let their words be heard about what the UP is really like, so just maybe those words will get to the ones responsible for coordinating the merger efforts for the UP. Don't make anything easier for Vena by staying quiet, while he continues to eliminate jobs.
@bd Good idea! This is only the beginning. We need to get the word out there for the whole nation to see.
@d0 Tell that to the 10,000 people Vena eliminated. They should have “paid their dues” instead of getting their jobs eliminated. They all had dreams of a 30+ career when they started. Vena had other plans.
No thanks… Pay your dues like the rest of us are having to and have done for generations. In an age where the social security retirement age is increasing, automation is ki-ling jobs and power hungry politicians are greedily exploiting any pile of money they can get their hands on, the railroad retirement system is generous enough. Watering down requirements will only jeopardize its solvency.
Sounds good, but let’s also add that you are fully vested and can start collecting full retirement at 60 if you have your 60 months. Let’s try to help those lives were forced to be changed by this Vena PSR scheme.