My True and Actual Position Upon the Current Meter Rate Proposal

While doing my "turn" yesterday I encountered a long-time taxi colleague who made mention that drivers were upset with me.  This all stems from my "yes" vote for the increase during a taxi advisory commission special session.  Given both the animosity and anger associated with that action it appears that I must add even more clarification upon what appears to be a very confusing subject.  My one request relates to any lease-drivers or single owners reading this is to refer all and anyone interesting in the L&I issue and the meter increase to this particular posting and to the many others addressing this subject and topic.

To all those who don't know, the proposed meter increase is all about Labor & Industry's goal of having all lease-drivers (independent contractors) seen as what they describe as "covered workers" hence a kind of employee which means that they (you and me) should be covered and insured beneath the L&I coverage "umbrella."  Got that? This is extremely important to note, because this is the SOLE reason why a meter increase is being proposed, the increase part of a mandated imposition of L&I coverage stemming from the passage of HB 1367.  If you don't know what L&I insurance overage is please read on as I about to tell you.

As far as I know, all states within the Republics' grand total of 50 all have some version of Labor& Industry insurance providing protection for all workers or employees actively engaged at their version of a workplace. The theory is that the logger who has a limb bonk him upon the head or the hospital nurse slipping upon an urine covered floor will receive prorated wages and any and all cost that is related to the injury which could include medical and rehabilitation and other types of fees.  Before this kind of work site protection existed, an injured or killed worker received nothing whatsoever in compensation.  L&I insurance is designed to protect the worker and his/her family.  Sounds like a good program, doesn't it?

Currently in our local industry lease drivers are considered to be independent contractors responsible for all their costs in the same way any business owner would be.  This is key to note because we appear to have a problem of definition when applied to the various government entitles.  The City of Seattle requires us to have business licenses and report our wages as independent business owners.  L&I is saying that despite that, we are actually some version of employee.  The problem in part stems from the reality that nearly none of the 3000 plus lease drivers (including myself) have created their own L&I account as any wise business owner would.  As I pointed out in my Friday meeting in Olympia, not once have I been contacted by L&I to suggest setting up my own account.  Certainly no one suggested that when I obtained my first taxi for-hire license back in 1987.  In part that makes the current L&I demands so curious.  If they are so interested in us being covered, why haven't they done the obvious beginning at least 25 years ago?  They don't appear to have a legitimate response to that glaring ommission.  Instead they say it is all the associations and companies fault, which is where we are now.  Over the past few years, huge monetary assessments have been placed against taxi associations large and small.  L&I has become the classroom bully, change your policies or I will bloody your nose.  L&I has big bureaucratic fists.  They can really beat you up.

HB 1367 for better or probably worse, was an industry response to this threat.  Without consulting the lease-drivers, the state-wide industry led by Seattle & King County taxi associations wrote the bill and had it passed.  The cost was compromised to the cost per car as opposed to per individual.  The bill states that the cost will be shared between owner and driver.  This is where the meter rates and the subsequent lease rates increases come in.  Yes, if all this goes through, you the lease driver will be paying a higher daily rate.  Did you know that?  And do you want L&I insurance protection?  Starting from day one of this year 2012 you have been  covered by L&I.  Did you know that and do you want L&I protection to continue?  These are vital questions, which brings me to my own position both as a driver and taxi advisory commission member.  Just what is my position?  Here it is.

I am opposed to Washington State government imposing their will upon the workers of the local and statewide taxi industry.  If a given company or association has a traditional employer/employer relationship then by all means there should be mandatory L&I coverage.  Beyond that, no, the State of Washington should not be mandating that independent business operators have to have L&I coverage. If we are stupid and don't understand the need for this kind of protection, then it is our own fault and responsibility.  Along with that, if we all injured on the job, then we CAN NOT apply for L&I insurance that we have not signed up for.  This is key because injured drivers and the hospitals serving them have applied for L&I benefits when they were not applicable.   You can not sign up after the fact.  And I blame L&I for having paid those erroneous claims.  No one forced them to pay the claims.  L&I did it voluntarily.  How is that OUR responsibility?  I don't understand that position.

My position is simple.  HB 1367 should be repealed and dissolved. All audits should be cancelled.  In turn statewide all industry workers should be notified that it is in their best self-interest to sign up and pay for their own L&I insurance.  L&I should make it clear that they will not pay for claims for anyone not signed up with them.  Plain and simple.  End of the story.  That is what I want to see happen and urge you to support.  And now back to the meter rates.

I voted yes because it was the RESPONSIBLE position to take.  I personally do not support the meter increases and the related lease increases.  As I told the council aide yesterday, over a five-weekend month, I have to make $2000. before I make a single dime.  That is a lease of $200. per weekend plus the average cost of $200. worth of gasoline. Do the math and you find it to be 2000 dollars.  I nor you need added costs.  Nor does our customer base need the added burden but please PLACE the blame upon the proper shoulders.  Labor & Industry has pushed us to this point.  You need to tell them two things.  That you want them to stop labeling you an employee.  And that you want them to send you all the information around creating your own individual L&I account.  Do that and you will have personally assisted toward a much needed resolution.  In other words, quit shouting and pointing fingers.  Instead, take personal responsibility for your own lives and business and family.  Do that and you will have done something great.  Make yourself proud and take care of yourself.  No one else will.  You are one in charge of your life. Do it and be happy.  I will be taking my own advise.  I am with you on that point.  We drivers suffer enough as it it. Boring, isn't it?



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Meeting

Admittedly tired today, which might of had something to do with it but my appointment with a city council member's legislative assistant did not go particularly well.  Flat affect is the descriptive term. Response was difficult to come by.  Even though I have strong disagreement with the L&I folks, I can never question their conviviality. Mr. Moomeau is a master of tact and civility and Les Hargrave is the kind uncle.  Today's meeting was a version of catatonia. Clearly the industry is not a council priority.  I will say that this isn't the first time a council reception was less than welcoming.  Talking to the council members and their aides is like scaling the castle walls.  I guess I should be pleased that boiling oil was outlawed in the century just past.  A prime council member even opposed my appointment to the commission, a letter from her stating that they were going in another direction.  Looking at the current state of the commission one can not deny that. But being someone not interested in holding resentments, I still voted for her in the last election.  The good mayor instead anointed me with his official blessings.  I believe I will take up future problems with his office.  Kenny Pittman is a master of decorum. And he has a advanced sense of humor.  Highly necessary when dealing with the taxi industry. Otherwise crying is the recommended response.

Taxi Birdbrains: Sparrow and the Hawk & Chickens Coming Home to Roost

I might be or I am certainly too tired to reflect coherently upon serous issues facing the local taxi industry.  Eight Saturday airport runs and drives to Auburn and Issaquah intermingled with everything else wore me out.  My week finished with a Monday 4-5 AM hour of NE 50th & 37th NE to Madison Park and First Hill to Sea-Tac.  I immediately got first up in the West Seattle zone 262 but after sitting 20 minutes enough was enough.  But I feel driving like this keeps me connected to the heart of the business, the literal finger upon the taxi pulse. The false full moon prompted the insane to run red  lights and drive down one-ways making it a barrel of privileged monkeys.  Where are the zoo keepers when they are needed? Now back to the subject at hand: Labor & Industry and how the hell did this mess! get started?

Coming back from Olympia last Friday I noticed a small songbird agitatedly harass a very large brown hawk who continued  to complacency fly due southwest.  An analogy was formed, the little sparrow representing Yellow and the state-wide industry and the lumbering hawk L&I and state government.  Currently the hawk is winning the argument. But with enough sparrows darting in and about the raptor might have to change course.  Now I am not calling the good folks I met with rapacious.  Not at all but to say the least they have a wider wingspan.  This is a story with legs and like an emu or ostrich it is running full out across the level plain.

As more details emerge, I truly question the wisdom of some of the prime operatives. That is I why I have been inspired by our native fowl to assist in explanation. Birdbrain is an interesting word, dating from 1933, meaning a person with confused ideas.  Sounds like the taxi industry.  Synonyms are addle-headed and loon.  That crazy John Burroughs wrote about trying to shoot a curious loon.  I am familiar with that marvelous bird from my northern Alberta days. The definition I perused also added  the term misfit to the mix, meaning someone unable to adapt to their circumstances. Now that really sounds like taxi but my advise is that they better move quickly because a very tangible tsunami in rising upon the horizon. Time to move to higher ground and regroup.

And the "chickens coming home to roost" dating from Chaucer in 1390 is highly appropriate when applied to the current situation.  Might be time to twist the tongue and bone up on Old English.  "Consequences of earlier actions are making themselves felt" is exactly what is happening.  The full, earlier idiom is "curses are like chickens; they always come home to roost."  Friday afternoon made it clear that L&I is watching the industry and gave assorted  and various examples of what they feel is an industry treating independent contractors as employees.  I gave examples countering that but they are convinced otherwise.  On some level it is difficult to dispute their interpretation of a heavy-handed dispatch and callous and punitive response to driver error and poor and faulty decisions.  That is where the chickens come in.  Like the deranged cabbies flying down I-5, doesn't the industry realize that those brightly painted yellow cars make them the center of attention?  Folks are paying attention and they don't like what they see.  The L&I hawk is a pious raptor.  It feels it is only coming to our rescue, that we are truly "good eggs" and just require the proper incubation.  Just remember good old FDR and his executive order 9066. Watch out for that liberal sentiment.  It too might be sightly addled.  Everybody knows about rotten eggs and the inevitable stench.  Continuing with that thought, the crazy cabbies may not be the only ones slightly cracked.  But of course a little adhesive should do the trick, everything suddenly intact and whole.  Believe that and you might believe anything.  All I know and believe is that this is a continuing saga, with much more to be written.

Sticking Together: Maturation Of An Industry

After my meeting at Labor and Industry I was in a state of shock after finding out that our future had been in part based upon a verbal commitment.   It was hard to take as I wandered back up I-5 from Tumwater ruminating upon the one hour and twenty minute  conversation. As I told someone who perhaps should have known better: we are in this together, meaning the L&I conundrum.  As the title states, I can only view this as the maturation of an industry.  There will be growing pains.  And time for me to hit the taxi hay.  I am bushed if not bushwhacked.  More upon this topic next week.

Accuracy & Reading Fiction

Unfortunately time is a factor so briefly ever so briefly I can tell you that today's Teamsters meeting was a candidate forum where a handful of drivers spoke and about 10-12 candidates and elected officials listened. I got there late due to my Vien Dong meeting which went well considering again there was not enough time.  I did meet Kathy who is the owner of 3 taxis in Lacey, Washington.  L&I has audited her for about $234,000 dollars. Seems like fantasy to me.  Her entire company averages maybe 45 fares total in a given day. 

Anyway, I arrived late and couldn't sign up to speak.  It was clear that the drivers were not up to date on the good work and results of the commission.  We will have to do a much better job of communicating. There was much pleading and requesting for assistance.  It was kind of wonderful how the panel, knowing nearly zero about the taxi industry (other than Bobby Vick, from the greater SE Indian community) took in much that was mostly inaccurate and misinformed. It was informative in that sense.  There does appear to be great enthusiasm for a union. More on that in the coming weeks.

Books

My longing for fiction took me to Cason McCullers and her "The Ballard of The Sad Cafe" where Miss Amelia dominates a comic-book type of yarn. I am now on to Dickens' "Great Expectations" where Pip is terrorized by his sister Mrs. Gargery.  Good writing but perhaps weakened by the serialisation of his novels forcing a timetable. Good writing is damaged by timetables.  Ask the ghost of J.B. Preistley next time you have a pint in the Hubblehome tavern. If you don't find him there, just take a stroll around the churchyard.

Hobnobbing WIth State Demos & More Cabbie Book Reading

How wonderful! as it appears I just published the title before composing the actual text.  Well why not, headlines telling it all reminding me of the many folks I see bending down reading the front page of the local daily from the disadvantage of the newspaper vending machine.  I always feel like interfering and buying them a paper but perhaps all they want to know is the outline of the news.  Which of course is different from what you get by reading my blog, getting up to date info on everything Seattle and King County taxi has to offer.   How boring, how exciting and how utterly frustrating it all is!

Yesterday afternoon I get a call informing that I needed to zoom down to Seattle and hobnob with the good elected officials that will be now repealing HB 1367, the L&I authorizing legislation and troublesome document that has caused so much anxiety for the industry.  By the way, the term hobnob or hobnobbing originally meant "to drink together" and first usage dates from 1763.  Yes I did have a couple of glasses of red wine and the cheeses were just terrific, reminding of the 1984 "cheese restaurant" meal I had in Paris 1984.  Talk about rich and creamy!  But beyond the finger food I met a few state senators and such.  My greatest impression was that I did not look like anyone else there.  Perhaps as I get more involved in all this political business I will have to trim my locks a trifle but shaving me from head to toe would not mask my true identity. And what could that be?  I'll let you guess!

Another development is that I have a meeting scheduled with the Labor & Industry folks for tomorrow afternoon.  The major impetus for this is that L&I have decided to go forward with previously threatened audits requesting more or less a half million from Seattle Yellow and nearly a quarter of a million from the small WAT or wheelchair taxis which had won the most recent RFP from the city/county, I believe a total of 15 taxis.   As I told a driver yesterday, government bureaucracy is like the mythological Hydra with nine heads each speaking for itself. I must proceed with caution because the last thing I want to appear is presumptuous.  I also need to avoid any hydra-like appearances because it is for the taxi body politic I speak and on some level represent.  My personal opinion is of little consequence.

And I just got a telephone call for a 3:30 PM meeting at the local Tacoma Vietnamese restaurant Vien Dong, which I highly recommend.  It is on the corner of South 38th & Yakima.  All this means is that I  have to stop and continue after the Teamsters gala.  I promise you a full reporting plus all the wonderful books I am reading and that you too should  have your nose stuck in!



  

Always Blame The Customer & Union Rumblings Update

I just reviewed my union/alliance rough draft and was at least impressed with the coherency if not total content.  In the short time taken, because four total hours is nothing when applied to writing, I believe I got the essential points across.  Individual empowerment and the stopping of wrongs of all types coming from a wide variety sources would be, should be, and is the purpose of all labor and human organization.  Why did people like Lenin and Stalin and Mao and Castro fail?  One, because they embraced violence and two, somehow got the erroneous idea that they were more important than the revolutionary concepts they promoted and espoused.  Always the group is of greater importance than the individual.  It is silly for the compass to take credit for magnetic poles.  More than laughable, it is plainly dumb.  Mao's contribution in his old age was the spreading of syphilis to unsuspecting young women.  So much for political evolutionary ideals.  Always too easy to fail but extremely difficult to succeed.  A year to build the house but only an hour to burn it down to its foundation.  Such is the truth of earthy endeavor, and confusion.

And quickly, on my conversation at Guru Motors, it was oft repeated the positive virtues of labor organization and the Teamsters new efforts toward the industry.  I kept saying that organization was fine but why was it necessary to bring in strangers.  Why kiss the blind date?  I don't understand it when there are alternatives.  I guess that is why I am batting my eyes.  How much more encouragement do you need?

One Passenger, Two Hotels

Getting a time call at the University Inn I instead discovered the guy was waiting at the University Travel Lodge, only about a mile and a half distant.  Mentioning it to a taxi buddy at the lot today he suggested that the passenger got it wrong.  Of course all our customers are __________but this gentleman was clearly coherent and fully understood which hotel he was staying at.  What I have found in this industry is that everyone is blaming everyone else.  Why not?  It's traditional!

The Teamsters Are Coming (and remember, draft horses are our friends!)

I had a longish conversation on the telephone with Leonard Smith, major honcho at Teamsters Union 117.  He is completely convinced of the veracity of his mission.  I will be attending the big organizing meeting in Tukwila on May 24th.  In case you care, I will take geraniums upon my grave.  My fondness dates from 1960 and Fallbrook, California.  The scent has stayed with me.

I was amazed to be told that there are 3 full-time union organizers working on the taxi effort.  Took my breath away.  I am still processing it all.