TWU Secretary-Treasurer Ousted Over Improprieties: He Claims It’s Retaliation
The Chief
By RICHARD STEIER
Nov 5 2010
By RICHARD STEIER
Nov 5 2010
The executive board of Transport Workers Union Local 100 Oct. 25 voted overwhelmingly to remove fiery Secretary-Treasurer Israel Rivera from office for allegedly improperly trying to steer business to his live-in girlfriend and refusing to perform his duties regarding processing of the local’s payroll and providing a financial report to the board.
Mr. Rivera contended the next day that he was the victim of trumped-up charges brought by President John Samuelsen after he had accused him of financial wrongdoing of his own. While he must first appeal his removal to the TWU’s international union and then the U.S. Labor Department before he can sue to regain his post, he said he had spoken to unspecified law-enforcement officials “and they may be interested” in looking into Mr. Samuelsen’s activities.
Samuelsen: ‘Ridiculous’ Claims
The Local 100 president responded the following evening that Mr. Rivera’s formal allegations against him “are utterly ridiculous, and they’re going to be dismissed.”
Mr. Samuelsen also scoffed at claims by Mr. Rivera and his one staunch supporter on the union’s board that he was denied a fair hearing and that the board functioned like a “kangaroo court.” Contrasting himself with former Local 100 President Roger Toussaint, with whom he broke ties several years ago and then led a slate—including Mr. Rivera—against his hand-picked successor in last year’s elections, Mr. Samuelsen said, “Unlike Roger, I don’t have a ‘Stepford Wife’ executive board. There are people on it who are sworn political enemies of mine, and they all voted based on the evidence.”
While board members found Mr. Rivera guilty of all four charges against him and voted 38-1 to remove him from his post and 37-1 to bar him from seeking union office for three years, a motion to permanently bar him from running was rejected by a count of 17-9, with 13 abstentions.
The two days of deliberations that ended in Mr. Rivera’s ouster underscored the internal strife caused by his recurring clashes with Mr. Samuelsen and other former allies on the Local 100 board over matters ranging from what he claimed were improper receipts for mileage reimbursements and questionable donations to candidates for public office to the appointment of a former Toussaint loyalist to oversee the union fund assisting laidoff members in maintaining their health coverage.
Denied ‘Hell’ Memo Was Threat
In a Sept. 19 e-mail he stated concerning that fund’s administrator, J.P. Patafio, and Local 100 staffer Willie Rivera (no relation), “I will launch at them in the next several hours and may whatever God they believe in have mercy on their souls, I won’t... I hope all these fools understand the hell that’s about to befall them.” Israel Rivera denied he was making a physical threat, but Mr. Patafio was sufficiently alarmed that he called police.
Two days later, Mr. Samuelsen restricted the areas of the union offices in which Israel Rivera was permitted, citing the threats; Mr. Rivera claimed that he had been locked out of his office as well. On Sept. 25, the secretary treasurer formally accused Mr. Samuelsen of using a Local 100 credit card to buy groceries, while questioning union-related spending in other areas. Mr. Samuelsen responded that it was a common and accepted practice for officers to sometimes use their credit cards for personal spending but provide reimbursement at a later date.
Mr. Rivera alleges that the charges filed Oct. 7 that led to his ouster were concocted in retaliation for his accusations against Mr. Samuelsen. The Local 100 president said in an Oct. 27 phone interview, however, that it was scrutiny of Mr. Rivera’s e-mails following his incendiary message concerning Mr. Patafio and Willie Rivera that led to the discovery of the matter at the heart of those charges.
Alleged Pressure on Commissions
The board found Israel Rivera guilty of complicity in a plan in which he violated his fiduciary duty “when he engaged in a scheme causing the Union to enter into expensive leases with Xerox Corporation—without comparison shopping—for the purpose of funneling commissions” to his live-in girlfriend, Lizette Baumgartner. The union claimed he did this after first being involved in a scheme to pressure Xerox by threatening to otherwise seek bids from competing suppliers of copying machines and printers.
Mr. Rivera initially scoffed at an accusation that he was acting on behalf of his wife, noting that they were separated, but Mr. Samuelsen subsequently said that he had frequently described Ms. Baumgartner, with whom he shares a home address in Sparta, N.J., as his spouse. Mr. Rivera and his ally on the Local 100 board, Power Division Chair Thomas Creegan —formerly a Samuelsen supporter— disputed the charge of improper commissions being sought by citing a March agreement labeled “Addendum to 2010 Xerox Sales Agent Compensation Plan” signed by both her and her supervisor that stated, “It is agreed between Johnson Business Products and Lizetta Baumgartner to forego any compensation or commission from any Agent/Direct business between Xerox and Transport Workers Union Local 100, NY.”
‘Said They Were Shaken Down’
Mr. Samuelsen questioned the veracity of that document, however, noting, “It has no heading on it, it has no letterhead on it. I personally spoke to a sales rep and his manager, and both of them told me they were absolutely shaken down to pay commissions to Lizette Baumgartner and were told that the 38-year relation- ship [with Local 100] was going to end if they didn’t pay commissions to Lizette Baumgartner.” He said Mr. Rivera had told those employees “he was going to shop around” unless they agreed to his demand.
He noted that Ms. Baumgartner is not employed directly by Xerox but rather by Johnson Business Products, likening its relationship with the copier company to that of a car dealer who is an authorized agent of a particular manufacturer.
Mr. Rivera accused Mr. Samuelsen of improper conduct in allegedly breaking a contract that he said ran through 2019 with USI to offer insurance to Local 100 members, replacing it with a firm called M3 Technology without getting his approval. He said the union was forced to pay $1.5 million to USI “to walk away” from the remainder of its contract, and that the Local 100 leader violated the union’s constitution by giving M3 a list of members and their home addresses.
Calls Deal Good and Proper
Mr. Samuelsen disputed those claims and denied having to make a settlement with USI, saying, “Local 100 wasn’t forced to pay a dime to anybody. And I don’t need the secretary treasurer’s approval to enter into contracts” with service providers. He added that Mr. Rivera had himself been involved in the discussions with M3, and said the firm “gave us a tremendous deal including 25 $1,000 scholarships for members” in return for the union’s business.
Once the union reached terms with the insurance firm, he continued, it was permitted to supply the member- ship list, noting that the Local 100 constitution merely forbids providing that data “to any unauthorized entity.”
Mr. Rivera also accused Mr. Samuelsen of running with and giving union positions to members who were not current on their union dues and therefore in bad standing. Mr. Samuelsen questioned this claim while noting that Mr. Toussaint’s allies had conducted last fall’s election and were responsible for determining whether candidates were behind on their dues and therefore ineligible to run.
In fact, Mr. Rivera became the secretary treasurer candidate on Mr. Samuelsen’s slate only after a couple of his other allies were forced to withdraw from the race because of questions about their dues status. The previous union administration had disqualified a number of activists from running over alleged dues delinquencies, which resulted from the 17- month period in which Local 100 was without the right to have dues automatically deducted from members’ New York City Transit paychecks as punishment for the illegal 2005 strike.
Improper Communication?
Mr. Rivera and Mr. Creegan cited an Oct. 1 e-mail from Mr. Samuelsen to Steve Downs, an executive board member who chairs the union’s Train Operators Division and presided over the disciplinary trial, as evidence of improper communication that bolstered their claim that Mr. Rivera was victimized by a “kangaroo court.” That e-mail stated, “Izzy acknowledges the lizette connection.”
Mr. Downs said, however, that there was nothing inappropriate about that communication because it occurred six days before the charges were brought against Mr. Rivera and “I had not yet been asked to chair the hearing.”
Mr. Creegan predicted Mr. Rivera would eventually prevail in court, likening his case to that of Ainsley Stewart, a former Local 100 Vice President whom a jury awarded $205,000 last year after finding that Mr. Toussaint improperly docked his pay in retaliation for his vocal political opposition. That award was set aside earlier this year by a Federal Judge who ordered a new trial after concluding the jury erred in finding the deduc- tions from Mr. Stewart’s paycheck to be improper.
“He’s gonna get a couple hundred grand,” Mr. Creegan said of Mr. Rivera, “and it’s gonna come from the members, not John Samuelsen.”
Mr. Samuelsen responded that the two cases were not comparable, saying Mr. Toussaint had acted in violation of both the Local 100 constitution and Federal law. “Toussaint never brought Ainsley Stewart up on charges and suspended him,” he said, “and he docked his pay in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act. And Ainsley Stewart didn’t commit a felony, and Izzy Rivera very likely committed more than one.”
He acknowledged that the internal war had both divided the union he pledged to reunite after years of tumult under Mr. Toussaint and created a major “distraction” at a time when it has been reeling from the layoff of hundreds of members by Metropolitan Transportation Authority CEO Jay Walder.
“When we replace Izzy as secretarytreasurer,” Mr. Samuelsen said, “the leadership will stabilize and we’ll be able to focus on the fight-back against the MTA.”
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