September 16, 1997 Mr. Douglas Dority, President UFCW International Union 1775 K Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20006 Re: September 4, 1997 Hearing At Local 304A to Determine Trusteeship Dear Mr. Dority: I write this letter with total contempt for you and your move to place Local 304A into trusteeship. Anyone who has a sense of history between Local 304A and the UFCW International Union leadership, particularly over the last decade, knows exactly what you are up to. An imposed trusteeship is your way of trying to crush political opposition just before an International Union Convention. You are trying to silence criticism of corruption, sell-out bargaining and an International Union leadership serving itself first and the members last. By placing Local 304A into trusteeship, you hope to crush efforts to democratize one of the most undemocratic and top down unions in the U.S. trade union movement. From the standpoint of crushing freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and freedom to act collectively aginst wrong doing, there is little difference between the Chinese government rolling the tanks in Tiananmen Square and you placing Local 304A into trusteeship. Observing the September 4, 1997 hearing in Sioux Falls, South Dakota to determine if Local 304A should be placed in trusteeship was very interesting. Those proceedings showed me how undemocratic UFCW really is and how your administration abuses and misuses the power vested in it. There was nothing impartial, fair or objective about the September 4 and 5, 1997 proceedings. Even your own puppets Mr. Lynch, Mr. Siemonsma and Mr. Reichelt admitted it was a one-sided hearing. Talk about rigged proceedings, we found out after the so called hearing that International Union representatives had been rooting around in Local 304A files for six months trying to build a case against Pati Daggitt. In an uncommon and unheard of move, UFCW representatives looked at five to six years worth of Local 304A records. Not once did the International Union representatives hare [sic] their conclusions with Pati Daggitt regarding the examination of records. Not once did they week [sic] clarification on so-called concerns from their examination of the records from Pati Daggitt or individual officers or Local 304A members who were considered on the opposite political fence of the International Union leadership. Like assassins in the night, highly paid International Union representatives picked, chose and twisted information to serve the political purpose of the Dority administration. After arming themselves with one-sided information and adulated [sic] documents, the UFCW International leadership ambushed Local 304A with a trusteeship hearing. It is very interesting to note how this whole hearing procedure was conducted by the UFCW International Union leadership. The UFCW International Union assigned people to work some six months secretly reviewing Local 304A documents. The UFCW International Union leadership saw to it that their witnesses received pay from the union to be prepared to testify on behalf of the International Union's move to trustee Local 304A. The International Union provided professional help to their witnesses to testify at the hearing. Throughout this six month period, both before the hearing and once the hearing was called for, the UFCW International Union leadership provided only the most token assistance to their political oppositionn to prepare for the hearing, while providing countless hours of professional help, resources and finances to their political allies. The International Union leadership withheld from what they considered their political opposition, valuable information, documents and witnesses that were germane to the hearing. The UFCW International Union leadership did not seek clarification from what they considered their political opposition concerning questions on records, practices and procedures at Local 304A. As a matter of fact, they conducted a one-sided investigation and presented only one side at the hearing when in fact they have an obligation to present all the facts. The bulk of testimony presented at the hearing was by Mr. Kevin Sullivan, UFCW International Union auditor. His testimony consisted primarily of innuendoes, speculation, conjecture and and fabricated documents not backed up by hard facts. Further, in an effort to vilify your political opposition, Mr. Sullivan presented views or opinions that he had neither the expertise, knowledge or qualifications to do. The UFCW International Union leadership has used people such as Lynch, Siemonsma, Reichelt, Skyberg, Raile, Benson, Larson and Mark Anderson as pawns to move Local 304A into trusteeship. The UFCW International Union leadership also knows that the only breakdown of operations at Local 304A is that which has been purposely created by the Dority administration. You, Mr. Dority, know full well that the September 4 & 5, 1997 hearing at Sioux Falls was a one-sided sham designed to accomplish your political agenda as it relates to Local 304A. You and your bunch have destroyed anything that was good in meat packing including our standard-of-living. It does not surprise me that you are trying to destroy a local union with a rich history of good trade unionism. In conclusion, it seems to me that maybe the U.S. Justice Department ought to look into placing the UFCW International Union into trusteeship. In the last four yours we have lost the two top UFCW International Union officials (International Union president and secretary-treasurer) to corruption. I find it interesting that Kevin Sullivan, UFCW chief auditor and assistant to the International Union secretary-treasurer comes to Local 304A and pontificates about procedural controls on finances, when $1.9 million of the members dues was embezzled by a high ranking UFCW union official working in Mr. Sullivan's own department at the International Union headquarters. Let's not forget about the UFCW International Union vice president indicted for taking bribes from the employers or the UFCW International Union vice president connected to a bank robbery. In my opinion, this is just the tip of the iceberg at 1775 K Street. Sincerely, Dee Black UFCW 304A member