March 1, 2023

Participants for AMFA
Bret Oestreich – National President
Earl Clark – Region I Director
Will Abbott – Region II Director
Tony Christner – Airline Representative
Lucas Middlebrook – Legal Counsel

Participants for Sun Country Airlines
Kristen Peterson – Sr. Director, Labor & Employment
Bobby Purzitza – Director of Maintenance
Jacki Thompson – Legal Counsel
Laurie Lofgren – Labor Consultant

The AMFA-SCA Negotiating Committee is providing this update to the Membership at Sun Country Airlines (SCA). This is the only official authorized source of negotiating communications by the Committee.

The parties held a three-day bargaining session, February 21-23 in Minneapolis to continue bargaining toward a first collective bargaining agreement (CBA) for the SCA group. The Company, at the beginning of Day 1, presented counterproposals to two articles, Article 10 – Filling of Vacancies and Article 9 – Seniority. Your Negotiating Committee immediately went to work analyzing the Company’s counterproposals and preparing counters to these articles. The Union, in the afternoon on Day 1, delivered counters to both Article 10 – Filling of Vacancies and Article 9 – Seniority. With these proposals, the parties were optimistic that tentative agreements (TAs) could be reached during this session. The Company took the remainder of Day 1 in caucus to analyze the Union’s counters and the parties agreed to resume in the morning on Day 2.

The Company, on the morning of Day 2, presented its counters to Articles 9 and 10. The Company’s counters continued to bridge the bargaining gap between the parties on these articles. The parties then engaged in productive dialogue at the table, which allowed each side to develop an understanding as to the remaining issues that needed to be ironed out prior to reaching TAs on Articles 9 and 10. Following the table discussion, AMFA took a short caucus and was able to return counterproposals on both articles. The parties caucused, and upon returning in the afternoon, were able to reach a TA on Article 10 – Filling of Vacancies. The Company presented another counterproposal to Article 9 – Seniority, and AMFA spent the remainder of Day 2 in caucus with the aim of developing a counterproposal to Article 9 that would allow the parties to reach a TA on Day 3.

As planned, AMFA countered again on Article 9 – Seniority on the morning of Day 3. The Company took a short caucus to develop a prompt counterproposal. Upon returning to the table, the Company presented its Article 9 counterproposal, and with that counter the parties were able to reach a TA on Article 9 – Seniority. The parties then spent a considerable amount of time in open dialogue as to how Article 4 – Classifications would be developed. Thereafter, AMFA spent the remainder of Day 3 in caucus preparing a proposal on Article 4 – Classifications, which it plans to pass at the beginning of the next bargaining session. Following the January session, the parties continued their productive work at the table, and have now reached tentative agreement on ten (10) articles of your future CBA.

We would like to thank all the SCA members who took the time to attend the union meeting held this week in connection with bargaining. The next negotiation session is scheduled for March 21-23 in Minneapolis. If you would like to be an observer in future negotiation sessions, please communicate with your Airline Representative, Tony Christner.

Remember to stay engaged, remain informed, and continue to support the Negotiating Committee as that support increases the ability to bargain a CBA your hard work deserves.

Fraternally,