Members of the Executive Board listen as Capt. Tim Canoll, ALPA’s president, opens the 119th regular meeting of the board.

ALPA’s national officers and master executive council (MEC) chairmen met September 14–15 for the 119th regular meeting of the Executive Board in the Association’s Herndon, Va., Conference Center, ahead of this month’s Board of Directors (BOD) meeting.

Capt. Tim Canoll, ALPA’s president, opened the meeting by welcoming the pilot leaders and highlighting ALPA’s work enhancing airline safety and security, negotiating and enforcing pilot contracts, and advancing the future of the profession. “We are the leaders of the airline pilot associations across the globe,” he said. “We are the organization that accepts the never-ending challenges to protect our members and our industry.” ALPA, he reiterated, is “the ultimate guardian of our profession,” with aspirations to continue the union’s rich legacy.

With the upcoming BOD meeting and the challenges in front of us, said Canoll, “this is a particularly apt time to remind ourselves of who and where we are; who we aspire to be, and what we aspire to be.” He referenced the pilots that the MEC chairmen represent and reminded them that “trust and authority are derived from them and vested in us.”

Capt. Joe DePete, ALPA’s first vice president and national safety coordinator, opened by applauding the MEC leaders’ recent Labor Day messages emphasizing the role ALPA pilots have played in advancing the labor movement. “It’s an excellent reminder of the societal significance of our work,” he said, “and the realization that when we work together as one, we can achieve our goals and advance aviation.” He emphasized this year’s BOD theme, “Powered by Pilots,” saying, “We are the best at what we do, and we need to remind our members of that because their work—how it’s advanced aviation and how it’s made our jobs safer and more secure—has made all the difference in the world.”

After a rundown of ALPA’s Air Safety Organization priorities, DePete provided an update on ALPA-PAC and stressed the importance of increased participation. He stated that ALPA-PAC has donated nearly $2.9 million this election cycle, highlighting that those donations are split 50/50 between Democrats and Republicans. “ALPA-PAC works both sides of the aisle when advocating and educating on our issues,” he acknowledged.

Capt. Bill Couette, ALPA’s vice president–administration/secretary, also reminded attendees that ALPA is powered by pilots and that they have a duty to keep all 54,000-plus ALPA pilots in mind when discussing policy. “All of the benefits and protections we have today are thanks to the generations of ALPA members who came before us,” he said. “We owe it to the next generation to continue this legacy.”

Capt. Randy Helling, ALPA’s vice president–finance/treasurer, thanked the MEC chairmen for their unceasing diligence as ALPA continues to improve its financial footing. “With sound financial planning and continued fiscal discipline, we will continue to meet the challenges of the future and remain the strongest, most effective, and most respected pilots union in the world,” he proclaimed. Helling also announced at the meeting a $9 million surplus of dues income in the 2017 budget, to be redistributed as allowed by Section 60 of ALPA’s Administrative Manual. The Executive Board later voted to distribute it evenly to the Major Contingency Fund and Kitty Hawk.

Throughout the meeting, the Executive Board members broke into committees to evaluate projects and policies, do a final review of the 2014 strategic plan and its initiatives, and discuss recommendations for Association strategy in the coming years and items to be examined at the upcoming BOD meeting. The members also voted to send multiple national committee reports and policy resolutions to the BOD for consideration.

Also at the meeting, Nathan Gonzales, editor and publisher of The Rothenberg & Gonzales Political Report, spoke to the pilots about the upcoming election on both the national and local levels. The Report is nonpartisan, he stated, with predictions and projections instead of endorsements. Gonzales explained a bit of the lead-up to the election and how he thinks things will play out in November for both the White House and Congress—and why.