The National Mediation Board's role at this stage of the game is to monitor an election - which, presumably, should have nothing to do with Delta executives. Delta executives have reportedly spent an unheard of amount of money lobbying in the first ($819,566) and second ($752,902) quarters of 2009: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/07/24/ap6697496.html

So - while we are supposedly going to be "brought up to industry standards", management spends buckets of money that could be in the pockets of flight attendants, gallivanting around Washington DC.  Well, that's one way to run an airline. Meanwhile, they're spending money against our best interests - lobbying against FMLA fairness for flight attendants, lobbying against flight attendant security training, etc.  The NMB was just one stop of many in their most recent - and one of many - treks to Washington DC.

Being clearly more even-handed than in the past, the NMB agreed to meet with Delta executives in late July, but also insisted all interested parties must be invited for a meeting.  AFA and other unions also met with the NMB.  Delta wanted to lay out their plan and to outline how they feel our voting timeline should go, however they have no role in decisions about our election.   

While we didn't show our hand to Delta executives, we did share our concerns about policies that we would like the NMB to review and discussed our issues, including: