Worker, Verizon in Flap Over Flag-Waving

By JAY FITZGERALD

U.S. and Massachusetts flags that flew with state National Guard troops over in Afghanistan are now at the center of an ongoing labor dispute between Verizon and a union trying to organize workers.

Terry Skiest, a Verizon employee and Massachusetts Air National Guard member, said his Acton supervisor ordered that two flags be removed last fall from the outside of his office cubicle and hung less prominently inside his work station.

The reason given: to comply with a workplace rule that bans personal memorabilia from being hung in “public places” at job sites.

“I just want to hang my flag” where it can be seen, Skiest, 46, a telecom-technician with Verizon Business told the Herald. Skiest, a Shrewsbury resident, said he has served two tours of duty in Afghanistan with the Massachusetts Air National Guard.

During his first tour in Afghanistan, in 2003 and 2004, he said he received a package with two flags – one American, the other the state flag of Massachusetts – from a local Veterans of Foreign Wars post.

After he returned home in 2004, he hung the flags on his cubicle walls.

But after he returned from his second tour of duty in Afghanistan last November, the flags had been moved to inside his cubicle – and he was told that’s where they should stay, he said.

Verizon, which owns the small Acton facility via its Verizon Business unit, didn’t deny that Skiest’s flags had been moved inside his cubicle.

But a spokesman said a union pushing to organize Verizon Business employees, including Skiest and his co-workers, is trying to “manipulate facts” and use “standard practice” tactics to attack Verizon during tense labor talks.

Peter Lucht, a Verizon spokesman, said the giant telecom company clearly isn’t against the American flag, having proudly hung many at hundreds of Verizon sites across the country. The company is only trying to enforce workplace rules, said Lucht, himself a former Army National Guard member. Lucht said Verizon has an “excellent” reputation of supporting employees who serve their country overseas.

Though Skiest said his complaints have nothing to do with union- organizing efforts that he supports, the AFL-CIO is escalating the flag flap, creating a special Web site about the dispute at PutUpTheFlag.org and vowing to hold a “flag day” in support of Skiest.

CAPTION: OLD GLORY: Terry Skiest displays the flag that Verizon Business has told him he can’t hang outside his cubicle because it’s against company policy. STAFF PHOTO BY NANCY LANE

Originally published by By JAY FITZGERALD.

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