Campaign 2023: Establishing a Budget at Local 308

In my previous life, I ran a business called Photo Grafix (www.photografix.pro). It is a shadow of what it once was and is under the control of my family for posterity. But when I was running it, the business kept my family fed and housed. Maintaining a budget was critical to its survival. In fact, in my personal life, my wife maintains a budget the same way she does for Photo Grafix. 

No such thing exists for Local 308. We just take in money—less and less since more members no longer pay dues—and spend it. The spending is a huge secret. This is a major reason for distrust about Local 308 officials among the membership.

A Local 308 budget must be accessible by the membership online and in-person. It must also be easy to understand and maintain by anyone. No longer can fear of the CTA or "non-members" possibly seeing our financial records be an obstacle to information.

If nominated and elected as your president, I intend to prioritize hiring a third party for a Local 308 financial review (learn the difference between a financial audit and financial review here: https://keydifferences.com/difference-between-audit-and-review.html). 

 

Of course, I will present various service providers to allow you to democratically choose which one we hire—and how much we spend.

 

From there, I want to present the facts to the membership, gather feedback and create a budget. Any such presentations will be done online so all members can participate in it—and view on-demand. An accompanying poll will allow you to submit that feedback.

 

Yes, we use bookkeeping software at Local 308—such as Quickbooks and something else from the ATU—but budgeting is very different from bookkeeping. It is so different—and so important—that it requires its own software. 

 

Basically, a budget manages expenses for the future. While bookkeeping software reconciles accounts while reporting revenue and expenses in the past. Sure, we can know exactly where our money is going with the current process. However, we cannot PLAN nor SEE how we could spend it. 

The budget we formulate can be done with an excellent—and very inexpensive—program called "Budget" by Snowmintcs.com. It uses a highly-intuitive graphical interface that can be customized for managing expenses. Check out this tutorial: https://www.snowmintcs.com/downloads/tutorials/mac_expenses_only.pdf 

 

Every month, the Secretary-Treasurer can report exactly how much money is allocated for what expenses—and how our dues revenue feeds those expenses. You will see each expense as an envelope with a dollar amount. You will also see how the dues revenue is split up to feed those envelopes. Moreover, the membership can motion for the reallocation of revenue for various goals and expenses. This can be done in real time!

 

Based on our first budget, the Local 308 president must work with the membership to analyze and create successive budgets—at least annually. This will build trust for the officials among the membership—and give them a full stake in our success and failure as an organization of workers. 

 

Learn more about the difference between budgeting and accounting here: https://www.letslearnfinance.com/difference-between-budgeting-and-accounting.html

 

If you like what I am proposing, definitely nominate and vote for me at the November 2023 membership meeting (not this year). Moreover, join me in my mission to democratize Local 308 by accumulating membership meeting attendance credits and running for office with me. We need to replace every single person in there now in order to give Local 308 back to the members. I cannot do it alone.

 

As always, please leave your suggestions and criticisms in the Comments.