The Homa Files

Excerpted from IBD, “The UAW’s Money-Squandering Corruptocracy”, Malkin, December 31, 2008

While carmakers soak up $17 billion in taxpayer bailout funds and demand more for their ailing industry, United Auto Workers bosses have wasted tens of millions of their workers’ dues on gold-plated resorts and rotten investments.  While membership in the union has plummeted, the UAW retains assets worth $1.2 billion.

The UAW owns and operates Black Lake Golf Course — a “championship caliber” course opened in 2000 that’s part of a larger “family education center” and retreat nestled in 1,000 acres of property in Onaway, Mich. The resort includes “a beautiful gym with two full-sized basketball courts, an Olympic-size indoor pool, exercise and weight room, table-tennis and pool tables, a sauna, beaches, walking and bike trails, softball and soccer fields and a boat launch ramp.” The Detroit Free Press reported earlier this year that the golf course (valued at $6 million) and education center (valued at $27 million) have together lost $23 million over the past five years. 

The UAW  bid $9.75 million to purchase the gated La Mancha Resort Village in Palm Springs. The 100-room walled resort with spas, poolside massages and a “croquet lawn lit for night use” was on the verge of bankruptcy with $5.2 million in debt. Fortunately (for members), that deal didn’t go through.

The union poured $14.7 million into Pro Air, a start-up airline that, well, didn’t get off the ground. Plagued by safety problems, the feds shuttered the company less than a year later.

In 1996, union heavies invested $5 million in United Broadcasting Network, a liberal radio network precursor to Air America.  They shelled out for a $2 million, state-of-the-art studio in Detroit and incurred years of losses of a reported $75,000 a month before closing the network down in 2003.

And while the UAW and carmakers cry poor, they’ve operated massive joint funds for years that have paid for lavish items such as multi-million-dollar NASCAR racer sponsorships and Las Vegas junkets. 

At least the groveling Big Three CEOs gave up their corporate jets. Where’s the public flogging for the greed-infested UAW fat cats reaching into our pockets to keep them afloat?

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Full article:
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=284004627416260

UAW’s annual report:
http://www.unionreports.gov 

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This entry was posted on January 6, 2009 at 7:56 am and is filed under Autos - Travel, Unions - UAW. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.