Penalizing Patrons for defective ticket dispensing machines

 

For the toll patrons that still stop and get a ticket from the automatic dispenser, you will note that the tickets are stamped with the time that you received the tickets . . . and they expire 12 hours later.  When they are expired, the collector is required to charge you the maximum distance from that particular plaza.

As long as you aren't planning to be gone, from the plaza that you entered at, more than 11 hours and 59 minutes the following will save you money: (1) IF, when you stop and pick up your ticket, there are no cars behind you, you can back up (safely) about 20 feet and then pull back up to the ticket machine it will dispense another ticket.  This second ticket can be used, as long as you exit at the same plaza that you entered, as a U-turn priced ticket. U-turn costs at every plaza are different but if you entered the toll road at the Port Saint Lucie plaza and returned 11 hours later, for example, the collector would charge you 40 cents even though you got your ticket from Lantana an hour earlier . . . just don't use the Lantana ticket at exit plaza.  AND, if you commute back and forth to work every day, you can do this every day.

The deputy director of tolls knows that the machines don't always dispense a ticket when a vehicle pulls up but if you leave without a ticket, she has issued a memo that the collectors, when you get off at your exit plaza, charge you the maximum distance unless you can produce proof of where you entered earlier and didn't get a ticket.  The collectors don't have a choice in what they are required to do.  Collectors have been directed, through a memo posted at the plazas by the Deputy Director of Tolls, Milissa Burger to charge these unreasonable rates.  But since they have cut back on the collectors that gave out the tickets and she is unable to get her technical personnel to fix those machines at all of the plazas, she has decided to penalize the patrons instead.

Cheers,

Marvin Foster
447 S. E. Cork Road
Port Saint Lucie, FL.  34984
greenway59@att.net

 

Alleged abuse of power and abuse/waste of DOT resources

February 9, 2014

 I have tried to report abuse of power and abuse of state resources but of course no one wants to listen.  And all I got for my efforts was to be terminated from my position as a toll collector with 19 years of service.  My entire reason for being terminated was due to the fact that Milissa Burger and Andrew Clayton could not silence me in my attempts to report those actions.  Just one example was when Ms. Burger, knowing that automation in the entry system was being installed, allowed a build up of the old toll tickets that had to be destroyed ( and paid to destroy at the dump site at $48.00 a ton) and the tickets to be destroyed at approximately $100,000.00.  No problem for her though, it was just toll patron dollars being wasted.

 

The Deputy Director of Tolls, Milissa Burger is in charge of contract compliance between the DOT and Faneuil, Inc., the outsourced company in charge of employees that work for tolls, and Andrew Clayton, VP for Faneuil, Inc. in my opinion has violated almost every item in the contract that relates to the employees working in tolls.  I have a copy of the contract which I have read and it has almost no resemblance to what Milissa allows Faneuils Andrew to get away with but there seems to be no person, with the intelligence to dissect and understand the terms of the contract, willing to take this task on so because of this Milissa goes about doing what she wants to do in allowing Faneuil executives to cheat the toll employees out of wages and benefits for which they are entitled according to the contract. 

 

But Milissa and Andrew Clayton did a snow job on the investigator of the CIG's office, who told me in person that in all of his years of investigations, he had NEVER investigated and official contract and as the so called investigation proceeded it became quite apparent that he had no clue as to the terms of the contract and he just simply believed everything that Milissa and Andrew Clayton told him. 

 

Anyone who has any knowledge of a contract and it's legal implications and done a proper investigation would know that they had just gotten a snow job and what he was told couldn't have been further from the truth.  It was simply a cover up and pushed under the rug and hoped to be forgotten.  But the untrained investigator just sucked up the BS that they fed him while Milissa was still under oath.

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Career Employment on Florida's Toll Roads

On November 9, 2009, I sent the following e-Mail to Mr. Jack Leoard, assistant council for the DOT (department of transportation) in Ocoee, Florida which is the headquarters for the Toll Road.

The response I got from my e-mail to Mr. Leonard was for him to forward my e-mail to the president of Faneuil, Inc. At the time I was under the impression that Mr. Leonard was employed my the DOT and not by Faneuil, Inc.

It seems rather unusual that a state agency that has been advised of alleged allegations of contract violations between the DOT and Faneuil, Inc. that that informaton would be forwarded to the Company that the alleged violations are against.

It is no wonder that there is so much waste in our government. No one intends to be held accountable for their actions or their responsibilities.

"IN GOD WE TRUST"
November 9, 2009

Dear Mr. Leonard:

The JPG Document that I have enclosed is just the latest memo that Faneuil has written up and posted on bulletin boards. It's just another example how employees are being treated.

The contract that I read on the CD that I received from you is simply window dressing. It has almost no similarity to actually what is being done by Faneuil Management.

When we went to orientation at a Fort Pierce motel and it was first known that (Faneuil Group) would be taking over the contract for tolls, the person giving the orientation was a Mrs. Mary Coopland. The meeting that she conducted made it sound like we were going to work for a company that really cared about their employees. Other words, she made Faneuil Group to be "to good to be true". And, I truly believe that Mary represented a good company and gave an honest orientation. Then we find out that Ronald Perelman bought out the part of Faneuil Group that had successfully got the tolls contract and named his part of the company that he had just bought: Faneuil, Inc. By the way, Ronald Perelman is the 26th richest man in the United States. And, it would appear by the way his management team treats employees, he didn't get to be that rich by being fair to his employees.

Also, I have found out that Mr. Perelman, who also owned Allied/Barton when they had the tolls contract sold Allied/Barton some three months after buying Faneuil, Inc. for some $700 million. Tolls must be a pretty profitable endeavor when a man of his stature goes to as much trouble as he did to make sure that he kept the tolls contract. When Faneuil, Inc. was awarded the contract, everything that Mary Coopland promised us went out the window but it seems that some of the state executives aren't to concerned about us collectors. Those are kind of harsh statements but actions speak much louder than words.

The executives that are supposed to be overseeing that the language in the contract is adhered to are obviously taking Faneuil's word that they are doing so. Jack, as you know pretty words can be put in writing and records can be made to look good but the "truth" can be easily masked over.

Last week, one of the Port Saint Lucie collectors came to work very sick but she was a new collector so she didn't have any sick time ACCRUED. If she had not come to work, even though she was very sick, she would have been WRITTEN UP simply because she didn't have any ACCRUED sick time yet. This collector was in the toll booth with me and she could hardly hold her head up. She kept the trash can in front of her in case she had to vomit. (Faneuil management will tell you that this isn't true but I am willing to swear to these facts on the Bible and I don't take that lightly.)

Mr. Leonard, as stupid as this sounds, I personally have had to program my mental being to communicate with my physical being so it will understand I can't get sick until I have at least 8 hours of ACCRUED sick time, otherwise, my body would get sick when it feels like it and then I would get written up for calling in sick. Also, if I feel a little sick at 9:30 p.m. when I normally go to bed, I have to go ahead and call in sick to the "call center" (because we are REQUIRED to call in 4 hours before our shift is scheduled to start) even though after getting a good nights rest I may feel much better and would have been able to go to work the next morning.

In the contract, Faneuil claims that they have policies in place for the purpose of retaining employees. Nothing could be further from the truth (the more people that quit, the better they like it). They have ZERO incentive to want employees to stay. They get paid by billing hours - the more the better. Better to put two people in the same booth as often as possible ( a trainer and a trainee). More billed hours. Plus, for the first 90 days Faneuil pays absolutely no employee benefits - add to bottom profit line. Faneuil HR encourages supervisors to write employees up for every little thing and these write ups they use to take away collector's seniority rights and also the best way to get rid of collectors. Jack, has anyone checked the "turnover" statistics for when Barton had the contract and now that Faneuil has the contract vs. when the state managed the entire toll system. When I started there in 1994, the turnover was very low. It took me more than two years to just get a good shift. Now, because how Faneuil treats seniority, we have a collector that has only worked at Port St. Lucie for 4 or 6 weeks that has the most desirable shift on the first shift. Other collectors that had bid for it (and had been there longer) were denied the shift simply because they had a reprimand that was given to them less than 12 months ago.

I don't have a clue when it comes to executive pay and office expenses but what I do know, after reading the 400+ pages of the contract, that there is no correlation between the wording of the contract that I read and the way we are treated.

It would almost appear that the state people responsible for signing this document didn't bother reading it first. There seems to be absolutely no oversight or enforcement to this contract - other words, there is no sheriff in town.

If the state calls the paperwork and records that Faneuil prepares and presents to the state as evidence of compliance, then I would like for them to know that I have a wonderful piece of paradise in Louisiana that I would like to sell them.

It's kind of like putting the "fox" in charge of the henhouse.



When Faneuil throws us a tiny doggy bone, we are supposed to be so grateful. And, I am, after working there 15 years, I'm finally making $8.19 per hour. I guess that's the competitive pay that the contract states. The contract also states that there will be 3 levels of pay, according to years of service - which no collector that I have talked to has ever heard about.

In the contract they claim that they have provided collectors with a "good health care" package. That package has a $10,000.00 pay out per year by the insurance company. So one day in the hospital and your benefits are totally exhausted for the rest of the year. Of course, if a collector is sick enough to be in the hospital more than 1 day in the year, it's just tough. Mortgage your house to pay the hospital bill.

I claim protection under the "Whistleblower Act".

Career Employment on Florida's Toll Roads

I have worked as a toll collector on the Florida Toll Road for 15 years.The state outsourced all of us in 1996 to a company named Barton Security. Later, they were bought out by Allied Security and called Allied/Barton. The only thing that changed was that the benefits that employees received got less and we had to contribute more.In 2007 that contract was up for re-bid and the successful bidder this time was a company named Faneuil Group. After a few questionable situations and delays of the contract being awarded to Faneuil, the toll part of Faneuil Group was bought out by a person named Ronald Perleman (the 26th richest man in the United States) which would make a person wonder just how lucrative of a contract this is when a man of his means would go to such an extent to purchase the toll part of Faneuil Group and name part of it Faneuil, Inc.The one thing that happened immediately was hiring of a total new management team (who seem to manage mostly autocratically) because the treatment of collectors and supervisors got worse again. The benefits also got much worse. The health insurance plan (which is very important to employees today) is intirely laughable. It covers approximately 2 days in the hospital annually or $10,000.00 total annually.Money for Salaries and benefits that toll collectors once had is now alloted to Faneuil, Inc. for creating the new company and executives pay. The really bad part of all of this is that the management in the Tolls Operation has sit back and turn their heads and allowed all of this to happen. Otherwords, Toll Operations executives has thrown all toll collectors "under the bus" and have sit back and watched it happen and without any personal investigation on their part. They just take Faneuil's word for what is happening.It's kind of like putting the Fox in charge of the hen house and when the chickens start disappearing, you go and ask Mr. Fox what has happened to my chickens - and Mr. Fox replies with "they probably are just out for a walk", but they will be back, not to worry. And, of course, you would say "I knew you would have a logical explanation Mr. Fox. Most of us wouldn't accept that answer but the state executives say to Mr. Fox, I knew you would have an acceptable answer.If you were to ask the state Toll Operations Executives what the turnover rate has been while toll collectors were managed by state management and what it has been and is still now while being run by these outsourced companies, you will not get an answer.I can't even imagine how these executives sell this to our Representatives and Senators to get them to appropriate the money for doing this and justifying them doing it while still maintaining their own jobs.Obviously a career as a toll collector is not an option at all for young or middle aged people. You can work there a few months until another jobs comes along and get a paycheck but don't count on the benefits or the salary to make a living for your family.Just isn't possible under this situation. The reason I say this is after 15 years of employment with these outsourced companies, I now am making a great salary which is $8.19 per hour. I am currently 68 years old, so I could conceivable be making $9.00 an hour by the time I'm 80.



You would make more money working at Burger King than you would make being a toll collector. And, just to think, at one time people used to brag about working as a toll collector. When I first started for tolls, it took me about 2-1/2 years to get a full time position at one plaza. Now the turnover is so high, I have seen new collectors get full time positions after being a collector for less than a month. That should tell you something. And the state just keeps "turning a blind eye". Would make a person wonder why. I suspect the state maintained the revenue that they had been getting. The big losers in all of this outsourcing was toll collectors and supervisors. We not only lost money that we would have gotten but we lost a lot of the benefits that we received as state employees. Just who made out in all of this, I would say that it would be Faneuil, Inc. and Ronald Perelman.