Posted on 12/20/2005 12:49:08 AM PST by Bobalu
Strike Is On TWU Announces System-Wide Transit Strike, Starting Immediately December 20, 2005
# See the contingency plan
The fears of countless commuters have been realized this morning, as the Transport Workers Union announced at 3 a.m. that a system-wide public transit strike will begin immediately.
The announcement, made after a vote of the TWU's executive board, means that the union's 34,000 MTA employees will leave their posts at the end of their shifts, shutting down the city's subway and bus system and thwarting millions of commuters and countless tourists on the cusp of the holiday season.
"Our contract expired on Thursday at midnight, but we postponed a strike in deference to our riders," said TWU Local 100 President Roger Toussaint during the early-morning announcement. "All local TWU members are directed to report to the picket lines."
To the city's seven million commuters, Toussaint said: "For the riders, we ask for your understanding. Our fight is their fight."
Union officials say that all currently-running subway trains will complete their runs before being returned to the depots, assuring that no passengers currently in the system will be stranded.
Nevertheless, all trains and buses are expected to be idle by the time the morning commute gets underway.
Station agents and token booth attendants have been told to lock up the turnstiles, but stairway gates and "high gates" will be open to let passengers out of the system. Signal operators and switchmen will remain on the job until the last train has passed their location.
Similarly, the TWU says that no new bus routes will be started now that a strike has been declared, but that all currently-running buses will complete their runs so that no passengers are stranded.
A strike by the city's 34,000 transit workers is illegal under the state's Taylor Law, which provides for substantial fines against public workers who strike. City officials say a protracted transit strike will have a debilitating effect on the city and result in billions of dollars in lost business during the holidays.
"The TWU's action today is illegal and irresponsible," said MTA Chairman Peter Kalikow in a separate press conference following the union's announcement. "The MTA has made every effort to resolve this dispute and I guarantee the public that we will take every necessary step to bring this illegal action to a halt."
Kalikow said the state was preparing to file contempt charges against the union in response to the work stoppage.
The last time transit workers walked off the job was in April of 1980, when an eleven-day strike stranded commuters and resulted in millions of dollars in lost productivity. The TWU's local chapter was fined more than a million dollars for the stoppage.
After five days of high-level negotiations, the union rejected the MTA's final offer shortly before 11 p.m. Monday, then moved to their Upper West Side headquarters to formulate plans for the work stoppage.
The negotiations broke down after going almost two hours past the 9 p.m. deadline that the TWU had set for the MTA to present its final offer. Earlier in the evening, TWU officials asked the MTA to present its best offer at 9 p.m. so the TWU executive board could vote on it before midnight.
Earlier Monday, workers at two private bus lines began picketing in Queens to underscore the union's stance.
At a Monday morning press conference, Toussaint said that the union would agree to lower its wage demands to a six-percent increase for each year of the three-year contract if the MTA agreed to make security improvements. The TWU's new demand was double the three-percent raise per year that the MTA had offered.
Workers from Queens-based Triboro Coaches and Jamaica Bus Lines fulfilled their promise to walk off the job at 12:01 a.m. Monday, leaving 50,000 riders scrambling for other ways to get around.
The TWU imposed the partial strike after a deal wasn't reached by midnight Sunday. Toussaint joined the striking bus workers on the picket line in Queens Monday.
The MTA's head negotiator didn't sound very confident that a deal could be reached in time to avert a strike at a Sunday night press conference.
"I think in addition to the fact that there's no progress to report, I think the MTA is very concerned that we are down to the wire," said Gary Dellaverson. "Obviously the MTA does not have any deadline on these talks. We have said we will continue to negotiate for as long as it's fruitful."
On Friday, it looked like the MTA was done negotiating when Chairman Peter Kalikow said the contract offered after overnight talks was "the final offer." MTA officials went into talks Saturday maintaining that they would not budge from the offer rejected by transit workers early Friday morning.
The MTA’s contract proposal offers a nine-percent raise over three years, but the union is seeking more. The contract also requires new hires to pay one percent into their health plans, whereas under the current contract they pay nothing.
The final MTA proposal also sought to increase the retirement age for new hires from 55 to 62, but the union wants it lowered to 50.
As the clock ticked toward the strike deadline, hundreds of transit workers rallied Monday evening in front of Governor George Pataki's Midtown office.
TWU members who attended the rally said they were upset about the governor's refusal to enter the negotiations.
"[What] we need is Pataki and [Mayor Michael] Bloomberg [to] have a little talk with the boss of the transit," said one union member. "We need their support because there are no winners here, and who's at fault? Who's going to be losing? The people."
"The governor has been staying out of the picture so far, in my book,” said another TWU member. "He hasn't wanted to get involved, and I don't know what his reasons are but he needs to get involved by midnight tonight, otherwise the city is going to be shutdown to zero. There's going to be no transportation in all of the five boroughs."
Workers from other unions were at the rally in a show of solidarity for the TWU.
The union representing Metro North Railroad workers showed their support for the TWU at a Monday morning press conference, but it's still not entirely clear if those workers will walk off the job in support of their sister union.
"Metro North and the MTA have not budged one inch, but instead have continued with their, 'take it or leave it' type of approach," said Russell Oathou of the Metro North Labor Coalition.
Metro North's service is a critical part of the city's strike contingency plan.
Meanwhile, the mayor had some strong words for the union on Monday.
"A strike is illegal, let me just reiterate that," said Bloomberg. "A strike is illegal, and the city and state, courts, everybody is going to enforce the law. And anyone that thinks that they can just go break the law is sadly mistaken."
"There's a reason it's illegal, because of its impact on the people, eight million plus people who need our mass transit system to get around, not just to get to work but to get to see a doctor or to respond to an emergency,” said the governor. “That's why the law makes it illegal and that's why the law has very real penalties for those who break it."
A group that claims to represent more than 10,000 livery cab drivers says it will honor a strike by transit workers, which could make it much more difficult to get around the city in the event of a widespread work stoppage.
In the event of a strike, the city would waive restrictions and allow livery cabs and commuters vans to make curbside pickups along MTA bus routes.
However, the United Drivers Group of America says what the mayor is asking them to do is unfair.
"They were asking us to break the strike, to alter the way that we do our work every day, maybe go to areas that we don't normally go and picking up more than one passenger, which we don't do," said Julio Alvarez of United Drivers Group of America. "Like I said before, we are going to do what we normally do on a daily basis."
The group also says drivers are normally given tickets upwards of hundreds of dollars when they make curbside pick-ups, and it refuses to be "used" by the city to manage the overflow of people on the street.
The city comptroller’s office says the city would lose $1.6 billion in the first week of a transit strike, with the hardest economic blow coming on the first weekday. The price tag would also include employers who would move workers to smaller satellite offices and a possible drop in productivity if employees leave early to get a ride home.
If the buses and trains aren't running over the weekend, it would cost the city about $200 million, since there are fewer businesses open then.
The starting salary for a subway operator is $52,644 before overtime. By contrast, starting salaries for New York's cops, firefighters and sanitation workers are roughly half that amount.
What's more, the average station agent makes about $51,000, and subway cleaners earn about $40,000.
They are drowning in poverty aren't they(/sarcasm).
When you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. Unions are nothing but whiney scum sucking infantile parasites, protecting the mediocre (and worse) and using their members' dues to promote anti-American garbage candidates that most of the membership wouldn't even break bread with. As a (thankfully) former member of the IBEW, I know of which I speak.
Bloomberg is getting what he deserves. Hopefully he'll grow a set out of this incident and fire the lot of them. But I rather doubt that will happen. And frankly, my dear, I don't much givadam. BWAHAHAHAHAHA.
Ever been there?
I guess you've never seen the folks around Lincoln Center, or Central Park. I worked on an assignment about 8 years ago on 61st and Broadway. The females are very trim, and have a terrific walk.
LOL! (I can laugh -- I'm in Boston!) I heard his statement this morning, asking for New Yorkers to show their famous "patience and resilience." This is the same guy who was practically sending out storm troopers to be sure no NY business had even a clean, unused ashtray on the premises? An illegal strike, however, . . . well, patience and resilience is just the ticket here!
Not me.
Toussaint is originally from Trinidad.
Now that I think about, he does an Anglo accent.
Is this a word?
What a well-reasoned response.
It sure is. I use it all the time when I laugh at lieburrals.
Oh. okay. I thought it was one of those eubonics expressions used by "African-Americans."
/sarcasm
Now they can stop wasting liesure hours on excercise, and walk or bike work. MTA pre-holiday diet program.
Was your momma fat? Is that why you have this clinical fixation?
I scabbed as a banquet waitress when I was working my way through college.
It was DANGEROUS. And that was only waitressing.
The workers deserve more pay. Look at their labor. They have to stop the trains, then start them - stop, then start, stop then start - repeating this hundreds of time over a day. It becomes quite stressful and fatiguing. I feel for the poor oppressed workers.
Donchya just love it when the clueless drop in?
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