Transit Labor

As the temporary restraining order preventing the MTA from firing 475 station agents remained in place throughout the weekend, the relationship between the authority and the TWU grew icier. Transit announced layoffs in spite of the injunction, and MTA Chair and CEO Jay Walder has engaged in a war of words with TWU President John Samuelsen over what Walder believes to be antiquated work rules hampering the authority.

The first development arrived on Saturday morning when Transit announced that 250 station agents would be let go this week while the remaining 225 would be retained until, as the agency anticipates, the temporary injunction is lifted. Since the restraining order focused only on keeping the booths open, the authority decided it could do so with a skeletal staff.

“A temporary restraining order issued by a court Wednesday night put the MTA’s closure of the 42 subway booths on hold for now,” Transit said in a statement on Saturday. “In light of the order, the MTA is refraining from laying off the employees needed to staff those booths while the litigation proceeds. More than 250 of the station agents, however, are not required to keep those subway booths open, and those layoffs are now scheduled for next week to ensure that we achieve the maximum savings possible in light of the MTA’s budget shortfall.”

According to the Wall Street Journal, those to be fired are the burgundy vest-wearing station agents who roam fare-control areas and help customers with directions and problems that may arise. Union officials have long maintained that station agents are an integral part of the system’s security, but the jury is decidedly out on that claim.

The bigger labor-related headlines this weekend, though, concerned the clash between Samuelsen and Walder. Pete Donohue has the story:

Rules embedded in labor contracts are hampering the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s efforts to increase efficiency – and save money, Walder told the Daily News. “That has to change,” Walder said. “It might mean some of our bus drivers aren’t as good at playing pool as they are now, but we might have to bear that cost.”

Some bus depots have pool tables in crew rooms for drivers to use on their so-called swing shift, a period of time when drivers receive half-pay but aren’t behind the wheel. A typical bus driver’s schedule can span 12 hours: driving a route for four hours during the morning rush and another four hours in the evening rush, the peak travel periods when service is most needed. During the middle four hours – say, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. – drivers don’t have any work-related duties but are still on the clock.

Transport Workers Union Local 100 President John Samuelsen bristled at Walder’s comments. “Our bus operators are away from their families 13, 14 hours a day and are compensated for it,” Samuelsen said.

Donohue details have competing union contracts prevent the MTA from assigning drivers to shifts in other boroughs after rush hour, and the authority is instead left with idle workers. This work rule, though, seems to make some sense. The authority can’t expect to ask its drivers to commute to and from work twice a day just to avoid a few hours of downtime. The flexibility should come in reassigning drivers.

Where Walder has a real gripe though is here, writes Donohue: “He also is miffed that when a driver who is behind the wheel eight hours a day calls in sick, he gets paid for the full 12-hour ‘run,’ including the swing span.” The sick day provisions have come under fire.

I don’t expect the unions to budge right now. They’re being assailed on all sides as the MTA looks to cut its number of employees and scale back compensation practices. Walder, though, is taking this fight to the media. “We should have a well-paid and well-compensated workforce, ” he said to the Daily News. “but the quid pro quo of that is we should have a productive workforce. I think we have a series of work rules and practices that have developed over many years that are all about how people effectively get paid for not working. I think that’s really where the shame of the system is.”

TWU head John Samuelsen outside of the MTA HQ. Photo via the Daily News.

As the MTA has dealt with a budget deficit of $751 million this year, the authority has asked everyone to chip in. The agency is enacting nearly $100 million in service cuts to the city’s bus and subway network at the end of June; it plans to layoff numerous employees, some unionized and some not; it’s also searching high and low for new ways to cut administrative costs. With fare hikes seemingly off the table until 2011 and no more service cuts coming our way, the MTA’s ability to cover its deficit without a new source of revenue remains tenuous at best.

This week, the MTA unveiled plans to layoff even more workers come Independence Day. According to a report in The Times today, the authority will axe 550 employees who work on buses. Those pink slips will be handed out on June 27th when the city loses dozens of bus routes. Another 120 subway car inspectors will be fired as well.

Union officials, of course, spoke out against the cuts. John Samuelsen, head of TWU Local 100, said that his union will “not [] be blackmailed into allowing Jay Walder and MTA management to gut our contract.” Implicit in that statement is the belief that the MTA wouldn’t fire these workers if the TWU gave up the raises it has earned that will cost the MTA nearly $100 million this year.

Samuelsen instead would prefer to see the MTA shift stimulus funds to cover the operating deficit, and in an extensive interview with Streetsblog’s Ben Fried yesterday, he said as much. Walder and the MTA were given a billion dollars in federal stimulus money in 2009. Out of that billion dollars they could have used roughly $100 million to pay down the service cuts and to use for the operating budget,” he said. “So Walder, who had that money in the bank, and probably still has that money in the bank, refused to use that $100 million, and instead enacted $93 million in cuts across the board, Long Island Railroad, Metro North, and New York City Transit, and MTA bus.”

When asked by Streetsblog what he is doing in Albany with the power of the union to help the MTA, he spoke about forcing Walder to spend: “One thing we’ve done is we’re working on a bill in Albany that’s being carried by Joan Millman in the Assembly, and by Bill Perkins in the Senate, that will force the MTA to use 30 million of that available 100 million. It’s essentially the state legislature directing Jay Walder to use available funds that he has in order to stop the service cuts.”

Yet, Samuelsen is missing the forest for the trees. Will $30 million taken from the capital budget — the underfunded capital budget that supports numerous jobs throughout the state — make a difference in the MTA’s bottom line? That $30 million represents less than 5 percent of the agency’s overall deficit, the MTA would still be enacting service cuts and layoffs. Throwing a cup of water on a fire won’t stop the flames.

Meanwhile, Samuelsen is using his labor clout to push a bill that would “put a two year moratorium on any kind of service cut that the MTA proposes that could have a potential negative impact on rider safety in the subway.” Who will fund this measure, I wonder? The answer: Without more service, the MTA will have to enact higher fares.

While the TWU seems to be exploring legal options to restore the money the state stole from the MTA toward the end of 2009, the union is in no hurry to support revenue-generating proposals. When it comes to congestion pricing, Samuelsen said, “there’s a recognition by the union that we don’t want to hurt middle or working class people that have to drive their cars into Manhattan, or small business owners. But there’s also a recognition on our part that that’s an excellent funding mechanism for mass transit, and that it’s green, it’s good for the economy. And we’re down with that. So we’re still debating that amongst ourselves, what our exact position is going to be on that.”

The debate should be over. The only middle or working class people or small business owners who drive to Manhattan on a regular basis are those who can afford to pass the costs of congestion fee onto their customers. Plumbers, delivery men and other service-based drivers will simply up their costs while enjoying higher productivity due to decreased production. The overwhelming number of middle or working class New Yorkers simply do not drive into Manhattan on a daily basis, and most don’t own cars to begin with. The strawman should not defeat common sense.

In a way, it’s not surprising to see this reaction from Samuelsen. His number one priority is to defend his union members and their jobs. I’d be surprised if he weren’t trying to force through legislation that mandates the MTA to keep workers in stations, but at the same time, he has to recognize reality: The MTA is broke and staffs at levels that are far higher than necessary. We don’t need two-person teams running trains; we don’t need a person at every station entrance 24 hours a day. We don’t need antiquated work rules.

What we need is flexibility and a willingness to bend in the face of an unprecedented economic crisis. While I’ll be living with reduced service in two months, what will the union do with its political power? What will it give up?