Transport Workers Solidarity Committee

SF "top-level labor" Pressuring TWU 250-A Drivers To Make Concessions

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/03/09/BA9O1CD86C.DTL

Sleep with the fish: San Francisco Supervisor Sean Elsbernd was walking to pick up his 8-month-old son at day care Monday evening when his cell phone rang.

It was a local labor leader, calling to inform the Sunset District supervisor that his political career "is over" if he continues with his efforts to pass a charter amendment ending the guarantee that Muni drivers be the second-best-paid transit operators in the nation.

Interesting to note that the call came just days after a top-level labor sit-down at which leaders urged the Muni union to consent to enough givebacks to take the wind out of Elsbernd's amendment and thus avoid a costly fight at the polls in November.

The problem is that the Transport Workers Union Local 250-A itself is in the midst of power struggle between the African American old guard and the newer Latino and Asian American members led by union President Irwin Lum, and no agreement - on anything - appears in sight.

Unions Seek to Pry Loose Transit Stimulus Funding At National Transit Meeting On Feb 27th

Unions Seek to Pry Loose Transit Stimulus Funding

Eye on Operational Needs
By ARI PAUL

LARRY HANLEY: Only Feds can help.

Representatives of transit unions from around the country gathered Feb. 27 at the headquarters of Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ to discuss a national strategy to get the Federal Government to pump more money into mass transit, specifically for operational use.

Amalgamated Transit Union Vice President Larry Hanley said that transit systems in every major metropolitan area are facing layoffs—the Chicago Transit Authority has already laid off 1,100 workers—and that while the Federal Government has put stimulus money into transit, it has been restricted to capital construction budgets rather than day-today use.

‘Feds Handicapped Transit’

“They handicapped transit by saying that that money was restricted to new construction,” Mr. Hanley said of Congress and the White House.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Restrictions hurting systems.

As a result of the six-hour meeting, he said, transit union leaders and reps agreed that they needed a national lobbying campaign for more Federal money that would also involve working closely with rider advocacy and environmental groups.

YouTube - NYC TWU Local 100 Pres. John Samuelsen denounces MTA proposed service cuts, job elimination-"Targeted Attack Against New York Workers And Their Families"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xs1R_HrWRkI&feature=player_embedded

TWU Local 100 Pres. John Samuelsen denounces MTA proposed service cuts, job elimination

3,000 NYC TWU 100 Workers and Transit Supports Rally And Speak Out Against Attacks "Hell no, Mr. Walder."
http://www.twulocal100.org/node/3743

Outside MTA Public Hearings, The Union’s Voice Rings Out

A powerful rally on March 4 put over 3,000 TWU Local 100 members in the streets outside the MTA’s Manhattan Public Hearing at FIT. We were joined by a large contingent of high school and college students, vociferously protesting the MTA’s planned elimination of student metrocards. TWU Local 100 got strong support from allies in the union movement and government, including New York State AFL-CIO President Denis Hughes, PBA President Pat Lynch, RWDSU President Stuart Appelbaum, the UFT's Michael Mandel, DC 37’s Oliver Gray, Teamsters Local 237's Gregory Floyd, and Public Advocate Bill DiBlasio, to name a few. (Watch this page for videos, coming soon.)

President John Samuelsen trenchantly criticized MTA cuts as blatant disregard of workers and the needs of citizens. He called upon members to speak in a single voice: "Hell no, Mr. Walder. We will fight your attempts to steal our jobs; we will fight your attacks on our students; you will not destroy our transit system."

Budget Woes Prompt Privatization Fights in Public Transit
http://labornotes.org/2010/02/budget-woes-prompt-privatization-fights-public-transit

Evan Rohar| March 1, 2010

In late January members of AFSCME Local 3299 surrounded a newly privatized non-union bus at a Berkeley lab. The University of California recently contracted out one bus line—but the union has stopped the administration's drive to privatize all service at Berkeley. Photo: Liz Perlman

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As budget-butchering legislators and executives slash away at public services and public workers, they’re reaching for a familiar tactic: privatization.

Privatization Watch, an information clearinghouse, counts 411 battles over privatization between 2008 and 2009, from a riot at a Kentucky prison provoked by a contractor’s lousy food to a Republican governor in Indiana who killed a billion-dollar contract to outsource welfare-benefits after big delays and denials to qualified applicants.

Only 30 proposed privatizations were stopped. But one arena where unions are generating outsized heat lately is transit.

NYC M.T.A. Delays A and E Plans for Reality Show on Subway Workers
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/nyregion/02reality.html?scp=1&sq=tv show transit&st=cse

And, Cut! Money Woes Delay a TV Reality Show on Subway Workers
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
Published: March 1, 2010

It is not your typical subway series.

Who knows what drama lurks beneath the city? Transit officials may let the A&E network find out, but not immediately.
For months, officials at theMetropolitan Transportation Authorityhave been working with television producers on a reality show set in and around the New York City subway. The series, commissioned by the A&E network, would follow an ensemble cast of train conductors, station agents and other subway workers as they handle track fires, angry customers and the grind of running the country’s biggest mass transit system.

But as with many of the authority’s major projects, the show is now facing a delay. Citing hard financial times, transit officials said they were halting work on the show, even though shooting had started last month for a 15-minute sample episode — the first step toward a pilot and potentially a full season.

“I still want to do it at some point,” said Christopher Boylan, the authority’s top marketing officer. “It may not make sense to do it right away.”

SF TWU250-A Drivers & Riders Rally & March Against Attack On Transit Workers And Public
http://blip.tv/file/3287978

On March 1, 2010 in San Francisco hundreds of MUNI TWU 250-A drivers
and riders joined in rallies and a march to demand that the cutbacks and
attacks on Muni workers end. SF Mayor Newsom and his appointed MTA
board have sought to pit the TWU 250-A drivers against the public by
saying that unless they took concessions on their wages and pensions
the city would have to increase fares for the elderly, students and the
disabled. Already over 100 operators have been layed off by the city.
Produced by Labor Video Project, P.O. Box 720027, San Francisco, CA 94172
laborvideo.blip.tv www.laborvideo.org (415)282-1908

Battles over safety are at heart of UK rail disputes
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=20365

Posted: 7.25pm Tuesday 23 February 2010

News

Battles over safety are at the heart of rail disputes

Workers from National Rail protesting outside the transport department this week

by Matthew Cookson

Crucial struggles over safety are taking place across Britain’s rail and tube networks.

The rail regulator has told Network Rail, the company responsible for maintaining Britain’s railways, to make “efficiency savings” of 21 percent over the next five years.

“Privatisation has led to repeated attempts to cut maintenance,” said Dave Barnes, a Network Rail worker and member of the TSSA union.

“If this continues then the railways will no longer be safe. These cuts risk more disasters, such as Potters Bar, Grayrigg or Hatfield.”

Bosses are planning to begin their huge programme of cuts by slashing 1,500 rail maintenance jobs.

Safety has already been compromised by previous cuts. The RMT union has produced a report with information from hundreds of maintenance workers.

It shows that there are reduced track safety inspections, delays in the repair of faulty level crossings and reduced safety checks on railway signals.

Rallying for Mass UE union bus drivers
http://socialistworker.org/2010/02/23/rallying-for-bus-drivers

Rallying for union bus drivers
By Mark Clinton | February 23, 2010

GREENFIELD, Mass.--At least 100 members and supporters of United Electrical Workers (UE) Local 274 turned out February 20 to show the fighting spirit that ledNation columnist John Nichols to name UE the country's "most-valuable union" in 2008.

People gathered bright and early in this small, now largely reindustrialized, city in northwestern Massachusetts, to demand that the Franklin Regional Transit Authority (FRTA) stop trying to enforce a policy prohibiting the long-standing practice of UE demand-response bus drivers from assisting passengers into and out of the buses, as well as into and out of their homes as needed.

Demand-response buses provide for the transportation needs of senior citizens. One UE member denounced FRTA's policy, observing, "The only good management rule is one that's broken."

In an inspiring show of solidarity, members of UE locals in Vermont, Connecticut, New York, Boston and Pittsburgh attended the rally and joined the picket line, some carrying signs that demanded FRTA stop "throwing grandma under the bus." Senior citizens with walkers and canes held signs thanking UE drivers for their dedication.

SF Examiner Bosses Blame Driver salaries for fueling deficit

http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/Driver-salaries-fueling-deficit-84933332.html

Driver salaries fueling deficit
By: JOSHUA SABATINI
Examiner Staff Writer
February 22, 2010

As The City’s mass transit commuters are being threatened with another round of fare increases and service reductions, Muni’s operators are raking in thousands of dollars in overtime — even as they are guaranteed by city law to have the second-highest wages in the nation.
The average base pay for a Muni operator — those who drive buses, cable cars and light-rail vehicles — is roughly $60,000, which is determined by a City Charter mandate that says they must be among the top paid in the country.
And Muni’s 2,350 operators are almost guaranteed a bevy of overtime pay. In calendar year 2009, 622 Muni operators raked in more than $80,000 in total pay, including 82 who brought home more than $100,000.
More than 400 operators were paid overtime in excess of $20,000. One operator earned as much as $78,722 in overtime and brought home a total of $146,498 in pay last year. Seventeen operators earned more than $51,000 in overtime, contributing to more than $100,000 in take-home pay for the year, according to data obtained from the city controller.