Public Employee Press

CONTRACT NOW!
Tension builds at contract talks

By GREGORY N. HEIRES
with Jane LaTour

Union leaders are getting angry over the slow pace of the negotiations for a new economic agreement following a tense July bargaining session in which the city appeared to demonstrate little interest in wrapping up talks.

“These negotiations are going on longer than usual, and what the city has put on the table so far is unacceptable,” DC 37 Executive Director Lillian Roberts said.

“The money is there in the budget for a fair and reasonable wage increase, but despite settling with other unions, the city doesn’t seem to be willing to make any serious movement to reach a contract agreement with us,” she said.

The DC 37 Negotiating Committee, which is made up of the union’s 56 local presidents, met with the city on July 14.

Union: Pay offer is inadequate
The city upped its pay offer slightly. But union negotiators characterized the increase as inadequate and criticized the city for its failure to address other DC 37 demands.

Roberts told Labor Commissioner James F. Hanley that DC 37 is demanding the same pattern as other municipal unions, and she said the negotiating committee regards anything less as unacceptable.

With a projected $4.6 billion surplus for this year and extensive waste due to contracting out $9 billion in services annually, the city has the resources to fund the contract, noted Roberts.

The current contract expired on March 2. But while the negotiations continue, the terms of the expired contract remain in effect. The parties have met seven times since the collective bargaining talks opened in October 2007, almost a year ago.

The economic agreement covers about 100,000 DC 37 members at mayoral agencies throughout the city, as well as members at the Health and Hospitals Corp., the New York City Housing Authority, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the Off-Track Betting Corp. and cultural institutions.

The union demands include a “fair, equitable and living wage,” the preservation of current health benefits, the expansion of the dedicated leave program, increases in the meal and mileage allowances and a hike in the city’s contribution to the union welfare fund, which covers the union’s prescription drug and other benefits.

“We definitely are not where we would like to be at this stage in negotiations,” said Dennis Sullivan, director of the DC 37 Dept. of Research and Negotiations. “The members of this union must be treated fairly and equitably in the current round of bargaining between the city and the municipal unions,” he said.