T: Money worker caught lying down
Security video shows piles of cash
An MBTA surveillance camera captured a union worker in the much-maligned “money room” lying face-down on a yoga mat while cash lay scattered on a nearby table, T officials confirmed to the Herald.
The incident on Feb. 19 was never investigated and the worker wasn’t identified because it happened before the MBTA’s GM installed new employees to supervise the money-counting operation, officials said.
MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo confirmed the image, a still from surveillance video, came from a T camera inside the money room. The video shows the worker inside the manager’s office rolling out the mat, then lying down with her eyes closed.
Just outside the office, cash and latex gloves were strewn on a counting table. There appears to be another worker just around the corner from the table.
“It was not investigated because it happened two to three months before the change in leadership,” Pesaturo told the Herald. “We’ve already taken numerous steps to fix things there.”
The surveillance photo was provided to the Herald by the MBTA. Many, but not all, of the workers in the T’s fare collection operation come from the carmen’s union, which is fighting the Baker administration’s privatization efforts, but it’s unclear if the worker on the floor is from that union.
MBTA officials say all the workers in the money room, including the manager, were from unions at the time. A new, non-union manager took over a few months later as part of acting GM Brian Shortsleeve’s revamping of the operation due to concerns about lax security and discrepancies in the amount of cash collected.
MBTA officials said yesterday there was “no evidence” that any of the union workers in the moneycounting room had any medical issues that would have allowed them to take a break in the manager’s office lying down.
A spokesman for the Carmen’s Union Local 589 said he didn’t know whether the worker on the mat was from that union and declined to respond to questions about a possible medical problem that would justify the worker lying down on the job. But they raised the possibility that the worker sprawled out on the mat in the manager’s room was taking an allowed break. The time stamp on the video is 4:31 p.m. on Feb. 19.
The disclosure of the surveillance picture comes amid an escalating battle over a plan to replace union workers in the money counting operation with a private firm.
The Herald reported yesterday that a Carmen’s Union lawyer sent letters to several potential bidders for the money room contract, warning them they would have to negotiate with the union and if they didn’t, they could face legal action.
A union spokesman yesterday said letters to three vendors went out and demanded the T release the full audit of the money room.
Shortsleeve, who called the letter a “threat” to intimidate private firms to pass on the bid, also sent letters yesterday to potential bidders saying the union’s claim that privatizing the contract was illegal was “false and misleading.”
“The union’s letter is empty bluster designed to frighten away bidders,” Shortsleeve wrote. “Local 589 does not have any carryover rights with respect to employment or wages.”
Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh, who himself is under fire for the extortion indictments of two top aides for allegedly withholding permits to force a music festival into hiring union members, jumped into the fray yesterday, slamming the T for accusing the union of bullying tactics.
“The union can advocate however they want — the bullying question is getting a little ridiculous now,” Walsh said. “Unions advocate for their members, that’s what they do.”