Airport worker raises grounded
Wage hikes for airport workers have been grounded by the Port Authority after airlines raised a legal challenge.
The PA had planned to take a final vote Thursday to set the minimum hourly salary for airport workers in New York and New Jersey at $19 in September 2023 — with full support from both states’ governors.
The agency opened the proposal for public comment in March, and that’s when the airlines threw a legal wrench in the works.
Airlines for America, a trade group, wrote in a letter that it “strongly opposes” the Port Authority’s plan of staggered raises. The organization argued that the bi-state agency “lacks the legal authority to regulate wages of third parties,” and any effort to do so would be trumped by federal law.
The Port Authority is creating a “patchwork of minimum wages” favoring one group of workers over another — like airport cleaners earning more than office cleaners — the airlines insisted.
The Port Authority board will vote Thursday to add another 30 days to the public comment period. The agency will use that time to analyze other issues raised about tipped workers, benefits, prices on retail goods sold at airports and small employers that operate in them.
In 2014, The Daily News highlighted the campaign to raise the minimum hourly salary for low-wage airport workers — who often toiled long hours and were sometimes forced to rely on government assistance to survive.
Each month, 32BJ SEIU union-organized airport workers have packed Port Authority board meetings to push for the raises to go through as planned.
“It’s disappointing to hear that the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is making airport workers wait to get a much deserved raise,” 32BJ SEIU President Hector Figueroa said Wednesday. “This delay means workers keeping our airports and the traveling public safe and secure will have to do without resources that help them take care of themselves and their families.”
A spokesman for Gov. Cuomo, who backed the effort along with New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, said the Port Authority will ultimately pass the wage increase.
“While we recognize the Port Authority has procedural obligations, we are confident it will do the right thing by airport workers and implement the wage increase this year,” Cuomo spokesman Peter Ajemian said.
Murphy spokesman Dan Bryan echoed that comment.
“Gov. Murphy believes that it is critical that airport workers on both sides of the Hudson receive equitable wages,” Bryan said. “He is confident that the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey will make this a reality.”
In March, with new leadership at the Port Authority, the board unanimously passed a resolution to hike minimum wages at airports to $19 an hour in September 2023.
The pay-raise schedule also closes the pay gap between airport workers in New York and New Jersey.
Airport workers at Newark Liberty will get a $2-an-hour boost, to $10.45, this September. The pay gap will close in 2019, when the minimum wage in both New York and New Jersey reaches $15.60 an hour for airport workers.