Cut jobs, & riders will pay: Union
Transit workers may slow down subways and buses as retaliation for an MTA proposal to layoff thousands of workers in its COVID-19 budget crunch, the president of their union said Wednesday.
“This is the utmost betrayal that MTA workers have ever seen,” Transport Workers Union President John Samuelsen told the Daily News. “It should not surprise anybody if this causes the system to be placed into a complete state of havoc.”
Straphangers saw some service hiccups last fall when Local 100, which represents a majority of the MTA’s 70,000 employees, was caught in a bitter contract fight with transit honchos.
Workers and union leaders used scrupulous safety checks to keep some buses from going into service. And over Thanksgiving weekend last year some subway crews used bathroom breaks to delay trains.
MTA officials say the agency needs $12 billion in relief from Congress by the end of 2021 to avoid the layoffs, which would also come with a 40% reduction in subway service and the elimination of entire bus routes.
Samuelsen hinted that the city could see worker action soon if the MTA doesn’t change its tune.
“MTA workers control this system. The bosses don’t,” said Samuelsen. “And an attack on MTA workers of this magnitude is surely going to be met with an appropriate response.”
Under the state’s Public Employees Fair Employment Act, known as the Taylor Law, it’s illegal for Samuelsen to formally endorse a work slowdown or to lead his members into a strike. Former TWU Local 100 president Roger Toussaint spent three days in jail following a 2005 transit strike that closed the city’s subways and buses for three days.
But the law hasn’t stopped Samuelsen from hinting at the idea.
MTA spokesman Ken Lovett said Samuelsen should focus instead on helping the agency lobby for a federal bailout.
“It would be more productive during this unprecedented fiscal crisis if our labor partners worked with us to secure the necessary $12 billion in federal COVID-19 emergency funding,” Lovett said.