News from TWU Local 100

Rain Doesn't Matter as We March in the West Indian Day Parade

West Indian Day Parade 2019

SEPTEMBER 2 -- Led by President Tony Utano, Local 100 marched proudly up Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn, rain notwithstanding. Joining the TWU contingent were longtime political allies NYS Attorney General Tish James and NYS Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, in addition to Congressman Hakeem Jeffries and various City Council members. The TWU float provided a much-appreciated pick me up to spectators who were braving the elements. Along with the float, we fielded an array of costumed dancers along with an old-school City Bus. Enjoy the photos and make plans to join us next year.

30 Apprentices Graduate; Heading to MOW and Better Careers

<Apprentices Graduate Summer 2019

At 38 years of age, Sakina Brown, a NYC Transit Cleaner (scroll through the photos -- she's in blue shirt and white pants with her two daughters), went back to school. She spent six months learning carpentry, masonry, plumbing and electrical in the industrial classrooms and tool-laden shops of The Apex Technical School in Long Island City, Queens. At night, Brown, a single mother of two daughters, studied take-home materials, including building codes, and prepared for tests on both theory and application.

It all paid off on Monday, Aug. 26, when Brown – in front of her two girls, her mother, sister and two nieces – graduated along with 29 other transit workers. They are now Transit Structure Apprentices - and solidly on new career paths as tradesmen and tradeswomen. “I’m proud of myself,” Brown said. “It’s a big accomplishment, and I’m grateful. Because the union gave me this opportunity, it will be so much easier for me to get a promotion and better pay.”

Part of the training included building two small structures – one brick and one wood framed – with fully functioning electrical systems and plumbing.  “It was tough,” graduate Craig Hodge, 40, a former CTA, said. “When everyone got here they all probably thought it was going to be a cakewalk but it was challenging. We had to learn so much in a short amount of time.” For the next three years, Brown and the other graduates of the program, which is administered by the TWU Local 100/NYCT Training & Upgrading Fund, will work side-by side with Transit carpenters, masons, electricians and plumbers. The next step will be elevation into Maintainer titles.

“Congratulations,” Local 100 President Tony Utano told the graduates at a ceremony at the Queensboro Plaza school. “Today, a trade is like gold. They don’t have enough people in the trades in the city, state and country. Everbody learns computers, but they don’t know how to fix and build things.” Local 100 Secretary-Treasurer Earl Phillips, Administrative Vice President Nelson Rivera and Car Equipment Vice President Shirley Martin also were on hand to congratulate the grads. “You should very proud of yourselves,” Rivera said. “You made a big accomplishment. Every one of you.” He urged the group to learn from the veterans in the field, and to share their knowledge with the union brothers and sisters that come up behind them.

TWU Local 100 secured NYC Transit funding for the program in contract negotiations. This was the third transit class to graduate from Apex since the trades program was revived three years ago, TUF Director Charles Jenkins said.

Utano Calls for Mobilization for our Contract; Remarks at the Union Hall

On Thursday, August 29, President Tony Utano called for members to mobilize for a massive contract rally in October. In honoring students who won union scholarships, he brought attention to the power of the union in bettering the lives of transit families. He then turned to the subject of the MTA and the need for a demonstration of union power. You can read the MTA's contract demands here. You can read the Union's demands here.

In Today's Daily News, Utano Blasts MTA Chairman Foye's Contract Proposal

AUGUST 27 -- Local 100 President Tony Utano responds to the MTA's latest contract proposal on the editorial page of today's Daily News. The piece, which was retweeted by the NYC Central Labor Council, puts responsbility on the MTA for not acknowledging the dedication and commitment of the transit workforce, which has been responsible for the restoration of a state of good repair and continued improvements in service statistics. Here is the text of President Utano's Op-Ed:

Transit workers know garbage when they see it. After all, we remove tons of it from the subway and bus system every day. The contract demands that MTA Chairman Pat Foye wants to impose on transit workers are garbage. They include attacking our health insurance, converting full-time jobs to part-time positions, and giving more work to expensive private contractors.

Are they out of their minds? Do they think living in New York has gotten less expensive? Do they think it’s cheaper to buy groceries, pay the rent, pay the mortgage or send your kids to college? Do people have part-time families that can be supported by part-time work? For 85 years, transit workers and Transport Workers Union Local 100 have fought to establish a decent standard of living for the men and women who move millions of people a day. We’re not going backwards. We will fight these demands together.

The MTA desperately wants riders to believe that bus and subway workers, and the contracts we negotiated with the MTA over the years, are to blame for its inability to close budget gaps. In reality, the problem has been gross mismanagement, as The New York Daily News has accurately reported many times. As the paper reported earlier this month: “Bad management caused the MTA to bust its overtime budget last year, says a consultant who shot down allegations of widespread overtime abuse in the cash-strapped agency.” As it reported last month: “MTA foul-ups led to extensive delays and budget overruns in critical subway upgrades, new controller report says….The controller’s reports said that several boneheaded moves by MTA officials were responsible for much of the delay.”

And in June: “Decades of mismanagement forced the MTA into a costly cleanup of subway drains — a multi-million dollar repair job necessary to speed trains and improve service.” Mismanagement didn’t start under Foye, but it continued under his watch. He was MTA president between August 2017 and April 2019, when he became chairman. Foye recently claimed transit workers are taking too much time off and are needlessly driving up labor costs. I don’t know how he came up with the “availability” statistics he cited without explanation at an MTA board meeting, and I don’t really trust them. I do know, however, about the conditions under which Local 100 members work. We work under live train traffic and around electrified third rails. We work in the extreme cold and extreme heat. We breathe in diesel fumes in bus depots and steel dust in subway tunnels. And we suffer for it.

We move 7.8 million riders a day. That includes people who are sick themselves, sneezing and coughing because they have some type of contagious virus. We get sick because of the environment we work in. In the last two years, nearly 2,300 bus and subway workers were hurt in on-the-job accidents in the tunnels, repair shops, rail yards, bus depots and other parts of the system. Another 550 subway conductors, bus operators, train operators, and workers in other titles, were attacked and assaulted. Nearly 280 train crewmembers were traumatized because someone jumped, fell or was pushed in front of their subway train. Transit workers were spit upon 358 times in those two years. This is all according to the Transit Authority’s own numbers.

TWU Local 100 members endure all of this while carrying an enormous responsibility. Whether we are operating a bus or a train, fixing decades-old signals and track, or maintaining train cars, the lives of millions of people are in our hands every day.  Foye is making a mistake. Transit workers are angry. They are fed up. They are sick and tired of being assaulted on the job for wearing the MTA uniform. And they are disgusted at the MTA for dragging their reputations through the mud. It’s a shameful and dangerous attempt to turn riders against workers. You think you hate the MTA? You should try working for it.

You can read the MTA's contract demands here.

You can read the Union's contract demands here.

Executive Board Unanimously Rejects MTA Contract Demands

IB ImageAUGUST 19 -- The TWU Local 100 Executive Board today unanimously passed a motion rejecting a series of contract demands from the MTA.
 
"If the MTA's goal was to enrage every transit worker in the city then they've done it," TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano said. "We will do everything in our power to fight these insulting contract demands. Transit workers have worked too hard to improve service - and this union has worked too hard over decades to establish a decent standard of living for our members - to now go backwards."
 
Click here for the full resolution passed by your Executive Board. Click here for the flyer on the Union's position.

Union to Honor Transit 9/11 Workers on Sept 5

Over 3,000 transit workers took part in the rescue and recovery effort on and after 9/11/2001. When the towers went down, tons of rocks and rubble had to be removed so that rescue crews could get to underground spaces where people people might have survived. In the first days, transit provided the heavy equipment to do that job. We also used lo-boys and other rigs to move abandoned cars, cleaned and inspected subway stations in the area, and brought hundreds of rescue personnel to the scene on city buses -- along with rescuing many who were trapped by the cloud of debris. But the story of what transit workers did at 9/11 has not gotten the recognition it deserves. For that reason, we hold our annual commemoration of 9/11 and transit's role in the rescue and recovery effort. Join your fellow TWU Local 100 brothers and sisters on Thursday, September 5th at the Union Hall for a 5pm event. Union members who participated in rescue and recovery are entitled to receive a commemorative pin. To receive the pin, we ask that you fill out an affidavit which will be notarized at the event, attesting to your service. Those who have been injured and have verified Victim's Compensation Fund claims are entitled to receive our official medal. For more information about the pins and medals, click here.

Frank Gurrera Recounts a Life Well-Lived

Frank Gurrera, at 94, is the oldest Local 100 member still punching the clock five days a week at the Coney Island Overhaul Shop.  He has been a machinist with NYCT for 49 years, most of them spent working at CIOH.

Frank recently sat down with a historian from the Coney Island History Project for an interview about his life as a transit worker, a veteran of World War II, and as a life-long resident of Brooklyn.

Frank’s poignant life-story of modest heroism, professional accomplishments, and steadfast belief in working in a union shop is a must listen:
http://www.coneyislandhistory.org/oral-history-archive/frank-gurrera

Utano Reacts to Bill that Would Create Felony for Attacking Police with Water

JULY 31 -- TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano released the following statement regarding proposed legislation that would make it a felony to attack police officers with water.

"No disrespect to police officers, but if you are going to make dousing a police officer with water a felony then you should also make spitting on a transit worker, or police officer, a felony. Bus and subway workers were spit at more than 150 times last year. In the subways alone, 13 were spit at this month (July). There is nothing more disgusting or vile than this type of abuse that transit workers are subjected to for just wearing the MTA uniform. Spitting is now just considered harassment, a violation, under the law. It’s offensively weak and needs to change."

Assemblyman Mike LiPetri of Long Island and Assemblyman Michael Reilly of Staten Island have announced plans to introduce legislation making it a felony to douse police officers with water after videos emerged of police officers getting soaked in several neighborhoods. Today's coverage of the proposed bill in the Daily News included President Utano's statement.

 

Eric Boyo, Train Operator, Lauded for Saving a Woman's Life

JULY 31 -- Train Operator Eric Boyo – and by extension all transit workers – received some well-deserved positive press on a grand scale this week. Television reporters from ABC, CBS, NBC, NY1 and WPIX11 – along with print reporters from The New York Daily News and AMNY – attended a press conference that Local 100 convened on Tuesday to showcase Boyo for saving a woman who jumped to the G-train tracks late Monday afternoon.

Boyo, who was approaching the Fulton St. station at about 37 miles per hour, alertly observed a rider on the platform urgently waving at him. He started to slow down and then activated the emergency brakes when he saw the woman on the tracks in front of him. The woman had jumped to the tracks moments earlier in an apparent suicide attempt, authorities said. Boyo’s  train came to halt approximately 75 to 100 feet from the woman, he told reporters. He then calmly helped her up to the platform with assistance from riders.

“My biggest concern was, ‘Is this person OK?’ ” Boyo told the flock of reporters. Asked if he considered himself a hero, Boyo humbly said, “We’re just doing our jobs…this is what we do.”

RTO Vice President Eric Loegel and Train Operators Chairman Zachary Arcidiacono, however, proudly and correctly declared Boyo a hero. “I want to commend Train Operator Boyo for his heroic acts,” Loegel said. “His professionalism, diligence and compassion saved a woman’s life. While something like this may seem remarkable, for a man like Eric and for our transit workers as a whole, like he said, this is what we do. These sorts of things are not always noticed, but this is reflective of the kind of person that he is and the kind of workforce we have as New York City transit workers. Arcidiacono said: “His alertness, his quick reaction time, his professionalism, his calm demeanor, is what our Train Operators and train crews bring to the job every day.”

Utano Tells MTA Board Cuts Can't Come from TWU Workforce

JULY 24 -- TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano, in remarks to the MTA Board of Directors, cautioned the Board that projected cuts can't come from the TWU represented workforce without 'tremendous consequences.' He also brought attention to a spate of recent assaults on transit workers and to our members' roles in successfully navigating the massive power outage that hit Manhattan along with a computer crash that stalled subway service.

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