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Standing Room Only as TWU Celebrates the Easter Rising on Quill Connolly Day

MARCH 15 -- Quill Connolly Day brought together Irish, British, Australian and Canadian trade unionists to celebrate the 100th Anniversary of Ireland's Easter Rising and its martyr, James Connolly, whose struggle provided so much to inspire the TWU's founder, Mike Quill, and his fight to organize the transit industry in New York City. President John Samuelsen keynoted the event, introducing Councilwoman Liz Crowley, who he called an outstanding supporter of labor in New York City. Samuelsen also held out the story of New York City's pedicab workers, who received crucial help from the TWU when their plight looked desperate. When the Mayor threatened to take their jobs away, these workers, he said, did what he hoped all those in similar circumstances in our industry would do -- reach out the the TWU. The Union's top leadership all atended the event and had places on the dais, including Secretary-Treasurer Earl Phillips, Recording Secretary LaTonya Crisp-Sauray, and Administrative VP Angel Giboryeaux. Jerome LaFragola, the TWU International's Director of the Transit Division, represented International President Harry Lombardo.

Mick Cash, the head of Britain's RMT -- the transit union that represents workers on the London Underground and many other properties in the UK -- gave a searing speech about inequality and the duty of labor to fight against it. Historian Brian Hanley recounted the grinding poverty which was the lot of Irish workers before the Easter Rising put them on a course to creating a powerful trade union movement. Canadian ATU Local 113's Bob Kinnear brought greetings from up North, and Sinn Fein MP from Armagh, Mickey Brady, spoke of his party's major successes recently in the polls and their strong ties to the Irish in America. Perhaps traveling the furthest to attend the evening's festivities was Luba Grigorovitch, Secretary of Australia's Rail, Tram, and Bus Union (TRBU) -- the highest ranking officer in that labor organization. Earlier in the day, she met with TWU Local 100 Recording Secretary LaTonya Crisp-Suaray and a delegation of TWU women. Grigorovitch, at 30, is fresh off a major victory involving a general strike of transport in Melbourne, resulting in pay increases for workers of twice the government's earlier offer. Enjoy the photos from the night and a longer account to follow in the TWU Bulletin.

A Wake-Up Call For Sleeping Riders

BY PETE DONOHUE

“Ladies and Gentlemen: This is an important message from the New York City Police Department: Wake the hell up!!!”

That’s not an official NYCT announcement but maybe it should be. Approximately 50% of subway crime victims are sleeping - or awake but not paying attention to their surroundings - when a thief steals their iPhone, wallet or some other property, according to police. “They don’t even realize they were crime victims until hours later,” NYPD Transit Bureau Police Chief Joseph Fox said.

Career pickpockets and thieves of varying skill carried out many of these thefts, but police have spotted a new trend: riders without criminal records stealing from other riders - just because it’s so easy, Fox said. “They are opportunists who have never been arrested before,” Fox said.

And there are plenty of opportunities. The new generation of riders is less fearful and less vigilant. Maybe that’s because weren’t around when taking the subway was a much riskier endeavor. There were approximately 48 felonies a day committed in 1990. In January and February of this year the daily average was about six felonies. Liam, a high school senior, became one of the first crime victims of the year after hitting the punch bowl a bit too hard at the New Year’s Eve party. He made it to the subway but then fell into a deep, deep slumber. Every Mariachi band in the city could have crammed into the empty car and our young straphanger would have snored right through it.

He woke up in the wrong borough – without his cell phone and wallet. A thief working the No. 1 line relieved him of his property. By the time Liam made it home to his very worried parents hours after his curfew the sun was rising. "I wanted to punch him in the face and hug him at the same time," his father said. “I told him he'd be punished by being grounded and by having me call him a rube every day for several weeks.”

So, don’t be a rube. As transit workers know, riders still need some street smarts underground. “Just think long and hard about when you close eyes, where you keep your property and where you sit,” Fox said.

WCBS: President Samuelsen demands more cops on buses.

TWU to MTA: Expanded Subway Patrols Are Not Enough

At a competing press conference held outside the MTA's 130 Livingston Street building, TA Surface VP JP Patafio said that the Mayor's announced plan to increase police patrols on the subways doesn't go far enough. As Mayor de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton spoke inside, JP, standing before a crowd of Bus Operators, made it clear that TWU Local 100 needs more resources assigned to cope with the epidemic of assaults on Bus Operators.

Another Day of Frustration as Pena Case Heads to 23rd Court Date

MARCH 3 -- Transit workers generally sit on the left side of Part 32 on the 13th Floor of Manhattan Criminal Court in the case of the people v. Domonic Whilby. Today, we filled those seats, assembling at 9AM only to hear Judge Gregory Carro, after an inaudible conference with the smiling attorney for the killer of our fallen Bus Operator, announce that there would be yet another postponement in the long-running case. Assistant District Attorney Randolph Clarke confirmed to Nancy Rodriguez, William Pena’s widow, that for an unexplained reason, the Corrections Department had failed to produce Whilby this morning so the trial could move forward. Coming out of the courtroom with dozens of transit workers, family attorney Sanford Rubenstein told members how important their presence is, and how important it will be going forward. At a press conference in front of the courthouse, Nancy Rodriguez, Willie’s widow, thanked transit workers for attending, commended the Union for standing with her family, and insisted that she is against any plea deal that would detract from the maximum penalty for the murder of her husband.

Lobby Day Rocks Albany as 1500 Transit Workers Stand Up for Pension Improvements and Security on the Job

1500 transit workers flooded Albany on March 1 as TWU's annual Lobby Day brought the rank and file out in force. TWU Local 100's top leadership ranged through the halls of the Legislative Office Building alongside members from every Department. We delivered packets of legislative agenda items to every legislator, and held scores of meetings with the elected officials. President Samuelsen met with Assembly Transportation Chair David Gantt on our quest to have more police officers assigned to details on buses to protect Operators. At the main event, TWU members were addressed by politicians including Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, Republican Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan, Senators Adriano Espaillat and Martin Dilan, Assemblymembers Peter Abbate, Denise Richardson, Walter Mosley, Latrice Walker, and many others.

Tops on our legislative agenda included a bill to "fix tier 6" -- alleviating the extra burden of pension contributions on our newest members. We also went to Albany to increase criminal penalties for assaults against Cleaners, provide due process for School Bus Drivers, get bus partitions installed in Westchester, enhance pensions for health conditions, and fight back against the "vision zero" law.

The day's actions were reported by Politico and other news outlets.

Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who were also at the rally, agreed that the issue of transit worker safety is crucial. “It pisses me off. No one should be assaulted on their jobs,” Flanagan, a Republican from Long Island, said at the rally while promising to partner with Heastie and Gov. Andrew Cuomo on a solution. Heastie agreed, calling transit workers “the blood and veins of the City of New York.”

Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, a Democrat from Yonkers, told workers at the rally that her father was a transit worker, and that the union was what allowed her family to be middle class. “What you do affects millions of people,” she said."

The day was also marked by union solidarity and union pride. Enjoy the slideshow -- see it by clicking on the image above.

Transit workers are on the front line and deserve pension fairness: Fix Tier VI!

BY PETE DONOHUE

Bus and subway workers may not carry guns or axes like cops and firefighters - but in a very real sense they too are on the front line. When the World Trade Center towers collapsed, thousands of transit workers volunteered, or were directed by the MTA, to work the pile. Many became seriously ill and some died for their service. As Superstorm Sandy barreled towards New York City, transit workers were ordered by the MTA into the mandatory coastal evacuation zones so they could quickly restore bus and subway service after the deadly storm passed.

When there is a shooting or stabbing or theft on a bus or subway train, transit workers are the first uniformed personnel on the scene. It’s not uncommon, meanwhile, for a transit worker to jump to the tracks and rescue a rider who has fallen from the platform and is in jeopardy of being hit by a train. But transit workers hired after 2012 contribute up to 6% of their pay for pensions – twice as much as police officers and firefighters hired after 2012.

“Transit workers are not police officers or firefighters, but like firefighters and police officers, transit workers have very unique, very important and very dangerous jobs,” TWU Local 100 President John Samuelsen said. “They deserve respect and pension fairness.”

The dangerous nature of transit workers’ jobs can’t be underestimated. Track workers contend with the electrified third rail and trains going through their work zones every few minutes. More than 240 transit workers – many trackmen struck by trains - were killed on the job since 1946. Four transit workers a day on average, meanwhile, are assaulted or harassed. The abuse includes being punched, spat upon, kicked and verbally threatened. Bus operators and train conductors are the public punching bag for the unhinged and riders frustrated to the point of violence about fare hikes, overcrowding, service delays and diversions. In one heinous attack, Bus Operator Edwin Thomas, 46, was stabbed to death in broad daylight in Brooklyn in 2008 by an ex-con farebeater.

More recent incidents include: a 62-year-old Bus Operator who was pummeled by a reportedly mentally-ill rider who first attacked while the bus, packed with passengers, was moving; a 69-year-old Bus Operator who was punched twice in the face by a young man reportedly upset that another bus didn’t stop for him earlier; a 52-year-old Bus Operator who was struck in the eye by a laser while driving, and Bus Operator who had a bottle thrown at him by a teenager at a bus stop. State legislation placed newly hired transit workers in the Tier VI pension class and mandated pension contributions jump from 2% to 6%. The Legislature should roll that back. Legislators should fix Tier VI.

Black History Celebration Unites Past and Future

#blacklivesmatter -- and for the TWU, the economic power of the Black middle class has always mattered. Civil rights and economic empowerment were celebrated on February 26th at the Union Hall, with a keynote address by noted black lives activist Walter Newsome and a reminiscence by Adam Clayton Powell IV, who remembered his father's proud stand along with TWU founder Mike Quill during the 1941 Bus Strike and Harlem boycott.

TWU Local 100 Secretary-Treasurer Earl Phillips opened the program by describing the early days of the Union, where we took our first stand for racial integration, demanding that bus mechanics -- his own title -- be hired with racial balance. The Irish unionists of that time had their own experiences with discrimination -- and were determined that their union would not perpetuate it

The Union's Black History event was -- as usual -- also marked by great entertainment and great food. In keeping with our tradition of activism, we heard from the talented spoken word poets of Split this Rock and enjoyed a dance performance of the New Beginnings Performing Arts Studio. A special Union welcome was extended to Firefighter Regina Wilson, President of the FDNY's Vulcan Society, and the first woman to hold that post. She described the discrimination that Black Firefighters -- both male and female -- have had to endure within the overwhelmingly white emergency service. The audience also heard from Thomas Giovanni, the Executive Assistant to NYC Corporation Counsel Zachary Taylor, himself only the second Black man to hold the position of the city's chief legal officer.

MC and TWU Local 100 Recording Secretary LaTonya Crisp-Sauray called every Division and Departmental officer up to the front of the room to show the depth and breadth of Black representation in the TWU's officer ranks. It was a dramatic demonstration of the progress of Black integration into the workforce and now into the leadership of the TWU.

TWU's Marvin Holland Honored with Legislative Conference Award

Our own Marvin Holland, Director of Political Action, and a constant presence in Albany, was honored earlier this month by the New York State Association of Black and Puerto Rican Legislators, Inc., the premier gathering of Black and Latino political leaders in the state. At the event, Brother Holland was presented with the organization's Labor Award, signifying "an individual who has made significant contributions on behalf of minorities in the labor movement." In this photo, he is joined by (l-r) Assemblywomen Rodneyse Bichotte, Latrice Walker, and Diana Richardson. Congratulations, Marvin!

Daily News's Hometown Heroes Salutes Transit Workers

FEBRUARY 24 -- The fourth annual Daily News Hometown Heroes of Transit is featured in today's paper, recapping yesterday's outstanding breakfast at the Edison Ballroom in midtown that showcased TWU Local 100 members who acted above and beyond the call of duty to help members of the public. In stories variously heart-warming and filled with drama, celebrity presenters like WCBS's Mary Calvi and WNBC's Darlene Rodriguez talked about the acts that merited these prestigious awards. TWU Local 100 President John Samuelsen expressed his pride in our members and their awards, and newly appointed NYCT CEO Ronnie Hakim also named and praised the TWU.