UPDATE: On Wednesday, May 7, Governor Paterson signed into law a funding bill for the MTA. This bill will provide the MTA with sufficient funds to avert all layoffs, prevent most service cuts and limit fare hikes.
 
Local 100’s leadership, working with NYS legislative leaders, received assurances the previous day that the MTA was told “No Layoffs!” as a condition for the funding.
 
This is a victory for all Local 100 and for over 1,000 members – Bus Operators, Maintainers and Station Agents – whose jobs were on the MTA’s chopping block. The resolution of this crisis means that there will be no layoffs in stations, buses, or any other TA department in which Local 100 members are employed.
 
Led by Acting President Curtis Tate and Administrative VP Barry Roberts, a Local 100 contingent including all seven departmental VPs, as well as over twenty Executive Board members was in Albany all day long on Tuesday to push for action.

Acting President Tate, joined by Barry Roberts and Station VP Andreeva Pinder, met with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith, and Governor Paterson.

Vice Presidents Stephan Thomas from TAS, Nelson Rivera from CED and Brian Clarke from MaBSTOA  led teams that met with other key legislators.

Legislative leaders met with the MTA representatives and grilled them regarding reports that, bailout or no bailout, they had embedded layoffs into their budget.  At the insistence of Local 100, legislative leaders made clear that the bailout would not move without assurances from the MTA that there would be no surprises or double-dealing in this regard. We will remain vigilant to  ensure that threats to our livelihoods do not reoccur.

Backing up our activities in Albany were other mobilizations back home. These included informational leafleting outside the offices of three NYC Republican Senators who did not support funding and swing time calls to those offices from hundreds of members in both MaBSTOA and TA Surface. These actions built on the success of the “Hands Off Our Jobs” rally outside MTA headquarters ten days earlier, and our annual Lobby Day the previous month.

Congratulations to all Local 100 members who took part in these mobilizations!

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