Tentative Agreement Reached with Liberty Lines

MARCH 1—TWU Local 100's negotiating committee at Liberty Lines has reached a tentative agreement on a new five-year contract, covering over 700 employees of the Westchester system. The Local 100 Executive Board is set to review the agreement in the coming days. It provides for:

President John V. Chiarello at the MTA Board Meeting

Chiarello Slams Management on Radio Outages; Bus Defects

FEBRUARY 25—At this morning's MTA Board Meeting, Local 100 President John Chiarello addressed transit bosses, taking them to task for ignoring ongoing problems with the citywide bus radio system and pointing out other grave safety concerns.

"The outages to date have not been addressed with the union. The vendor's records have not been supplied to the union for all the updates that are happening," he said. 

Chiarello said the union didn't know whether the Bus Operators stuck in high snowdrifts during this week's blizzard, the worst in 10 years, were able to reach the command center on their radios.

Local 100 Holds Janno Lieber's Feet to the Fire on Bus Radio Outages

JANUARY 28—Local 100 and other members of the newly formed inter-union Safety Alliance held a press conference at the Union Hall this afternoon about the ongoing danger of bus radio outages, which have left Bus Operators unable to reach command during their shifts.

“There are still buses without operational radios on the streets of New York, and that is unacceptable,” said Local 100 President John Chiarello to the assembled press.

Chiarello also shared a previously unknown detail about the recent birth of a baby girl on a city bus.

“There was a Bus Operator who helped deliver a baby last week, who was praised by management, but what they didn’t tell you was that he had trouble getting through to command in that poor woman’s time of need. He did not get a response for five full minutes on the radio and had to use his cell phone to call 911 as this woman was in agony on the bus.”