BART Strike Back On Workers Isolated by Own Unions

The strike is on again in San Francisco after a long tango between BART management, their lead anti-union negotiator, Thomas Hook, and Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 and SIEU Local 1021. The fist strike back in July was called off by the unions and further delayed by the intervention of State Governor Jerry Brown who sought and obtained a court ordered 60 day cooling off period. That cooling off period has expired and with the unions and BART management making little progress the strike is back on again.

According to one report "The strike is an expression of deep opposition among transit workers to the demands of BART management, which is backed by the political establishment and media in the Bay Area and California. These demands include significant cuts in health care and pension benefits, along with changes in job rules designed to significantly reduce pay and increase management power."

The unions involved in the negotiations have conceded to most of management's demands but they know that such concessions remain deeply resented by their local membership who are unlikely to vote in favour of a sell out deal at their expense.

The sister local to ATU 1555, ATU local 192, representing bus drivers employed by AC Transit issued a strike notice after its members twice voted down sell out deals recommended to them by their leadership. During the first strike AC Transit was an essential tool in BART management's strategy of blunting the impact of the strike by running buses across the Bay area. While there was expressions of solidarity between BART workers and AC Transit drivers prior to the first strike, the ATU leadership deliberately sabotaged the tactic of a united union front in the face of management intransigence during the negotaitons by both BART and AC Transit officials.

A worker interviewed   at a rally in support of the strike "noted that, just as with the first BART strike in July, the transit workers were not receiving any strike pay. Workers will receive a meager $25 a week in strike pay only if it lasts more than two or three weeks, he said." For many workers this second strike appears to be a continuation of the first one, which was shut down by the unions with the promise that management would bargain fairly. “This is pretty much a continuation of the first strike,” said one worker. “They never really negotiated so I think of this as the sixth day of our strike.”

Workers are aware and deeply suspicious of the role their unions have been taking in the strike, knowing full well that Governor Brown would seek the court imposed injunction, and instead of devising a common strike strategy between BART workers and AC Transit drivers, deliberately keeping them apart so that AC Transit drivers would be forced to work as scabs in the event of a strike by BART subway workers.

Only one day after the strike began two BART maintenance workers who were checking a section of track were struck and killed by a San Francisco Bay area commuter train. Because of the ongoing transit strike a non-union employee was operating the train. According to  the police deputy chief for Bay Area Rapid Transit the driver in the accident was “qualified.” Apparently at the time of the accident, the train was "being run in automatic mode under computer control."

BART Assistant General Manager, Paul Oversier,  told reporters that one of the two workers, whose names were not released, was with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Oversier said. The union is not on strike but had asked members to show up on picket lines to support other workers. The employee "chose to come to work," Oversier said.

In its twitter feed ATU Local 1555 said it would suspend picketing for one day due to the recent tragedy and out of respect for the families involved. On Saturday night, picketers held candlelight vigils for the two workers killed. The Local 1555 twitter post stated "Our hearts go out to any @SFBART comrades involved in today's incident. In the midst of this #BARTstrike, NO ONE deserves to die."

ATU 57th Convention Proposes Service Councils

The 57th Convention promises to change the way negotiations are done by increasing the use of "service councils" that the ATU constitution already provides for. The idea is to create service councils consisting of several locals with a common employer. The service council would discuss issues, respond to problems and centralize arbitrations. They would also negotiate a single contract for all members working for a common employer. The councils would be made up of the of the president and financial secretary of the local included in a particular council. Are you suspicious of how these service councils are going to work? Take a look at how this kind of centralization played itself out in the SEIU. Is this how the International is going to take "our" voice away? Is the real purpose here to stop members from having a say in their local. And is this just a vehicle to allow the International to keep the dues money flowing in while negotiating concessionary contracts with employers?

Back in 2009, Stan Lyles was a rank-and-file California hospital worker who attacked SEIU for being undemocratic, cutting backroom deals with Bosses, and selling out the union’s members. Listen to what he has to say about the actions of the International and how the membership of his local dealt with the situation.

Watch Video

Local 192 Rank and File Speak Out Vote "NO" to AC Transit

Facts For Working People reports that AC Transit workers, members of Amalgamated Transit Union 192, rejected a contract yesterday by a vote of 576 to 257. The local's executive board had recommended the contract by a 8 to 5 majority. This is an extremely important result in that BART workers are also still in contract talks although the state has stepped in and imposed a 60"cooling off" period preventing a strike. The train operators at BART are members of ATU 1555, the bus driver's sister local.

The no vote reflects the strong opposition to a concessionary contract and an organized campaign for rejection among the ranks of local 192. A solidarity committee composed of workers from other unions and the community also provided support and solidarity to local 192 members.

This is an opportunity for labor to go on the offensive and to do that we must raise our expectations.

By this I mean reject the propaganda from the bosses and their media (and echoed by the union officialdom) that concessions have to be made and that there is no money in society. The last 40 years have shown that this concessionary bargaining has no end to it---damage control doesn't work. The more we give, the more they want. Transit unions should demand that public sector pensions and benefits that are being blamed for the crisis of capitalism should be expanded to all workers. Sociey has the money, it's simply a matter of what we do with it.

Any time the rank and file of a union rejects the leadership's recommendation in instances like this, it is no small matter. This vote will send shock waves in to the boardrooms of the corporate and investment community we can be certain of that.

In the aftermath of this vote, the bosses will be working with the union hierarchy behind the scenes to get something passed and put an end to this. The membership must be brought to their senses as defined by the 1% and their representatives. Any sign of unity in action between the various unions will be met with counters by the employers. Attempts to divide the workers, blue collar against white, bus drivers against train operators, must be fought. One local will be offered the carrot in order to break intra-union unity. This will be done through the leadership and the ranks that have spoken through this vote must ensure this is not successful. The involvement of the community will also increase these divisive tactics from management as well and the best way to combat this is through active committees of rank and file workers and the community.

Congratulations to ATU members who have taken a stand and have no doubt given a great boost to our brothers and sisters at BART. But the war will heat up now. The dirty tricks, lies and propaganda will intensify in subtle and not so subtle ways. The union officialdom at the international level and throughout the AFL-CIO will be working behind the scenes with their allies in the Democratic Party to derail what could develop in to a movement that would undermine their view of the world, and that threatens the relationship they have built with the bosses based on labor peace. Any union official that breaks from this approach would be a positive but the best security is the conscious intervention of the rank and file.

The following video presents the voice of rank and file members of Local 192 on the negotiations and the representation they are getting from their union officers in the ATU; Don't Piss On Me and Tell Me It's Raining

ATU Backs Down Agrees to Sell Out Contract

This report is from the World Socialist Web Site

Late Tuesday night, the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) called off the strike scheduled for Wednesday morning and announced that it had agreed to a new contract with AC Transit (ACT) the public bus system for the East Bay in Northern California.

The ATU represents bus drivers, dispatchers, maintenance workers, and clerical staff at AC Transit, which has a daily ridership of approximately 180,000. AC Transit workers have been without a contract since the beginning of July. At stake in the negotiations were workers’ demands for higher wages and ACT’s demand for concessions on health care contributions. According to one driver, the transit workers have not had an effective raise in 15 years.

The final deal agreed to by the union leaders and management includes a 9.5 percent raise over three years and employee contributions to health care that rise to $180 a month in the third year. For a worker who makes the average income of $55,000 this would mean a net loss over the life of the contract. The average three year inflation rate in the US has stayed above eight percent for the past several years and the increased health care contribution amounts to a 3.5 percent wage cut for the average worker.

AC Transit workers have clearly shown their willingness to fight for a better deal, but they have been held back by their union. Before the contract expired, ATU members voted 97.4 percent in favor of a strike. The contract expired on July 1, the same day that BART workers, also represented by the ATU, saw their contracts expire.

In the face of widespread support for a common struggle by BART and ACT workers, the ATU leadership refused to let the two groups go on strike at the same time. The ATU demonstrated what they considered “solidarity” by agreeing to increase bus service during the BART strike, essentially pushing their members to act as strikebreakers.

During the strike AC Transit workers repeatedly complained that their union was not giving them information on contract negotiations and that they were not being respected at union meetings. To stem growing discontent among their members the union announced last Monday that it intended to strike Wednesday morning. Rather than actually follow through with the strike, the union leadership accepted an offer that was substantially the same as the management had proposed before the strike notification.

The last thing the ATU leadership wanted was any kind of combined strike which would have immediately brought the unions into conflict with public officials in the Democratic Party. California state governor Jerry Brown, a Democrat, has fiercely slashed budgets and championed public pension “reform,” which amounts to an end to defined benefit plans and an across-the-board assault on benefits. Brown and the Democratic Party enjoy the full-throated support of the unions, which function to block any opposition developing among workers to these policies.

The fact that the ATU leadership felt the need to announce a strike they had no intention of conducting points to a growing militancy of their membership. During the BART strike workers were often heard saying that if AC Transit and BART struck together, “that would be a shot heard round the world,” and “management would fold in a day.”

The 1968 Chicago Transit Strike

This may be the only video in existence about the Chicago Transit Authority (wildcat) strike of 1968. There is no wonder that official Chicago history has somehow buried this story in a deep crypt, but this video brings it back into the daylight, along with rare archival stills and film footage, and exclusive interviews with now retired CTA drivers who played key roles. Here is the 60s Civil Rights movement intersecting with the class struggle in a big North American city, engaging a major public sector employer. Adding to this mix was the fact that many of the drivers were returned Viet Nam veterans with combat experience and not inclined to back down from a fight. Now back in Chicago, the drivers confronted racism not only in the bus company but in the company union (warning: coarse language in video). "You could stand up in that union hall -- McNamara was the President -- at Van Buren and Ashland. Before you opened your mouth - whack! - you're out of order," recalls Rodgers Harmon, ret. 36 years CTA bus driver. "We didn't have any real representation in the union...the strike was not so much against the CTA, it was against the union with no representation," recalls Claude Brown, ret. CTA Bus Driver.

Go to video>>

ATU Leadership Fail - Lessons of the BART Strike

Richard Mellor is a retired Afscme Local 444 member in the Bay area and he has been following and documenting the issues around the recent BART strike in San Francisco. The ATU Local 1555 represents BART workers and initially went on a 4 day strike at the beginning of July of this year when bargaining with BART management reached an impasse. Workers for Bay area transit buses, AC Transit, are also represented by the ATU although a different local (Local 192), and were in a legal strike position at the time but choose not to go out on strike in solidarity with BART workers. AC Transit used their buses and workers to provide additional transportation services in the Bay area during the 4 day strike by BART workers.

The 4 day strike was called of by the union leadership in favour of a 30 day period of negotiations with BART management in spite of the fact that BART management had previously hired the well known union buster Thomas P. Hock, the VP of labour relations at Veolia Transit, as their lead negotiator. The 30 day period did not produce any meaningful progress and BART management then called on State Governor Jerry Brown to intervene. The strike has now been postponed indefinitely by the Governor and is subject to the outcome of a board of inquiry hearing which may result in the imposition of a state mandated further 60 day cooling off period.

The strike underlines a key failure of the leadership of the trade union movement today as it faces ongoing decades long decline in union density, introduction of right to work legislation and prohibitions and restrictions on the right to strike. Mellor's analysis of the ATU's failure to bring a class based approach to the BART strike are a lesson in where rank and file activists have to start in order to reclaim their unions from labour bureaucrats and to resurrect a moribund labour movement. The following are some highlights of a longer article he wrote on the situation at BART available at the Facts For Working People blog site.

"...there are some important lessons that arise in situations like these, one of them being the class bias of the mass media. In US society there is a massive and permanent ideological war waged by the mass media that Wall Street controls aimed at obscuring and actually denying the class nature of society, and indeed, that class struggle even exists, but when workers are forced to defend our interests in the way the BART workers are presently doing, the class nature of society is laid bare for all to see.

Jerry Brown, a politician representing the interests of the bankers, hedge fund managers and other coupon clippers----in short, the US capitalist class-----claims he stepped in to this dispute to save us all hardship. If the dispute cannot be resolved in this seven days through the intervention of the board of inquiry, then “Brown is expected to make a swift decision on seeking a 60-day cooling off period.”,the San Francisco Chronicle reports this morning. Brown will ask the courts to impose this 60-day cooling off period and if the court decides that a strike “Will significantly disrupt public transportation services and will endanger the public’s health, safety and welfare.”, a strike will be illegal.

But Brown’s justification for stopping the strike at the last minute Sunday night was that the strike would, “significantly disrupt public transportation services and will endanger the public’s health, safety and welfare.”. Why would the courts reverse that? Is it likely that a strike deemed by the state through one of its major representatives a threat to our health and safety last Sunday, will be declared fine and dandy a week later or 60 days later?

We are not stupid. In our communities, Brown and other representatives of the 1% are ordering fire stations closed because we can’t afford to keep them open they say. Might this be a tad dangerous for us; put us at risk? Might closing fire stations, schools and health care facilities in a society where national health care is dismal, “..endanger the public’s health, safety and welfare.” We know it would. Brown knows it does but it is a political decision Brown and his class colleagues make as a necessary part of their agenda to put the US workers and middle class on rations. It is necessary to shift the crisis of capitalism in a global economy on to our backs and take back all the gains that have been won by working people over a century and a half of struggle. It is part of the declining influence of US capitalism on the world stage. We have to be more competitive and that means, work cheaper, faster and without unions that actually go on the offensive to oppose this strategy. Profits come before safety in capitalist society.

We only have to stop and think for a second to remind ourselves amid the mass of lies and propaganda that their claims of public safety are a smoke screen. Every American worker knows that the people in power in this country don’t give a damn about the rest of us. Everything we have in this country, every social benefit, every political advance, every material gain, has come about by doing what the BART workers are doing. The capitalists have capital, the media, the police and the courts, and the military when they need to call on troops to fire on their own kin, ( a risky business) but we have labor power. Without the ability to strike we are left to the mercy of the institutions of the 1%.

The 1% is using all their “legal” tricks to halt the possible success of a BART strike. It’s profits yes, but there is the effect on morale as well as after years of defeats and declining living standards any victory by labor over the forces of capital would inspire all of us, would show us that we can win, that we can make gains, that we can drive back this offensive and austerity agenda of the bankers, the hedge fund wasters and all the coupon clippers who plunder the wealth of society.

The US bosses actually fear the potential power of the US working class, fear that the stifling bureaucracy at the helm of the trade union movement might not be able to control their members and derail and undermine every movement from below as was done in Wisconsin, the strikes of the 1980’s and the Occupy Movement and its attempts to build strong links with organized Labor. This is what’s at stake here for them. It was to stem that power that Taft Hartley legislation was introduced after the mass strikes of the 1930’s and the huge strike wave of 1946. We have to have a mass defiance of these anti worker laws.

As is always the case the strategists atop organized Labor (and lets not kid ourselves, the bigwigs at the AFL-CIO and the CTW coalition in Washington are in on all this behind the scenes) are doing what they can to ensure that things don’t get out of hand. Our power lies in our ability to stop production and draw the rest of the working class and our communities in to this struggle. I was at a solidarity meeting for the BART workers over the weekend and when I left that meeting with 7 hours to deadline, representatives of the union representing BART train drivers and Station Agents as well as the Executive Director (Sounds a bit like a business doesn’t it) of the Union representing other staff like custodians for example, stressed that they were in strike mode. They were going to strike at midnight as management was not showing any effort to negotiate in good faith.

In fact, this is what the Executive Director of SEIU 1021 repeated on the TV news a few hours later; management was refusing to negotiate in good faith. These are two major themes that arise, the bosses won’t negotiate in good faith and we want a contract. He nor any other official had anything to say about workers needing to fight for more at the expense of the 1% or the public’s needs and how the union was fighting for more transit, free fares for seniors, half fare for the unemployed, more jobs, 24 hour trains or increased routes and transit for the disabled and how this can be paid for by the rich and ending trillion dollar wars.

He certainly never mentioned any solidarity committee and how the public could get in touch with it to join organized labor in our struggle for a better life for all. This is because the official union strategy doesn’t include an agenda for the working public so they have no intention of broadening this struggle to include the communities. The appeal to the community is merely a tactic to get some (normally well meaning leftists and some not so well meaning ones) to help organize a few rallies and such here and there to pressure the bosses to be a little less aggressive. Many seasoned leftists/activists know this but refuse to point this out so the left bureaucracy can play this game safe in knowing that the strategy will not be challenged.

The response to these two points the officials raise should be obvious: (1) the bosses never negotiate in good faith. (2) They want a contract too. The difference is what is in that contract.

This is at the heart of the matter. This particular dispute is not about the right to a contract but what’s in the contract. The problem is that the Union officialdom from all three locals immediately involved do not want to discuss this issue in depth. Like the leadership of organized Labor as a whole, they accept that some concessions have to be made, or more accurately they have no intention of doing what needs to be done to make gains, not just for the BART workers but for workers as a whole including those that have to use BART every day and who will be adversely affected by a strike.

The reality is this. We cannot counter the massive propaganda war against the BART workers in the media if the Unions aren’t fighting for those workers who depend on BART as well as those who work for BART. We have given many examples of some issues that can be raised. But not only must these issues be raised in the media, they must be raised at the negotiating table on behalf of the communities and with real rank and file community activists involved which they can be through a real solidarity support committee. I say this as when the Union hierarchy talks of linking with the community, they generally mean with leading business or religious and pro establishment figures in these communities rather than the folks at the grass root level who are serious about changing the present situation.

The bosses are serious about taking away from us as all the gains made through the great struggles that took place with the rise of the CIO in the 30’s and the Civil Rights movement. We cannot defeat them alone, no one local can stop them in isolation nor can individual communities. We have to start where we are, if in a union by building rank and file opposition caucus based on a program and strategy that demands what we need rather than what is acceptable to wall Street and a “fight to win” strategy for accomplishing these goals. In the communities we do the same and in each case we link these struggles together as well as reach out to workers internationally.

The AC Transit drivers (also in ATU but a different local) contract ends at midnight on Wednesday and they are threatening a strike if their issues are not resolved although there is no reason to think they would strike when they refused to at the time they were strongest. When BART workers struck, under the direction of the leadership, the AC Transit drivers union weakened the strike and their own member’s interests by picking up some of the slack. Only a short time before, the unity and mood between these two groups of workers was strong and there was no doubt in my mind they would have used their united power to win a better contract for all had the leadership been willing to lead. (We should not discount the role of the International leadership in these instances as they undermine any local leadership that violates the relationship they have with the bosses based on Labor peace by going on the offensive.) The leadership atop these organizations are deathly afraid of their own members.

We cannot win if we blindly obey laws that are made by politicians of the 1% in the interests of the 1%. Mass violation of the law is unavoidable if we want to stop this assault on workers and the middle class. We all want a peaceful life, but they won’t let us have a peaceful life, unless we passively agree with their agenda which is to drive us down to the wages and conditions of third world countries. They’re already on the way to doing that here in many industries especially the service sector and industries that employ women and minorities. But they have also successfully cut wages in half in auto with the help of the leadership of the UAW leadership.

If they are successful in defeating the BART workers especially if they successfully deny them the right to strike which Governor Brown is doing temporarily but is on the cards in a more permanent fashion, it will be a huge setback for all Bay Area workers. A strike is disruptive, not just for the public but for the workers involved, and it is obvious that I am critical of the how the heads of organized labor conduct these affairs as well as their role in general. But we must sift through the rubbish we hear and read in the 1%’s media and support these brothers and sisters."

ATU 57th International Convention Structural Exploration Committee, What's it all about?

Have you been digging around the internet lately trying to find out more info on the great ATU initiative around this so-called "Structural Exploration Committee" that is being proposed by Int. Pres. Hanley? Not having any luck because you can't find a damn thing anywhere on your Local's web page, and nothing at all on the web site of the International? Even the latest copy of the glossy ATU InTransit magazine had nothing in it explaining what this process is all about.

Fortunately, there is a report by an actual member of the ATU's Structural Exploration Committee handpicked by International President Hanley himself, on what has been going on with this process - which must be top secret because there is so little information available to regular rank and file members about it. Go to the link below which is to the web page of ATU Local 1741 in Lafayette, Indiana representing Bus Operators, Maintenance Personnel, and Paratransit Operators employed by the Greater Lafayette Public Transportation Corporation, doing business as CityBus. The President of Local 1741, Bryan Walck, was appointed by International President Larry Hanley to serve on the ATU's Structural Exploration Committee.

The Committee was formed in accordance with a resolution passed at the 56th International Convention and is tasked with examining all aspects of the ATU's structure and operation. Committee recommendations will be drafted into resolutions and presented to the delegates assembled at the 57th International Convention later this summer. Local 1741 President Walck will serve as one of the fifteen members of the Committee which met between May 28th and May 31st near Washington, DC. The International apparently provided airfare, hotel accommodations, most meals, and all training materials.

A very detailed report on what transpired at each day of the meeting can be found on the President's Blog section of the the Local 1741 web site. The report actually starts midway to the bottom of the web page and you have to scroll up to follow the daily reports for the 3 day meeting.

Looks like the bigwigs were there, Hanley and International VP Javier Perez. Perez seems to be Hanley's right hand man these days - he is running the show in Chicago with respect to the ongoing trusteeship of local 241. Now apparently the resolution on "Structural Change" is an attempt by the ATU to address issues that are currently facing transit unions such as privatization, the needs of the Locals, challenges for the future, and the direction the ATU will be moving in.

The committee is discussing how success is to be defined and how they plan to build ATU power. They have prepared a detailed list of issues that the ATU confronts such as Privatization Legislation; Bargaining; Rising Healthcare Costs; Leadership Skills; Corporate Lobbying; Reporting and Recordkeeping; Funding; Organizing; Attacks on Defined Benefit Pension Plans; Grievance/Contract; Arbitration Costs; and Training.

When it comes to the matter of how to best use resources and capacity to build power within the ATU the committee appears to have focused on measures the International is taking to significantly cut operating costs and direct money back into the field where it's needed most. The field being talked about here is that of political campaigning and lobbying which requires turning members dues money into dollars for democrats.

That this is the underlying agenda becomes clear when the committee addressed the issue of how to empower ATU Locals and to shore up their strength and stability, especially small Locals with no full time officer. The committee is not looking at ways to increase member involvement in their local, to increase the participatory and democratic procedures within locals or the International, or how to increase transparency and accountability at the local or International level. 

What is being proposed is the increased use of top down bureaucratic structures within the existing International Constitution and General Laws of the ATU such as Joint Bargaining Councils, and Joint Service Councils in place of local officers and representatives. In this respect the purpose and goals of the Structural Exploration Committee are profoundly anti-democratic and seek to impose top down administrative control over ATU locals by the International. It is in essence a way of imposing conditions of trusteeship over locals without some of the political dissension and opposition generated by the formal trusteeship process.

The problems with the ATU were clearly exposed by the failed New York School bus drivers' strike this last winter. This is a union that has lost connection with its membership, where the leadership at the local and international level is more concerned with advancing their own careers as full time well compensated union officials and bureaucrats. The inevitable result for the membership is sell-out contracts, concessionary bargaining, loss of benefits, lower wages and loss of job security. The ATU has clearly abandoned all interest in defending the class interests of its membership and has become an intermediary for the state and private capital assisting and enabling the imposition of cutbacks and austerity politics throughout the transportation industry.