Showdown Set as Judge Enjoins Transit Strike
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The decision of a judge to issue a preliminary injuction banning transit workers from walking off the job if a contract with the Metropolitan Transit Authority is not reached by 12:01 a.m. Friday sets the state for a major showdown, as lawyers representing the city filed a separate lawsuit seeking to fine the Transport Workers Union $15 million and workers $25,000 a day if they strike.
The pattern is a familiar one: First in 1999 and again in 2002, judges in state Supreme Court in Brooklyn issued similar injunctions less than three days before a possible transit strike; the city followed the injunction with a lawsuit seeking damages, which it later withdrew.
In both cases, a strike was averted.
But with less than 48 hours before the transit union’s contract expires on Friday, the city is preparing for the shutdown of its subways and buses, which carry an average of 7.3 million riders a day. Officials from the MTA began their second negotiating session with the union at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Manhattan last night.
A new contract must be approved by the union’s executive board, which is not scheduled to meet until Friday morning.
An attorney representing Local 100 of the Transport Workers Union, Arthur Schwartz, yesterday called the city’s lawsuit, which calls for a $15 million fine to compensate the city for lost tax revenue and $10 million in punitive damages, “hogwash,” saying the fines are “mythical sanctions that don’t exist.” The city’s chief counsel, Michael Cardozo, was “grandstanding,” Mr. Schwartz added.
A strike is illegal under the state’s Taylor laws, which prohibit civil employees from striking, and fines them two days’ pay for each day off the job. The injunction, ordered by Judge Theodore Jones in state Supreme Court in Brooklyn, prohibits workers from engaging in a “strike, work stoppage, sick out, or slow down,” and prohibits union officials from “causing, instigating, or inciting a strike.” If the injunction is violated, union executives could be jailed.
The assistant attorney general, James Henly, told the judge yesterday that a strike would cause the city “irreparable harm.”
Judge Jones offered little commentary on his ruling yesterday and did not specify consequences for violating it, except to make a “parenthetical observation” that he does “not intend his decision to be used as a tool in collective bargaining.”
The legal brinkmanship by the city mirrored the theatrics on 42nd Street yesterday in front of the Grand Hyatt hotel, where union members held a rally that featured the Reverends Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson speaking from a stage fit for a rock concert, behind which was hung a projection screen the size of a Jumbotron.
“When you stop rolling, New York walks,” Rev. Jackson said. “Thus, you have the power.”
A vice president for the union, Ainsley Stewart, said the injunction would nonetheless have a chilling effect on what union members say publicly.
“It’s intended to scare the average worker,” he said. “If they open their mouth today, they might lose their job tomorrow.”
As of last night, however, it did not stop union officials from leading their members in the union’s signature refrain: “No contract, no work.”
A four-hour meeting on Monday night ended with an offer from the MTA that represented a slightly larger wage increase than an earlier offer. The deal, which came at the end of negotiations Monday, included a 27-month contract with a 3% pay raise to begin next December, followed by a 3% raise effective March 16, 2007. A contract that ends in March would be a significant concession for the MTA, since it would mean contract negotiations in 2008 would not be bogged down by concerns over a strike during the heart of the holiday shopping season.
While the union president, Roger Toussaint, has said he is optimistic that a strike will be averted, the city and the region’s transportation officials have put into place contingency plans that would go into effect if a strike begins Friday.
Under current plans, public schools would open two hours later than normal. Cars entering Manhattan south of 96th Street between 5 a.m. and 11 a.m. will be required to carry four passengers; the Metro-North Railroad plans to operate shuttle trains between the Bronx and Grand Central Terminal, including a shuttle leaving every half hour that will enable commuters to park at Yankee Stadium and ride the train to Manhattan, and the Long Island Rail Road will provide shuttle trains from Queens to Penn Station. Yellow cabs will also be allowed to pick up more than one fare at a time.
The city’s Office of Emergency Management has said a 20% increase in the number of cars that normally enter Manhattan below 60th Street, which is about 826,000 on a typical weekday, would result in complete gridlock.