RTA workers authorize strike

Back pay, cost of health care among sticking points

Members of the union representing Greater Dayton RTA bus drivers have authorized a strike after rejecting management’s third contract proposal.

Workers represented by the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 1385 on Sunday overwhelmingly voted in favor of a work stoppage, one day after they rejected the agency’s most recent contract offer, union officials said.

The union is required by law to provide 10 days’ notice to the State Employment Relations Board before going on strike. RTA management says it has not received notice.

The union has not gone on strike or authorized taking such action for decades, officials said.

Management and union leaders could return to the bargaining table in the next couple of weeks, and both sides say they want to avoid a strike. However, the parties are not confident that a compromise can be reached. A strike could shut down transit service that could affect some of the agency’s 30,000 daily riders.

Union officials said some of the sticking points include back pay, working conditions and proposed changes to health care plans that would greatly increase premiums and out-of-pocket costs.

But management said union members need to be more reasonable about what the transit agency can afford to offer in benefits and other compensation.

“They may have some unrealistic expectations about what we can provide,” said Mark Donaghy, CEO of Greater Dayton RTA.

The vote that ATU Local 1385 members took to authorize a strike was more than a year and a half in the making.

The union has been without a contract since April 2015, and negotiations have not gone well. Union members took part in organized protests last month after talks failed to move toward a resolution.

The union has about 461 members, including about 260 standard-bus drivers, 90-plus Project Mobility drivers and maintenance staff.

RTA management issued a final offer that was supposed to be withdrawn on Nov. 1.

RTA has about 300 buses on the road each day, and most riders primarily use the bus to get to work. If a strike occurs, regular service could continue to some extent if some union workers decided to cross the picket line.

The union has not had a raise since April 2014, and bus operators deserve back pay for 238,000 hours of overtime they worked in 2015 and tens of thousands of hours of overtime they’ve worked this year, union leaders said.

RTA at one point offered a one-time lump sum payment for 2015, but that was withdrawn and did not include the retroactive pay workers should earn for working extended shifts, said Glenn Salyer, ATU Local 1385 president. He said the union wants 2 percent raises, which the RTA board of trustees have approved.

“They sit in these seats a long damn time, and they should be compensated for it with a raise just like every other employee has been given,” Salyer said.

The Greater Dayton RTA has about 670 employees in total, and its other employees received raises, officials said.

Management wants union members to accept a high-deductible health insurance plan, Salyer said, that requires employees with families to pay $4,472 in insurance premiums and also pay the first $5,000 in medical expenses before the plan pays a dime.

“That’s just not acceptable,” Salyer said. “We’ve been asked to vote on (contracts) with no material changes to them whatsoever.”

But Donaghy said the union’s demands far exceed what the agency can afford, and he claims Salyer’s characterization of the health insurance changes is untrue.

He said RTA has to shift to a high-deductible plan because of several years of large volumes of expensive medical claims, and most union workers will not be required to pay $10,000 per year for medical expenses.

Donaghy said management has withdrawn “90 percent” of the concessions it proposed to the union.

He said union members have good jobs with good pay and benefits, but they refuse to recognize that the agency has limited financial wiggle room.

“At some point, there is a reality here that we don’t have an unlimited source of money to throw at issues like this,” Donaghy said. “We hope that people will come to grips with this, come to the table and hammer something out.”

Ian White, who lives several miles from downtown, rides the bus to the center city, where he works and works out at a gym. He said he saves money on gas by riding the bus.

He said a strike could be burdensome for elderly residents who use Project Mobility, but he’ll be able to manage because he lives within walking distance of the most important places and destinations.

“I feel sorry for a lot of the older patrons and disabled patrons, because they have no way, besides the RTA, to get to where they need to go,” he said.

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