UNION SOLIDARITY, KENNEDY NUDGE GIVE
WORKERS WIN OVER AMTRAK AFTER 8-YEARS

Union solidarity--and a potential strike--plus a nudge from Teddy Kennedy gave 6,000 workers at Amtrak and their nine unions a contract and a win after an 8-year struggle with the nation’s passenger railroad. The workers are in Amtrak operations other than actually running the trains, such as maintaining the railroad bed and undertaking repairs.

The agreement was announced Jan. 18 by the union coalition, led by the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees/IBT. The workers get a 35.2% raise retroactive to the start of 2000--the last time they had a contract. The pact runs through 2009. Ratification is expected to be done by the end of February.

"The Amtrak negotiations took a hard toll on our members," said Maintenance of Way Employees President Fred Simpson. "Now we are concentrating on explaining the terms of the agreement at membership meetings in preparation for the members' vote. Once again, coordinating bargaining among the rail unions succeeded."

“It’s finally over, except for the voting,” exulted the Transport Workers, another coalition union. Other unions included the Transportation Communications Union, the Machinists and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

Amtrak accepted virtually all recommendations of a 3-person Presidential Emergency Board appointed by anti-worker GOP President George W. Bush. After several days of hearings and volumes of evidence, the board sided with the unions on virtually every issue, including the wage hike--in two installments--and rejection of Amtrak’s drastic changes in work rules. The average worker will get $12,800.

TWU Railroad Division Director Gary Maslanka said Amtrak’s acquiescence--after years of stonewalling--on back pay and work rules ended the stalemate. “This contract includes back pay more than three times what Amtrak was offering, substantial wage increases, and none of the concessions Amtrak was demanding on work rules,” he said. “Amtrak wanted a regressive agreement that gutted our work language and dramatically eroded job security,” added IAM District 19 President Joe Duncan.

Kennedy’s intervention had something to do with Amtrak’s yielding. The senator, chairman of the Senate Labor Committee, put pressure on the railroad’s management to settle. Had the two sides not settled, the workers would have been free, under rail labor law, to strike at the end of January. Bush’s naming of the board delayed the permission to strike, legally, until that time. Congress also could have imposed a pact.

“After eight long years without a raise, Amtrak’s employees finally won a contract that grants them the fair wages and benefits they deserve and reflects their indispen-sable contributions to Amtrak. The leaders standing here today were serious about negotiating a contract that both sides can be proud of.

“The union leaders held their ground, and they have delivered an agreement worthy of the hard-working men and women who keep the trains running every day,” Kennedy said.