Optimism Fails to Produce End to MTA Strike

Contract talks that could end Los Angeles County’s 16-day-old transit strike failed to produce an agreement Sunday, frustrating hopes of a settlement after Gov. Gray Davis signed legislation he thought would help end the stalemate.

“We are still talking. We are still smiling at each other, but quite honestly we have not made a lot of progress,” said Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan.

By 9:30 p.m., hopes had faded as the talks broke into small caucuses and both sides said that no breakthroughs would occur Sunday night.

Contract discussions had continued Sunday morning amid guarded optimism at the Pasadena Hilton when United Transportation Union leader James A. Williams, who represents about 4,400 striking bus and rail operators, met for almost two hours with Brenda Diederichs, the MTA’s chief labor relations officer.

The talks continued off and on throughout the afternoon as MTA negotiators met separately with representatives of three unions that represent drivers, clerks and mechanics.

Officials said they expected the discussions to expand Sunday night after the MTA board conferred by conference call at 5 p.m. for an hour and provided further direction for Diederichs and other MTA officials. But the parties failed to work out a new labor contract as talks pushed further into the night.

Williams said he was encouraged by a proposal he received from the MTA late in the evening. He said he would study it and discuss it with his colleagues, and they would offer a counterproposal.

But he was not sure how long the process would take. He would not elaborate, but said he expected better news this morning. Even so, Williams said buses probably won’t be running until the end of the week at the earliest.

Riordan, who controls four seats on the 13-member MTA board, attended the negotiations this weekend along with MTA Chief Executive Julian Burke. The mayor, who says he hopes to facilitate the discussions, has been criticized by the transit union for not taking a more prominent role in the talks.

“I think the board and the union want to get the drivers back on the road in the next day or so,” Riordan said. But “trying to overturn rules and habits that have been going on for many years is not easy.”

Although some headway has been made, Burke and the mayor indicated that it was not as much as they and others had hoped for.

Both sides declined to discuss the specifics of the talks, citing an agreement not to reveal their differences at this stage of the negotiations.

MTA officials have offered the United Transportation Union a $43-million wage-and-benefit increase over three years, including an 8.1% pay hike. The transit agency also wants to create a two-tiered work force by hiring more part-time drivers, who would earn lower, entry-level wages and would not be eligible for benefits such as health coverage.

The MTA is under pressure to reduce annual operating expenses by at least $23 million and is seeking concessions from its bus and rail operators, including a 15% reduction in overtime. In that effort, the MTA has proposed a four-day workweek with pay for 10 hours, although drivers would have to spend up to 13 hours at work.

Union officials, however, are trying to protect as many full-time positions as possible because they pay better than part-time work. The wage increase, they contend, is not enough to compensate drivers for the proposed reductions in overtime.

In addition, the bus and rail operators want to end the MTA practice of paying workers on split shifts for eight hours of work although they are required to put in 10 to 11 hours per shift. Union officials basically want 10 hours’ pay for 10 hours’ work.

“Beyond cautiously optimistic, I would not say a word,” said Goldy Norton, a spokesman for the United Transportation Union, whose picket lines are being honored by the MTA’s clerks and mechanics.

Contract negotiations broke off Tuesday amid serious disagreements between the union and the MTA. They resumed for a few hours Saturday after the governor signed pro-union legislation that dealt with a major source of contention in the talks.

The bill, SB 1101, calls for a four-year period in which the MTA must recognize existing collective bargaining agreements if it reorganizes into small suburban transit zones.

The measure by Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Culver City) “will protect MTA employees’ rights if MTA reorganizes into proposed transit zones in the San Fernando Valley or elsewhere,” the governor’s office stated.

After he signed the bill Saturday, Davis called on the MTA and United Transportation Union to end the strike that has idled the nation’s second-largest bus system for more than two weeks.

Williams and and Miguel Contreras, the chief of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, vowed earlier this month to end the strike within 24 hours if Davis signed the bill. But they also said Saturday they wanted to see how the negotiations progressed before making a final decision.

Contreras contended Sunday that further movement in the negotiations over the weekend depended on the MTA board, which apparently had difficulty getting enough members together for a quorum.

He noted that the board was going to meet at noon Saturday, but rescheduled the meeting for 5 p.m. Sunday. Until the board gave the chief negotiator her marching orders, he said, the talks were all exploratory.

“The unions are all here. The mediators are here. We have the chief negotiator, who is lacking the authority of the MTA board of directors,” Contreras said. “I think there is more than meets the eye here. I think that there is a lot of politics going on.”

MTA officials maintain that their negotiators, including Diederichs, have always had the authority to reach a settlement.

Out on the picket lines Sunday, striking bus and rail operators said they hope negotiators will reach a satisfactory agreement soon so they can return to work and their personal lives.

“I’m kind of disappointed, but I trust in the union and I know they’re doing the best for us,” said bus driver Avtar Singh Chattha, 40, of Canoga Park as he picketed near Canoga Avenue and Nordhoff Street in Chatsworth.

“You have to stick with the union,” said Parmjit Singh Grewal, also 40, of Canoga Park, who has been a bus driver for 12 years.

Grewal, who has a wife and two children, has joined the picket line every day since the strike began. He says he is living off his savings and has reduced his family’s expenses by cutting out such things as going out to dinner with his wife.

“We want the strike to be over,” Grewal said. “I hope they work out something. We need to go back to work.”

MTA spokesman Marc Littman said that even if a deal were reached immediately, the strike would probably continue for several days because union members were unlikely to return to work until they ratified the new contract.

It would take a day or two to resume all service, he said. Buses would have to be fueled and inspected, and electricity would have to be restored to 60 miles of train track. The MTA has about 2,000 buses on 200 routes, as well as subway and light rail lines.

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Times staff writer Caitlin Liu contributed to this story.

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*COUNTY WORKERS” STRIKE

Employees, unhappy with the offered salary increase, start a series of walkouts today. B1