So, the other day I was talking about Black Friday – the very real prospect that the unions that run BART (our local commuter rail system) might walk of the job starting tomorrow, throwing our San Francisco transit system into chaos. Well, the last couple of days have seen several developments which warranted a full-scale update on the situation:

* First, “Black Friday” has been pushed back to NEXT WEDNESDAY. If no agreement is reached by Tuesday, the BART unions will walk off the job. That’s what the unions are saying now, that this is a hard and fast deadline. As one BART Union leader told the San Francisco Chronicle, “Our strike captains are ready, our picket signs are ready and our members are ready to walk off the job.”

* BART has 2,700 union workers.

* BART carries 320,000 riders a day, about half of that total during peak commute time. In one sense, one could say that these 320,000 riders are at the mercy of the 2,700 union workers, but in reality, of course, the displacement of the 320,000 daily riders onto other modes of transportation will impact many more people than just the 320,000.

* The BART system is facing a $24 million deficit for the fiscal year that begins tomorrow. BART is projected to lose $100 million over the next four years.

* The average full-time BART union employee receives a total benefits package worth $31,719 a year on top of their average annual base salary of $67,865 for a total average annual compensation of $99,584.

* The cost of benefits has increased 66 percent in four years, and is likely to rise another 70 percent over the next four years. Full-time BART union employees now pay about $25 per month in health care coverage for themselves and all their eligible family members, a rate that has remained the same since 1996.

* In 2001, a strike was averted when Bay Area politicians intervened and the BART board approved a 22 percent raise over four years. The last BART strike was in 1997 and caused massive regional transit disruptions.

* BART’s latest contract offer to the unions is for no pay increases for the next two years, then in the final two years employees would be given raises based on the consumer price index, with a cap of 2 percent.

* In addition, BART would raise current and retired employees’ monthly contributions for family health benefits from $25 to $100 beginning July 1, 2006, and raise the contributions to $150 a month starting July 1, 2008.

* BART would also immediately cap what it pays for health benefits at the amount charged for Kaiser Permanente’s health plan, instead of providing the several options now available. Employees would have to pay additional costs if they chose health care plans from other providers.

Any way you slice it, the compensation BART union employees receive now is fair and more than fair. For the unions to be holding a gun to the public’s head in this way and demanding even more now, with BART facing a deficit and the entire region trying to sustain an economic recovery, just seems to me to be the height of arrogance and short-sighted selfishness. I mean, come on, BART workers got a fat 22% raise just four years ago — in 2001, when most of us out here in private business were facing the big downturn. BART’s new contract offer seems quite reasonable.

Oh, and the San Francisco Chronicle — a pretty consistently pro-union paper — weighed in with the following editorial on the BART situation in this morning’s edition:

BART talks are way off track

TAKE A VITAL public service. Add lousy labor relations, a pot of money and political pressure. For BART, these ingredients produced a nightmare that avoided a strike in 2001 but has impoverished the transit system ever since.

With another work stoppage in view, BART faces a rerun. Management may cave in by steering scarce dollars to raise already-high wages. The unions may persist in pushing for money that they know isn’t there. Serious problems such as health-care and pension deficits may get lip service.

Riders should be furious after this year’s round of fare hikes and parking charges in suburban lots. If BART wanted to force people into cars, it couldn’t come up with a better plan.

A strike will deepen this downward trend, and both sides need a reality check. The past 22 percent pay increases can’t be repeated, yet the unions are asking for 17 percent. Since Sept. 11, fare-box collections and sales-tax revenues — the two prime sources of BART income — haven’t recovered.

An added problem has arrived: deficits are widening in the employees’ health-care and pension funds. Most of the $100 million deficit forecast for the next four years is from rising retiree-health-care costs; the system’s short-term outlook is for less revenue, but more bills.

Neither side is talking good sense, but that’s par for the cat-and-dog relations in this standoff. One insider describes it as the train builders versus the public workers, two interest groups with little in common. This gulf required politicians to sail in four years ago and order up an agreement that raised wages but did nothing to address underlying problems.

BART can’t afford a stoppage and the public anger it will bring. It’s time to hammer out a plan that doesn’t bring on more trouble.

Absolutely. It seems to me that a mass replacement of the BART workers should be on the table, too. Without this possibility, our whole regional transit system can be held hostage by 2,700 workers. Otherwise, what is the incentive for the workers to compromise?

June 30th, 2005 | Economics, SF Politics & Culture

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