Local 757 members protest C-TRAN’s inadequate offer

Picket signs went up June 12 outside a C-TRAN board meeting in Battle Ground, Washington, as union transit workers protested a contract offer from the Clark County transit agency.

“They didn’t want to look at us when they walked in.” said C-TRAN worker Scott Miller, a member of the union bargaining team. Portland-based Amalgamated Transit Union Local 757 represents about 250 C-TRAN workers under three separate contracts, including 230 bus operators and paratransit drivers, 23 passenger service representatives, and seven paratransit dispatchers.

In each case, workers are being asked to take a pay freeze and pay out-of-pocket for their health benefits for the first time. This after the union helped pass a local transit tax measure two years ago, and after managers were given raises last year.

The union is asking for modest cost-of-living increases, and for benefits to be continued as they are now. C-TRAN bus operators top out at $20.73 an hour after five years. Paratransit drivers, who transport the elderly and disabled, make up to $17 an hour.

Management is proposing that workers begin paying 10 percent of the premium, about $100 a month. And with inflation, the employer-proposed pay freeze would amount to a cut in pay, said Local 757 board member Roy Jennings, a C-TRAN bus operator.

“There’s no way I can take that offer to my members,” Jennings said.

C-TRAN managers began sharing the cost of the premium, Jennings said, but were also given three additional vacation days that they can cash out at the end of each year, which effectively cancels out the extra expense.

If there’s no change at the bargaining table, union leaders say they’ll continue to protest, and are eyeing high-profile public events for their informational pickets, like the Clark County Fair and the Washington State Rodeo.

About 50 people took part in the picketing outside Battle Ground City Hall — C-TRAN employees and members of other local unions that are part of the Clark, Skamania, West Klickitat Counties Central Labor Council.

The drivers’ contract expired Aug. 31, 2006; the other two contracts expired earlier this year. Public transit workers in Washington are prohibited from striking, and instead settle contract disputes through binding arbitration if the two sides cannot agree.