A high New Jersey Transit union official mentioned Friday the railroad must make important motion on wages if a doubtlessly crippling strike is to be averted earlier than a Could 16 deadline.
“The only sticking point of this contract we have is wages,” mentioned Tom Haas, basic chairman of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, throughout a press convention at Newark-Penn Station Friday.
“We want the passengers to know we’re on their side.”
NJT administration and the engineers are set to move to Washington D.C. to satisfy with Federal Mediation Board members Monday. However Haas mentioned his workwers want parity with different railroadsin the realm. The union is searching for the bottom wage of $89,000 a yr to extend to $120,000 by 2027.
BLET members overwhelmingly rejected a proposed contract final month after greater than 5 years of negotiations.
The engineers mentioned on the time they needed a brand new contract proposal by Could 16. Now every week out from their deadline, they are saying they’re able to strike.
A New Jersey Transit practice in Morristown NJ. (Shutterstock)
NJ Transit runs greater than 900,000 bus and practice journeys each week and is taken into account the nation’s third-largest commuter rail community, behind the MTA’s Lengthy Island Rail Street and Metro-North.
Wages have lengthy been a sticking level in negotiations with NJ Transit administration, and union management says their members deserve wages akin to these of engineers on the opposite aspect of the Hudson.
NJ Transit’s engineers have been working and not using a contract since Dec. 31, 2019. BLET membership voted to approve a strike again in August 2023, however federal railroad labor legal guidelines name for an prolonged course of earlier than staff can legally stroll off the job.
A tentative settlement was reached between union management and NJ Transit administration in March, however 87% of the rank-and-file membership rejected it.
The final NJ Transit railroad labor dispute, again in 2016, was resolved on the eleventh hour narrowly avoiding a strike.
A 1983 strike lasted 34 days.
Initially Revealed: Could 9, 2025 at 12:08 PM EDT
