50 years later...

50 years ago this year, activists began the historic Montgomery bus boycott for equality and justice.  Today, more than 5,000 local bus drivers, mechanics and sales people find themselves in a similar fight for justice, the fight for their health care.  The SEPTA management is pushing workers and riders toward a strike as they threaten the health care of these workers.  SEPTA's health care grab may force a strike in an attempt to reap saving with health care cuts.  SEPTA management will benefit while the rest of us walk.

Sample Letter for Campaign

Subject: SEPTA rider demands justice for workers!

Dear [ Decision Maker ] ,

I am writing to express my grave concern with the slow progress of the contract negotiations between SEPTA and Transportation Workers Union Local 234. The bus drivers, mechanics and sales people who work for SEPTA are my friends and neighbors and their health is of great concern to me as a rider.

SEPTA management has been unable develop a budget that protects workers and adequately provides for the riding public. Now, SEPTA management is putting workers and riders at risk by threatening to raise health care co-pay and premiums on its workers. By shifting costs onto workers, workers are less likely to use the health care that they do have. Many government agencies and corporations are shifting the costs of health care onto employees. Public institutions which receive tax money, like SEPTA, should be setting the standards for how workers should be treated. Raising co-pays and premiums could push workers and riders toward a strike. Our city will loose millions of dollars, workers and riders will suffer. SEPTA management, on the other hand, benefits from a strike. Everyday that the public transit system stops running, SEPTA management puts ten million dollars in the bank in saved operating costs.

As a rider I demand that you keep your hands off of the health care of my friends and neighbors!

Like Dr. Martin Luther King said fifty years ago, that if a strike is necessary, "in the long run, it is more honorable to walk in dignity than ride in humiliation... in a quite dignified manner, we decided to substitute tired feet for tired souls, and walk the streets." Fifty years later my community and I are willing to make the same march for justice and support these workers.

Sincerely,

Campaign Launched:
April 12, 2005


Background Information

 - The Struggle Continues:

 

50 years ago, courageous activists in Montgomery came together for a bus boycott to demand justice and equality. Today, the workers who drive those buses continue to face injustice as they defend their health care.

 

 

SEPTA management is not asking for reasonable health care compromises. A closer look at what SEPTA has asked for it is clear that they aim at giving workers a bad deal and hope to break the union. SEPTA claims that these drastic cuts stem from lingering financial difficulties. It is true that our growing transit system needs a sustainable and dedicated funding source. However, what SEPTA and most of the press has failed to mention is the fact that SEPTA has become a holding tank and handout job for the politically connected. This lumbering bureaucracy has nearly one manager for every worker! If something needs to be cut, we should look closely at slimming down General Manager Faye Moore’s burgeoning staff first.

Like the Montgomery City Commission in 1955 when they refused to allow the full integration of the bus system, Septa management offers riders and workers no compromise as they slowly push the riding public and workers toward a strike.

 

 

"I want to say that in all of our actions we must stick together.  Unity is the great need of the hour, and if we are united we can get many things that we not only desire but which we justly deserve." Dr. Rev. Martin Luther King, Montgomery, AL, 1955

 

 

SEPTA workers have made sacrifices. In fact, the first health care compromises came in 1989 when SEPTA workers began returning the Cost of Living Agreement to defray the rising costs of health care. SEPTA workers pay for all of their prescription, dental and vision and 30% of their medical for the first two years and for every doctor visit (co-pay) and prescriptions after the first two years. In contrast, SEPTA management (remember, there is nearly one manager for every worker), get 100% health care coverage from day one. SEPTA workers have forgone any raises for two years. These savings have played a big role in keeping the system solvent. Management raises, however﾿. you can guess what the answer is. Additionally, SEPTA workers have given up any sick pay for the most common, short term sicknesses. This concession was made to help meet rising health care costs for the workers. Any illness that keeps a workers off the job for three days or less are paid for by the workers themselves up to six days per year. Management gets full sick pay from day one. This health care giveback alone has saved SEPTA millions of dollars per year. SEPTA has not only proposed 20% premium increase but also 20% cuts to the benefit. They are asking for a 40% give back and cuts from both ends of the workers health care. SEPTA workers have made big and reasonable sacrifices for there good health care but this is not just about these benefits. SEPTA management wants much more.

The list of demands that SEPTA has put on the table belie more than dollar and cent practicality. SEPTA is asking workers to give up maternity leave, some vacation time, earned and sick days and all weekly overtime. Perhaps the most revealing demands have to do with the welfare and the strength of the union itself. TWU has proven over the passed few decades that it is a strong union with a high level of solidarity among its workers. The last strike in 1998 last for forty days with virtually no scabbing and strike breaking. SEPTA wants to put an end to decades of effective trade unionism by one of our cities most diverse unions. SEPTA is demanding that unions give back the ability to collect Authority Dues to represent workers and that unions concede SEPTA authority to subcontract work. SEPTA wants to strip the unions from having any say in lay-offs. What reason would any member have to stay in the union with a pay cut, a huge chunk missing from their health care and no job protection? SEPTA management wants to break this union.

Philadelphians should stand with these workers because TWU Local 234 members are huge economic force in many of Philadelphia’s most underserved communities. These workers are our neighbors and friends. Nearly 50 years after the Montgomery Bus Boycott, a group of workers have declared that they have given enough and are poised and ready to, as Martin Luther King Jr. said, “substitute tired feet for tired souls, and walk the streets.” Riders and workers should be ready to march in solidarity together for health care justice and for better public transit. Like in Montgomery in 1955 we should recall the sentiments of Martin Luther King Jr., "In all our actions we must stick together. Unity is the great need of the hour, and if we are united we can get many of the things that we not only desire but which we justly deserve.”