Union Penalty for NY Transit Strike

I thought this had just gone by the wayside, but it looks like the judge actually is putting down some real penalties. Well, at least of the union management.

Roger Toussaint, the president of the transit workers' union who led bus and subway workers in a strike that crippled New York City for three cold days in December, was sentenced yesterday in a surprise ruling to 10 days in jail.
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Mr. Toussaint was also fined $1,000. Ed Watt, the union's secretary-treasurer, and Darlyne Lawson, its recording secretary, were each fined $500, but were not sentenced to jail.
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"I am confounded by the tortured tale of these negotiations," he said. "It is unfortunate that it came down to an illegal strike, but it was nonetheless illegal."

The judge's ruling, read before a packed courtroom, provoked angry gasps from the 40 union supporters who were present.

The charges stemmed from the union leadership's failure to order transit workers back to work after Justice Jones ruled that they must do so under the state's Taylor Law, which prohibits strikes by public employees.

"Angry gasps" is just entertaining. Why is it that they expect no penalty for contempt of court. Considering the effects of the strike, this is astoundingly light. The union overall will be taking the fall not those mismanaging it.

The ruling came amid a series of hearings on other penalties that are being sought for the strike, including fining the union $1 million for each day of the walkout, as dictated by the Taylor Law, and a motion by lawyers for the transit authority that it be authorized to stop automatic payroll deductions of union dues for Local 100 members.

Justice Jones has not ruled on those matters, but acknowledged yesterday that the financial penalties could put the union out of business.

"In light of the millions of dollars in fines," he said, "the potential danger to the continued existence of the union rests fully with the adjudication of those fines." The union maintains that either measure would devastate its overstretched finances.

Stop the payroll deductions? Where is the money going too? You'd think those fines would be going to the city, not back into the pockets of the union members that performed the illegal strike.

I see no issue with the penalties that were prescribed. The Taylor Law specifically outlines what methods are to be used in cases where contracts cannot find resolution. The law wasn't enacted to punish unions, but to protect the public from union threats to the public welfare.

Then there is the call for changing the law:

With no negotiations taking place, the state has ordered binding arbitration to settle the dispute. Mr. Toussaint and other union leaders are urging members show their support in a second vote for the same contract they voted down, with ballots to be cast by next Tuesday.

But Roger L. Green, a Democratic state assemblyman from Brooklyn, who attended the hearing in support of the union, said Mr. Toussaint's jail sentence would provoke fresh calls to amend or eliminate the Taylor Law, which many union leaders believe gives an inevitable upper hand to management.

What a surprise. Didn't see that coming. Union leaders believe the law gives the opposition the upper hand. If the law required that the management give them 90% of union demands for every contract negotiation they still would feel persecuted.

Unions have their place, but that doesn't mean that they have the right to violate law at their whim. I don't think you'll see much support for changes of the legislation when the public remembers those cold days on foot.