BART Negotiations to Resume Monday, July 8
BART union employees went back to work Friday, July 5 without a new contract under a temporary agreement reached Thursday evening. Following three days without bargaining, management, state mediators, and the unions are scheduled to resume bargaining Monday, July 8. Negotiations will continue while operations resume for 30 days under the former contract terms. New contracts with the unions will be retroactive to July 1, 2013.
BART management and SEIU leaders expressed opposition to a cooling-off period. On June 25 BART Board President Tom Radulovich wrote to Governor Jerry Brown, asking that the 60-day cooling-off period not be invoked. The parties agreed to the 30-day deadline delay to allow negotiations to continue without a strike. On Saturday, the New York Times reported, “The two sides said that they hoped to reach an agreement before the new deadline, but remained far apart on key issues, including wages, state pensions and health insurance.” Theoretically, the strike could be renewed in early August, a low volume BART ridership period. In contrast, a Governor’s “60-day cooling off period” would have pushed the strike point into the high ridership period of early September.
As BART stations were unlocked and the trains began rolling Friday afternoon, BART General Manager Grace Crunican greeted riders in several stations with an apology for the four days without service and a prepaid clipper card.
