Building Workers Union, Realty Board Reach Early Agreement

NEW YORK CITY-The Building Service Workers Union has forged what it says in an unprecedented early contract agreement with Realty Advisory Board president James Berg.

The three-year contract, which must be ratified by Service Employees’ International Union local 32BJ’s 70,000 members, includes a 10% weekly wage increase over three years. In addition, the agreement calls for increased employer contributions to members’ pension to $100 million over three years and $114 million in additional employer contributions to employees’ health funds. Annual legal service fund contributions by employers would total $6 million under the new contract and employee training would receive $5 million per year in employer funding.

The current contract runs until Dec. 31, but economic concerns and the World Trade Center bombings prompted SEIU 32BJ president Michael Fishman and Berg to begin negotiations early. “After the World Trade Center attack it became clear that it was in both our interests to reach an agreement without the usual long, adversarial relationship,” Fishman tells GlobeSt.com. “Typically, at the end of an agreement everybody’s facing a strike on New Year’s day. That would have been in no one’s best interest this year.”