Service Employees Strike Is Looming

NEW YORK CITY-Members of Local 32 BJ voted Thursday to authorize the bargaining committee currently negotiating a new contract with the Realty Advisory Board on Labor Relations to call for a strike if those talks fail. The service union’s contract expires at the end of the month. The board issued an extensive commercial building preparedness guideline designed to help owners and agents deal with the potential crisis. The union says the vote “sends a strong signal to the real estate industry on the importance of healthcare.”

One Wednesday, thousands of cleaners in New Jersey, Connecticut, Long Island and Westchester authorized the same strike action if talks with management fail to produce what they call an “acceptable contract agreement ensuring affordable, quality health coverage.” While negotiations continue, Kevin Doyle, the union’s executive vice president, tells GlobeSt.com that they’re ” not going well.” He says that management’s latest proposal is “ totally unacceptable as it shifts the burden for health costs from the owner to the employee and offers no wage increase for three years.” The union–the largest private sector union in the New York area and the largest building service workers union in the US–covers more than 40,000 commercial cleaners and has a total of more than 70,000 members.