Golden Gate Workers Headed for Possible Strike

By Bay City News Service:

Workers in 13 unions that comprise the Golden Gate Bridge Labor Coalition plan to strike next week if a contract agreement is not reached by Monday afternoon, a coalition spokesman said.

The announcement about whether the unions will strike will be made at 4 p.m. Monday at the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District’s office at the bridge’s toll plaza, the coalition’s co-chair Alex Tonisson said.

The 450 union employees are ferry deckhands and captains, bus service workers and mechanics, bridge ironworkers and inspectors and construction trade employees, Tonisson said.

The union members voted in August to authorize a strike and there has been no contract settlement since then, Tonisson said.

The bridge district is proposing a three-year contract with an annual 3 percent wage increase and an increase in the cost of employees’ healthcare premiums that is equal to 2 percent of wages, Tonisson said.

The district and unions have been negotiating since April and the employees have been working without a contract since July 1, Tonisson said.

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