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DRPA workers' unions fight effort to end their free bridge crossings, PATCO trips

Unions that represent toll collectors, police, and other Delaware River Port Authority workers are fighting the agency's effort to strip them of free rides across the DRPA's four toll bridges.

Unions that represent toll collectors, police, and other Delaware River Port Authority workers are fighting the agency's effort to strip them of free rides across the DRPA's four toll bridges.

The agency Wednesday notified all workers and contractors that as of 2 p.m. that day, free rides not taken in the course of their work duties were prohibited.

The unions responded that their negotiated contracts include provisions for 100 free trips a year for most workers.

"It would be like the DRPA coming in and saying, 'That guy that makes $15 an hour under the contract, we're now going to pay him $7.75 an hour,' " Frank Bankard, business representative for International Union of Operating Engineers Local 542, said Thursday.

The union represents about 200 DRPA toll collectors, maintenance workers, police dispatchers, truck drivers, and other employees.

The union is filing a formal grievance seeking to overturn the DRPA's decision to cancel free bridge trips and PATCO train passes for employees, Bankard said.

Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 30, which represents DRPA police officers, has notified the DRPA it is filing a similar grievance.

Such grievances could end up before an independent arbitrator to decide.

"This is a matter between DRPA and the unions that represent certain DRPA employees," agency spokesman Ed Kasuba said Thursday. "We will address this matter with the relevant union officials."

The free-ride policy became an issue in July, when the authority's chief public safety officer resigned after acknowledging that he had borrowed another executive's E-ZPass transponder to provide free rides to his daughter to go to high school in Pennsylvania.

On Aug. 18, under fire for executives' free E-ZPass trips and lavish car allowances, the DRPA's board approved a resolution to "eliminate all programs to all officers, employees and retirees of the authority [under which they] receive free bridge passage and free PATCO rides, effective immediately."

But DRPA workers continued to cross the spans without charge to commute to and from their jobs.

After inquiries from The Inquirer, DRPA chief executive John Matheussen said Tuesday that the free-ride ban applied to commuting, too, and that the free rides would be halted.

On Wednesday, chief operating officer Tim Pulte sent an e-mail to all DRPA employees saying "it has been determined that [the Aug. 18 board resolution] applies to all authority employees who use the authority bridges to travel to and from work. The resolution also applies to contractors who are working at our facilities and, who, in the course of their work for the authority, must access our bridges.

"Therefore, effective today, Sept. 8, 2010, at 2:00 p.m., all free trips for commuting purposes for employees and contractors will end."

If DRPA wanted to change its free-ride policies, the agency should have negotiated new language in its contracts when the pacts expired, Bankard said.

"These were perks and incentives given to us through collective bargaining," Bankard said. "They were incentives to get people to take those jobs. When unemployment was at 4 percent, no one wanted those jobs."

Most DRPA union toll collectors make $46,176 a year. Nonunion, part-time toll collectors, hired through contractor PRWT Services Inc. to work weekends and holidays, are paid $10 an hour.

A retired PATCO executive, William Vigrass of Cherry Hill, also challenged the end of the free PATCO train rides in letters to Govs. Christie and Rendell.

"The free employees' pass is a universal benefit for all members of the American Public Transportation Association as well as the International Union of Urban Transportation," Vigrass wrote.

"PATCO now is unique in the entire world in not having an employees' pass. If your purpose was to further degrade morale of PATCO employees, you chose an effective way to do so," he wrote.

Before the board action last month, the DRPA's policy was that employees were permitted to commute to work by bridge for free and that DRPA employees hired before Jan. 1, 2007, were entitled to an additional 100 free E-ZPass crossings and 10 free rides on PATCO High-Speed trains annually.

Those same employees were entitled to 100 E-ZPass trips a year upon retirement.

Workers hired between Jan. 1, 2007, and Sept. 13, 2008, got the freebies while on the payroll, but not after retiring.

Those hired on or after Sept. 14, 2008 - the date of the most recent toll increase - didn't get any free trips, except to commute to work.

The policies were similar for PATCO employees: Those hired before Jan. 1, 2007, received 100 free train trips and 10 free E-ZPass trips a year. After retirement, they were eligible for 100 free train trips annually.

PATCO employees hired on or after Jan. 1, 2007, got the same perks, minus the retirement trips. Those hired after Sept. 14, 2008, weren't eligible for free trips.

DRPA has about 600 employees, and its subsidiary, PATCO, has about 300. Most were hired before 2007.