City unions with expired contracts eye SEPTA deal

For all the political drama and commuter inconvenience it caused, the SEPTA strike may have been just a curtain-raiser to a bigger act of labor strife, featuring the city of Philadelphia and 22,000 unionized city workers now laboring under expired contracts.

Fiscally, the SEPTA walkout has nothing to do with the city or its four unions. But the transit strike's impact on public opinion, the political landscape, and Mayor Nutter's image could well influence the deals the city eventually reaches with the unions, observers said.

At least some city workers appear to be inspired by the transit strike.

Members of the city's white-collar union, District Council 47, today passed out leaflets in City Hall encouraging employees to take off of work this Friday to protest the lack of progress on their contracts. DC47's contract, like those of the blue-collar workers, police and firefighters, expired June 30.

Referring to the mayor as "Mayor Cutter," the leaflets - which were not officially sanctioned by the union - read: "The Cutter is not negotiating with our Municipal Workers Unions but he found time to get involved in SEPTA's union. . . . Straighten your back and tell Mayor Cutter you are a city worker who deserves to be treated with dignity."

Former DC47 president Thomas Paine Cronin said city workers "have a perfect right to say they want a similar contract. If I were a current city union leader, I would be saying, me too! Me too!"

However, in interviews, few city and union officials, or political observers, said they believed that sanitation workers and other municipal employees would get fatter pay checks solely because that's what bus drivers would receive under the new five-year SEPTA contract. The two situations are unrelated, they said.

"The (Transit Workers Union Local 234) contract is of limited impact because it really is a state thing," Democratic political consultant Dan Fee said.

TWU negotiated with SEPTA, a state-created agency funded in part by the city, the state and Philadelphia's four surrounding counties, and not with a City Hall and its declining coffers.

Also, while Gov. Rendell helped seal the SEPTA contract with $7 million in state money, it's highly doubtful that he could, or would, bring a similar infusion of funds to the city's negotiations.

At the same time, though, the resulting SEPTA deal - and the talks leading up to it - could complicate matters for Nutter.

The mayor played only a supporting role in resolving the logjam, and at one point was barred from negotiating sessions by Local 234 president Willie Brown. The union boss blamed, in part, Nutter for the strike and dubbed him "Little Caesar."

For some, the episode raised questions about Nutter's ability to handle high-stakes contract talks under the threat of a strike.

"He didn't look good on TV, standing on the sidelines as the governor came swinging in with a $7 million early Christmas present," said Local NAACP president J. Whyatt Mondesire.

Nutter, in response, said he had no money to offer.

"But as mayor of the city that was facing at least that weekend the prospect of a strike, (SEPTA talks) something for me to be involved with whether I have dollars to put on the table or not," Nutter said today.

He also stressed that he participated in the negotiations at the invitation of U.S. Rep. Bob Brady, who has had much success mediating previous Local 234 strikes.

Nutter dismissed the tensions between him and Brown.

"In contract negotiations, a lot of things happen," he said. "It's over. This is not the Dr. Phil show. . . . Let's not have a psychology class here."

Nonetheless, the mayor will now be dealing with union leaders emboldened by the actions of their SEPTA colleagues.

"I'm proud of Willie for sticking up for his membership and I'm glad he stood tough against the politicians - the mayor, the governor, Brady, all of them," said Bill Gault, president of Local 22 of the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 22.

"I haven't spoken with Willie Brown or leadership over there, but it seems like they did a good job," said John McNesby, president of Lodge 5 of the Fraternal Order of Police. "He represented his members well, and he delivered."

But while union leaders may have been heartened by the strike and the contract it yielded, public frustration over the SEPTA walkout may play to Nutter's advantage, said Peter Capelli, director of the Wharton Center for Human Resources.

"The public was so unhappy with the union's argument that it's quite possible the next time a strike is threatened the public would be more willing to side with the administration," said Capelli.

The public, Capelli said, was not likely to make fine distinctions between SEPTA workers and city workers, even if city employees were seeking less generous contract terms than those sought by transit workers.

Nutter, for his part, sought today to emphasize that the SEPTA deal and the city contract talks "could not be more different."

Noting Philadelphia's 11.1 percent unemployment rate and declining tax revenues, he said, "our financial condition is deteriorating."

He also downplayed any chance of a strike by municipal employees, noting SEPTA workers lost a week's wages and that such a move would hurt the city.

"I'm not sure what the purpose of such an action would be," he said. (State law bars police and firefighters from striking.)

The mayor anticipated reaching new pacts with the four municipal unions "as relatively quickly as possible."

Of the four unions, the police are furthest along, having completed arbitration hearings. A decision by independent arbitrators is expected later this month or early next month.

Arbitration hearings with the firefighters began in late October and will go into February.

Far less progress has occurred with the city's non-uniformed employee unions, DC47 and District Council 33. Neither has met with city negotiators since July.

However, two sources said Nutter and his chief of staff, Clay Armbrister, did meet privately two weeks ago with Pete Matthews, president of DC33, which represents nearly 10,000 blue-collar workers.