CWA 1180 - Calendar

DC 37 makes deal with city
Residency requirement lifted; 9.42 percent raise; no pension givebacks

July 2006

Leaders of AFSCME District Council 37, the city’s largest municipal labor union, reached a tentative deal Wednesday night that will increase wages by 9.42 percent over 32 months and ease the city residency requirement. Significantly, the agreement includes no givebacks, despite strong pressure from Mayor Bloomberg to raise the retirement age and reduce pensions.

The deal is retroactive to July 1, 2005 and includes a raise of 3.15 percent the first year, a raise of 2 percent on August 1, 2006, and a raise of 4 percent on February 1, 2007. The accord also includes a one-time payment of $166 per member to the union’s welfare fund, and an annual increase of $100 per member in city contributions to the fund. On the last day of the contract, an additional 0.34 percent will be available for additional compensation, which could be used to grant an across-the-board raise, to address title inequities, or to increase differentials. The contract will expire at the end of February 2008.

According to a source at Local 371, whose president, Charles Ensley, voted against the contract, the city agreed to amend the city’s Administrative Code to allow city workers to live either in the five boroughs or in Nassau, Westchester, Suffolk, Orange, Rockland, or Putnam counties. Workers who move outside of the city will have to continue to pay New York City income tax. The Daily News reports that the city might not amend the Administrative Code, but instead provide a waiver of the residency requirement for DC 37 members. If the residency changes are made through such a waiver, they may not apply to members of Local 1180, but any change to the Administrative Code would include members of Local 1180 who work for the city.

In an article in the New York Times, Steven Greenhouse speculated that the agreement will allow the mayor to push the new municipal bargaining coalition, of which Local 1180 is a founding member, to follow DC 37’s wage agreement. But the coalition’s explicit goal is to escape the restrictions imposed by pattern bargaining in the past.

Back to Negotiations page