The seven unions that staff the Long Island Rail Road may delay their threatened strike from July ’til September. Though it’s gracious of the unions to pretend to care about ruining Long Island’s tourist season, there’s no justification for any strike. Gov. Cuomo shouldn’t bow to election-season extortion: Standing firm could help him with voters in New York and nationwide. Read More
The Long Island Rail Road workers threatening to go on strike this year make livings that most New Yorkers can only envy. The average LIRR employee made $83,794 in 2013 — 62% higher than the city’s median household income — and more than a quarter of them boasted incomes north of $100,000, according to the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More
Mayor Bill de Blasio's 9-year contract agreement with the United Federation of Teachers, including a pair of 4 percent base-salary increases retroactive to the fall of 2008, will cost so much that he wants to defer some of the expense all the way out to the end of the decade. Read More
Public employee unions can’t invoke the Triborough Amendment to preserve old pension plans that did not require employee contributions, the state Court of Appeals held in two cases this week. The rulings, favoring management in the cities of Yonkers and Oswego, were a solid win for taxpayers. Read More
The United Federation of Teachers would receive a 10 percent pay hike over seven years and retroactive raises of 4 percent for 2009 and 2010 under what Mayor Bill de Blasio Thursday hailed as a "landmark" deal with the union. Read More
Last week, at a Manhattan news conference that was also “live-streamed” on Governor Andrew Cuomo’s website, the chief executive officer of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) and the president of Local 100 of the Transit Workers Union signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) reflecting a tentative contract deal that will shape the MTA’s labor compensation costs for years to come. Read More
Governor Cuomo’s proposed two percent cap on interest arbitration awards to police and firefighters unions was stripped from the final Article 7 budget bill dealing with Education, Labor and Family Assistance issues. At the same time, the Senate and Assembly majorities were unable to get the governor to agree to their preference for a straight four-year extender of the arbitration law, which expires June 30. Read More
Rejecting almost every cost-sharing proposal suggested by the management side, a state arbitration panel has awarded a two-year, 6.6 percent increase in base salaries to members of the police officers union in the Village of Rockville Centre in Nassau County... Read More