Spitzer Enacts Track Worker Safety Law

Spitzer Enacts Track Worker Safety Law


Governor Spitzer July 3 signed into law a bill establishing a track safety task force for city subways to avoid tragedies like the deaths of two Track Workers in less than a week back in April.

ROGER TOUSSAINT: Upgrades safety. The task force will consist of the Commissioner of the state's Department of Transportation, the president of Transport Workers Union Local 100 and the President of New York City Transit. Its duty is to evaluate, inspect and recommend safety measures for track work.

Toussaint Pleased

Local 100 President Roger Toussaint celebrated the bill's enactment, claiming that it would allow the union and the state to have permanent oversight of track safety and proactively set up measures to protect transit workers on the tracks.

"Every transit worker who works around the tracks will have a better chance of coming home safe to their family with the help of this legislation," Mr. Toussaint wrote to Local 100 members after Governor Spitzer's signing.

While many transit workers agreed that the creation of a task force would address safety concerns, others predicted it would have less impact than a measure on the union's legislative agenda that would have established specific safety regulations for NYC Transit. That bill's movement halted when it failed to get a sponsor in the State Senate.

Track safety became a major issue for the union when two Track Workers died on the job in April.

The union's Power Division vice chairman, Thomas Creegan, who had pushed for the original track safety bill establishing regulations, lamented that Governor Spitzer's action would prevent the union from pushing similar bills in the near future. "We won't be able to do anything legislatively," Mr. Creegan said.