Includes HHC, DOC Staff
IBT '832' Members Move to Local 237

By MEREDITH KOLODNER

Teamsters Local 237 gained 500 new municipal employees after members of IBT Local 832 voted by a margin of 3 to 1 to merge with the much-larger local.

GREGORY FLOYD: 'We'll work to upgrade them.'

The school lunchroom supervisors, Health and Hospitals Corporation laundry supervisors and Department of Correction commissary employees voted 198 to 64 to join Local 237 after their local was put into trusteeship several months ago.

'They Were Underserved'

"From our investigation, we understood the local was really under-served," said Local 237 President Gregory Floyd. "We will be working hard to bring them up to date with their contract."

Local 832 officials contacted Local 237 in April 2007 and asked for the merger. Local 832, which also included Bakers, Institutional-Trades Instructors and motor transport supervisors, existed for 30 years as a separate public-sector local.

But its small size made it difficult to operate effectively and it was nearing bankruptcy before its parent union put it into trusteeship. Mr. Floyd said his local's initial investigation into a possible merger found dissatisfaction among a wide layer of members, including complaints about a lack of visitation by business agents and a union office that was closed on Fridays.

Local 832 officials had initially proposed the merger without a vote, but Mr. Floyd said he thought it was important that it occur through an election. "It would have been just a nightmare to have a local like that be forced to merge," he said. "We didn't want to have people join and have them be unhappy. We didn't want to have a civil war."

Local 237 is now in the process of negotiating with the city over benefits and transferring membership dues. Officials will also be working on bargaining a new contract, which has expired. In the long run, Mr. Floyd hopes to fold the new members into Local 237's existing contracts where possible.

Ballots were mailed to Local 832 members on Jan. 7 and were tabulated Feb. 19 by Election Services Inc.