'371' Official Claims:
War Costing Unions At Bargaining Table

By RICHARD STEIER

The massive cost of America's continued military presence in Iraq has had a significant impact on the city bargaining process, a prominent union official said last week.

UNIONS PINCHED BY WAR: Faye Moore says the city's tougher line at the bargaining table in recent talks with District Council 37 is the trickle-down effect of a faltering national economy that is largely the result of the costs of the continued large-scale presence of U.S. troops in Iraq.

Faye Moore, a vice president of Local 371 of District Council 37 who is strongly favored to win election later this month to succeed Charles Ensley as the local's president, said that cost can be seen in DC 37's struggles to win a new wage pact.

Differs With Roberts

DC 37 Executive Director Lillian Roberts on March 25 told the union's delegates that the prime cause of a lull in bargaining was uncertainty as to how much help the Bloomberg administration would receive from the state budget.

But Ms. Moore contended during an April 4 phone interview that larger and more-permanent forces had stalled the union's effort to get a wage deal along the same lines as those previously negotiated by unions representing Teachers and a wide mix of uniformed employees.

"We're last and we're in a holding pattern and they're asking things of us that they didn't ask of the unions that settled earlier," she said. "When we ask why, they say, 'Look what's happened to the economy.'''

Ms. Moore continued, "The reason the economy is in the shape it's in is because of the cost of the war. The economists knew that this day was coming."

The Local 371 vice president for grievances contended that government at all levels has been inclined to take an easier stance in bargaining with uniformed unions because it fits with a "culture of fear" that has been cultivated since 9/11. "It also splits the labor movement," she said.

City's Private War

One conspicuous argument against her theory, however, is the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, which is locked in a bitter arbitration battle with the Bloomberg administration over a contract to replace the one that expired nearly four years ago.

Ms. Moore, who touched on similar themes the following day during a forum sponsored by U.S. Labor Against the War that was held at the headquarters of Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union, also noted that many of the social service jobs represented by her union are partially funded by the Federal Government. War spending cuts into the money available for social-service delivery in the public sector, she said.

Asked whether her willingness to speak out on topics that go beyond DC 37 was one way in which she would be a different kind of president than Mr. Ensley, who is retiring after 26 years of running Local 371, she demurred.

"I've done these kinds of forums before," Ms. Moore said, including one at the City University Graduate Center and another on globalization. "Charles used to make these kind of speeches for us, but lately he's been handing it to me to do it."