Full Term in Hand, Floyd Focuses on Pact, Benefits

GREGORY FLOYD: Must improve pay, preserve benefits. Having secured his first full fiveyear term as president of Teamsters Local 237, Gregory Floyd is already looking down the barrel of a contract expiring next year and a city budget deficit that could reach as high as $5 billion. In the wake of his Oct. 5 victory, he says he is gearing up for the challenges his members will face in the coming year.

“The focus will be on maintaining employment and maintaining benefits, numbers one and two. And the third one will be trying to get an increase as large as possible,” he said in a phone interview. Perhaps aiding him in these battles will be Mayor Bloomberg, whom the union endorsed for re-election Oct. 7, strengthening an alliance with an incumbent widely expected to gain a third term.

‘Can Reason With Him’

“We’re going to have a good relationship . . . I don’t see the Mayor being this person that you can’t speak to and reason with,” he said. “Sometimes we agree, sometimes we disagree. But we both agree that there’s an economic crisis and the city has to function.”

On the city’s fiscal problems, Mr. Floyd said he had high hopes because of an upturn on Wall Street that could lead to higher tax revenues than expected. “I remain optimistic,” he said.

But he took care to acknowledge the movement against some public-employee benefits here and the coming battle to retain them. “I see the push for Tier 5, which we’re opposed to,” he said. But, acknowledging the impact of the compromise deal the United Federation of Teachers recently cut with the city, he said,“the die has maybe already been cast. I’m optimistic; but I’m not foolish enough to think that Tier 5, in some form, won’t come.”

He narrowly won the election, garnering 3,647 votes to 3,325 for his chief rival, Eunice Rodriguez, while his running mates also won close contests to secure new five-year terms that will begin in January. The third candidate for president, George Contoveros, received 368 votes in balloting tallied by Election Services Solutions.

‘Another 5 Years of Proving’

“It gives us another five years to show that we can operate a union. That’s what we’re going to focus on,” said Mr. Floyd, who was chosen by the local’s executive board 2½ years ago to complete the term of retired President Carl Haynes.

He acknowledged the tight margin but asserted that the opposing Members for Change slate had run a negative campaign. “They never stuck to issues. They confused a lot of people . . . and they made a lot of promises. They were in a position to make promises that I was not in a position to make,” he said.

Ms. Rodriguez said that she would continue to be active after closing the gap from her 2005 race against Mr. Haynes, which she lost by 470 votes. She noted that “3,325 members did demonstrate that they wanted change, and it’s imperative that their voices be heard.”

Disputing Mr. Floyd’s characterization of her tactics, she said, “We ran a good, clean campaign; we stuck to the issues that we wanted to bring to the members. We did our best.” She called the mail-ballot return by less than one-third of the union’s 24,000 members “unfortunate.”

‘Contoveros Didn’t Cost Us’

She also said that she didn’t think Mr. Contoveros, whose candidacy was considered the longest of shots, had siphoned votes from her. “I don’t attribute our loss to him,” she said.

Mr. Floyd said that with the election out of the way, he would also focus on restructuring the union to modernize it, although he offered few details. “We’re going to be sitting down with a team, we’re going to sit down and think of long-term strategy. Where necessary, we’re going to make some significant changes,” he said.

The rest of Mr. Floyd’s slate prevailed by slightly smaller margins in the balloting. Incumbent Vice President Richard Hendershot defeated Jakwan Rivers by 282 votes, and incumbent Secretary-Treasurer Ruben Torres bested Vincent Lattimore by 278 votes. Recording Secretary Patricia Stryker held off Noreen Hollingsworth, a trustee who had defected to the opposition, by 294 votes.

Incumbent trustees Steven Gordon and Ed Kane were also elected, with newcomer Curtis Scott taking Ms. Hollingsworth’s place as part of Mr. Floyd’s victorious slate.

The Local 237 leader said that he had dismissed Ms. Hollingsworth as a business agent for the union because of her defection to Members for Change and other dissident behavior. “There was definite attempt to sabotage this operation for the last two years. She told members things about the contract that weren’t true,” he said. “You don’t want to go through an election with people who are not with you. It was very damaging, because she was an executive board member.”