It’s not every day workers get to swarm their manager’s office to
demand union recognition. But that’s what a group of TriMet Lift workers
did Oct. 3, accompanied by a state senator, the Oregon AFL-CIO
president, and the president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 757.
The employer is First Transit — a division of the giant UK-based
multinational First Group. Under contracts with TriMet, First Transit
runs TriMet Lift, a transit service for seniors and the disabled, from
three Portland-area locations. At two of the locations, workers are
represented by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 757, but at the SE 92nd
and Powell yard, they’re nonunion. Up to now, anyway.
Workers weren’t surprised when First Transit operations manager Linda
Ciavara, caught off guard, wouldn’t say whether the company will
voluntarily recognize their choice to unionize. So the next morning,
union supporters filed a petition with the National Labor Relations
Board. The federal agency strives to schedule an election within 42 days
to determine if workers really want a union. [The fact that 112 of the
166 workers might have signed union authorization cards isn’t enough to
demonstrate their choice to join a union under U.S. labor law; the
employer first gets a chance to hire union avoidance consultants and go
at workers at mandatory meetings.
At TriMet Lift, contracted bus drivers say they want a union | nwLaborPress
