Mayor rules out
city takeover of bus
to end the strike
Federal laws make it "virtually impossible" to convert striking bus workers to city employees in an attempt to get buses rolling again, according to Mayor Jeremy Harris.
"The preliminary review from the attorneys ... is that it would be virtually impossible to do, and we wouldn't enjoy any of the savings simply because of all the federal restrictions," Harris said.
While Harris said he does not want to see changes to the privatization of the bus system, he has previously said that if the nearly two-week-long bus strike drags on, one of the options for the city to explore would be for the city to take over bus operations.
Bus workers, represented by Local 996 of the Hawaii Teamsters Union, are private employees who work for Oahu Transit Services Inc., the company that operates the bus system for the city.
Going from private to public employees could reduce the city's cost for the bus system by $18 million. Harris said city positions comparable to bus drivers and mechanics pay about $10,000 a year less than top-scale bus workers earn and about $3,000 less in pension contributions.
OTS pays 100 percent of health insurance contributions, while the city pays between 71 and 82 percent of premiums for city workers.
"That assumes the city has the ability to simply shift the operations over to a public stature, and the analysis really shows that that is almost impossible to do because of federal labor laws," Harris said.
Federal law prevents the public takeover of transit operations to result in workers receiving diminished benefits.
"You couldn't shift over and enjoy the savings," Harris said.
If the city did transform bus workers into public employees, there would be a two-tier system of workers.
"One set of employees doing actually an identical job would be paid significantly more, they'd have a bigger pension, they'd have more vacation days simply because they originally came from the bus," Harris said.
"I think it ought to hammer home the company's argument that the contract is a very good one for the bus drivers," Harris said.
