DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM
The Alcover family -- 9-year-old Nicholas, father Elton, mother Kimberly, and 6-year-old Noel -- signed the mayor's registration log in his office on Friday during a rally where Teamsters and other union members called for a new bus contract.
Families feel
strike’s tide risingMany fear getting in over
their heads financially as
the holdout continues
Nine-year-old Nicholas Alcover and his little brother, Noel, sometimes play video games to pass the time when their parents -- both striking bus workers -- are walking the picket line.
On Friday, Nicholas joined his parents at a rally, standing on a stone bench, waving to passing cars and carrying a sign with a message of union solidarity.
"Say no to take backs, layoffs or cutbacks," the youngster recited.
But his father, Elton, 46, a bus operator, worries about how much longer his family can endure the financial and emotional hardship of being on strike. His wife, Kimberly, is a bus company informational specialist.
"We're both in this together. It's been a double-whammy for us," Alcover said. "We have no income coming in at all, just the strike fund."
Husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, fathers and son -- the strike has affected all kinds of families.
"The average strike has an incredible impact on all families, single- and multi-family homes because many plans you have made -- vacations, college, appliances -- those things have to be put on hold," said Don Owens, spokesman for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. "The economic strings tighten in a household."
Alcover said his and his wife's support for a strike came after company proposals looked like benefits -- including medical -- would be eroded. Management at one point proposed employee contributions of up to 10 percent. Currently the company pays 100 percent of health premiums.
"This is about our family. They want to take back our benefits. That was my main concern," said Alcover, whose retired mother also lives with the family.
"The medical is very important to me. I admit, we get a good deal. We don't pay for medical (premiums), but we pay the co-payments like everyone else."
Mayor Jeremy Harris, however, got Oahu Transit Services, the company that runs the bus system for the city, to guarantee no layoffs or cutbacks in benefits if the City Council passes a bus fare hike that would raise $6.8 million. A final vote on the Council's latest fare plan is scheduled for Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Alcover has a mortgage and his family has had to cut back on nonessentials, although his boys haven't asked him for things they don't need. "We explain to (the boys) the reason why we're on strike is because we believe in certain things that they're taking away from us. I tell them that we feed them, buy the clothes that they wear to school and get certain things they need."
Alcover said he and his wife have about a month's worth of savings to live on but if the strike is prolonged, he'll probably have to take a part-time job.
"Financially, if we have to go another month, I don't know what I going do."
