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Now's the Time: Get Vaccinated and Tested to Safeguard Your Family, Co-Workers, and Riders

The latest info from the MTA on how to get the vaccine is here.

TWU Local 100 strongly recommends that every member take advantage of this opportunity to get the vaccine now. The vaccine has proven to be 95% effective, and adverse reactions are minimal. Thousands of transit workers have received it with no serious side effects. The disease, on the other hand, is deadly, especially if you are over 50, and have pre-existing health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, asthma, or high blood pressure. This is especially true with new, more contagious variants entering the US. Click on this link to go to the portal.

Sen Schumer, in TWU Zoom Call, Pledges Action on Hazard Pay

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One of the most powerful elected officials in the country told TWU that he remains committed to securing hazard pay.

During a Zoom meeting exclusively for Transport Workers Union leaders and members in New York on Friday, Jan. 29, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said hazard pay is a top priority for him as he works with the House of Representatives and the Biden-Harris administration to address the ongoing health crisis and economic damage it is causing. “It’s not in the new Biden plan, but we’re going to continue fighting for it in the next big transportation bill, and we will need your alliance all the way,” Schumer said. “We [need to] get the money for transit, first and foremost, so they don’t shut down anything, but priority number two is hazard pay. You folks who put yourself on the line, exposed yourself, you deserve that."

Schumer originally proposed hazard pay in April 2020. The House of Representatives adopted it but the Senate, then controlled by Rep. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky, refused to adopt it. The senator was instrumental in securing $8 billion for the MTA during the pandemic, helping to shelve MTA doomsday plans to lay off thousands of transit workers.

“Senator Schumer has always been a fighter for working men and working women,” Utano said. “He listens to labor. When he sets his sights on something he doesn’t give up.”

International President Samuelsen praised Schumer for securing billions of dollars for transit systems all across the country, and funding that stopped the layoffs for tens of thousands of airline workers also represented by TWU. “We worked very closely with the senator and we were able to deliver collectively and I think that’s how it ought to be,” Samuelsen said. “It ought to be with our elected officials in Washington working hand in hand with the trade labor movement to advance the interests of working people, and this is prime example of how that plays out when it’s clicking the right way.”

Samuelsen added: “The level of interaction and level of access that we had with Senator Schumer is just unprecedented and unparalleled.”

Div Chair Carlos Bernabel receives the vaccine

County Arranges Vaccine for Liberty Lines Workers

Carlos Bernabel, Chair of the Local 100 Private Operations Division, and Liberty Lines Bus Operator, was one of the workers to receive the Covid vaccine thanks to the efforts of Westchester County and Liberty Lines. The County arranged for vaccines for Liberty workers over a three-day period. Monday, Feb. 1, 20201 is the last day of the program. Liberty Lines workers still interested in getting the vaccine can call the company's Human Resources department to register. Vaccines are available from 3-6pm Monday afternoon. Carlos is urging his fellow workers to get the shot.

President Utano Praises Transit Workers in Annual Report to Membership

President's Report to Members presents recap of accomplishments and a preview of our ongoing objectives.

TWU LOCAL 100 BLOCKS MTA PLAN TO SHUTTER BOOTHS AND ELIMINATE LUNCH RELIEF

TWU Local 100 has successfully blocked an MTA plan to eliminate “lunch relief” positions and shutter all 470 token booths for significant periods of time every day.

Ruling on a lawsuit brought by TWU Local 100, Supreme Court Justice W. Franc Perry declared Thursday, Jan. 28, the MTA would be violating the New York Public Authorities Law if it went through with the closures, which were scheduled to go into effect on Sunday.

“This is a huge win for Local 100 and the riders we serve,” TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano said. “The MTA was trying to quietly, and without public input, impose service cuts that would make it more difficult and dangerous for riders to use the system.”

Stations Vice President Robert Kelley said: “We had a strong and well-crafted legal argument. We fought and we prevailed.”

Under the MTA plan, Station Agents would have been directed to lock their booths – and leave them empty – when going on meal breaks during the morning, afternoon and overnight shifts. Right now, “Lunch Relief” Station Agents fill the booths during the 30-minute meal breaks. That was going to end. If the plan was not derailed, booths would have been shuttered and unstaffed nearly 1,500 hours per week combined, Local 100 lawyer Arthur Schwartz said. (470 booths, three 30-minute meal breaks per 24 hours) There wouldn’t be a Station Agent in vacated booths to assist riders, including disabled riders and parents with strollers who need to be buzzed through access gates; riders having problems with faulty turnstiles or MetroCard vending machines; riders needing a Station Agent to alert the police of an emergency, Schwartz said.

The plaintiffs in the case were Stations Vice President Robert Kelley, Congressman Adriano Espaillat, and Michael Schweinsberg, President of the 504 Democratic Club, an association comprised of, and advocating for, persons with disabilities. TWU Local 100 argued that the booth closures amounted to a significant reduction in service and access, which would first require public hearings and MTA board approval. Since the MTA did not hold hearings or get board approval, the MTA can’t close the booths, the union argued.

Justice Perry agreed: “Based upon the testimony adduced at the hearing and evidence presented therein, the Court finds that the elimination of the duties of those transit workers who provided lunch relief for station agents will result in significant token booth closures within the City of New York. Such closures clearly constitute a reduction of services and a reduction of access to the system by the general public.”

If the MTA pushes forward with public hearings, TWU Local 100 will lead the fight to keep booths staffed, Utano said. “The Authority cynically used the pandemic as cover for eliminating our work, and for flouting the Public Authorities law,” Utano said. “Additionally, their stated position in court that closing individual station booths across the system for upwards of one and a half hours a day is a ‘minor inconvenience’ to New Yorkers was contemptible, and we will call them on this shameful and dangerous attitude if they decide to move forward with public hearings."

Sample letter from the MTA

Don't Let the MTA Cut Off Health Coverage to Your Dependents!

The MTA does an audit every 5 years to remove dependents from the health plan who are no longer eligible for coverage. This is an audit year.

In December you should have received a LETTER FROM THE MTA asking for certain documents to prove that your dependents are still eligible for coverage under the plan. If you do not submit the documents you were asked for, your dependents could end up without coverage.

Don't let that happen.

You must get the the documents to Ernst & Young, the MTA's auditor, by February 12, 2021.

There are three ways to send your documents in:

·       Go to https://MTA.eydeva.com via computer or mobile phone and log in using your User ID provided to you in the letter you received. This is fastest and safest.
·       Fax your documents to 1-888-349-9420
·       Mail your documents to PO BOX 851408, Westland, MI 48185-0690

If you have additional questions, you can call Ernst & Young at 888-649-2003, 8am to 8pm ET, Monday-Friday.
(If you only have single coverage, this does not apply to you.)

Eladio Diaz, Retired LE/S Chair, is Mourned

Local 100 is mourning the passing in late September of retired Executive Board Member and LE/S Division Chair Eladio Diaz. He was 64.

Brother Diaz was born on Christmas Day in Cataño, Puerto Rico in 1955. and was raised in Brooklyn. He attended Brooklyn Tech and graduated from John Jay HS in 1974.

After high school, he joined the U.S. Airforce and served until 1976. He studied electrical engineering at SUNY, Brooklyn.

Eladio worked as an electronics engineer at the Standard Microsystems Corp., Loral Corp., and Thompson Signal Devices before being hired by New York City Transit as an Electronics Equipment Maintainer in 1987. He retired from service in 2010.

In addition to Division office, Brother Diaz was a member of the Local 100 Executive Board. He used his professional experience in electronics to help modernize the union’s information technology capabilities as well. Brother Diaz was interred at Bushnell National Cemetery in Tampa, FL. He was a resident of Spring Hill, FL at the time of his death.

Union Members who Fell to COVID-19 Honored Starting Today Throughout the System

JANUARY 25 -- Photographs of our fallen pandemic heroes will be on display in subway stations across the system in a moving and beautiful tribute that begins today.

The MTA-commissioned memorial is an eight-minute slide show with portraits provided by family members, a new poem by a former U.S. Poet Laureate, and an original score for the piano. The tribute will be playing daily on digital screens in subway stations through February 7th at 10:30 a.m., 2:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. After each airing, the presentation immediately will be shown a second time.

In the MTA press release announcing the project to the public and the media, TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano said:

“Transport Workers Union Local 100 will never forget our union brothers and sisters who perished in service to the city. It’s our fervent hope that with this memorial the riding public also keeps them in their hearts and minds. Stop for a moment during your daily travels and reflect on these departed heroes, the lives lost, and the heartbreak being carried by their families and co-workers. May they rest in peace.”

The memorial can be seen on this website: https://new.mta.info/covid-memorial

Since the beginning of the pandemic, 136 MTA employees at NYC Transit, the Long Island Rail Road and the Metro-North Railroad, were infected and died due to the coronavirus, including more than 90 members of TWU Local 100. The tribute features 111 portraits collected by the authority. TWU Local 100 is working with a Brooklyn artist and design team on a permanent memorial at the Union Hall on Montague St.

Read the MTA's press release here.

Dr. Fauci's Message to the Transit Workforce

Training and Upgrading Fund Announces Tax Prep, Courses for 2021

Our Training and Uprading Fund has announced a free tax prep seminar and our Spring course schedule for 2021. Download the course schedule here.