BART Workers Go Out On Strike; Commuters Brace For Traffic Nightmare

BART workers officially went on strike at midnight after contract talks stalled on Thursday afternoon.
The walkout set up a nightmare of a commute for Friday morning.
BART officials urged commuters to work from home, carpool or find other means of transportation.

BART spokesman Rick Rice said the transit agency contracted for bus service into San Francisco, but that system can only carry 6,000 passengers. BART's average daily ridership is 400,000.

The buses will pick up passengers just outside the Walnut Creek, El Cerrito del Norte, Concord, Lafayette, Dublin/Pleasanton, San Leandro, Hayward, Fremont and West Oakland BART stations.

 (Click here for a summary of transit alternatives along the Peninsula and into San Francisco.)

Rice urged commuters to get those stations at 5 a.m. to catch a ride. He reminded riders they need to purchase a round-trip ticket. Evening commuters will not be allowed on the San Francisco-to-East Bay buses if they didn't ride them in the morning.

You can get more details on BART's suggestions for alternate transportation on this web page.

You can also get more information on ferry service and other alternatives in this Patch article.

After talks broke off Thursday afternoon, union representatives held a news conference to say that unless BART management softened its "hard line stance" on several issues, the transit workers would walk off the job at midnight.

"I'm sorry, I'm regretful," said Service Employees International Union Local 1021 President Roxanne Sanchez. "The employer has been unwilling to reach an agreement or to settle these disputes without a strike."    

A marathon bargaining session between BART management and its two biggest labor unions -- SEIU Local 1021 and Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 -- began Wednesday morning, lasted all night and continued into Thursday afternoon.

BART General Manager Grace Crunican has participated in the talks, along with three federal mediators.

Federal mediator George Cohen said the two sides have reached agreements on "a number of very significant items that have previously separated them" but that sticking points remain and no one is budging.

"The parties were unable to bridge the gap," Cohen said. "Our efforts to do that at this point in time were not successful."

The three-person federal mediation team decided there was "nothing further we were able to do," he said.

Early Thursday evening, Crunican released a statement, saying some progress had been made this week but "a large gap" still remains between management and the unions.

Crunican said they presented the unions on Thursday with an "updated final offer" that includes a 12 percent raise over four years and $1,000 in incentive pay bonuses for each employee if ridership increases.

The proposal also calls for workers to contribute to 4 percent of their pension and 9.5 percent of their medical benefits.

They gave the unions until Oct. 27 to respond and schedule a vote with their members. The unions rejected the proposal.

They also requested BART enter voluntary arbitration to resolve some of the non-economic issues. Rice said BART would not agree to arbitration with only a portion of the contract.

Work rules for employees emerged as the key sticking points in the talks. (Do you agree it's worth striking over work rules? Take our poll.)

Antonette Bryant, the president of ATU Local 1555, said in a statement that, "We've found agreement on nearly every 'must-have' issue for both sides including wages, pensions and benefits."

But she said "the last 72 hours have seen management demand new - and unreasonable - workplace authority that would give them license to abuse and extort our workers."

BART spokeswoman Alicia Trost said the transit agency wants work rules to be part of a comprehensive agreement with its employees, not a separate matter that would be decided in arbitration.

Trost said management wants to change work rules because it believes it would make BART more efficient and save money.

Crunican said she's disappointed, but she also drew a line in the sand.

"We are not going to agree to something we can't afford," said Crunican. "We gave it our all and it didn't come together and that is disappointing for everybody involved."

BART workers previously went on strike for four and a half days at the beginning of July, after their previous contract expired, but they have been at work since then as negotiations have continued.

Bay City News Service contributed to this report