Capitalist crisis slams mass transit

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NEW YORK—The capitalist financial meltdown has wrecked havoc on public transportation, slashing jobs and service to working people. Once again working people are being made to bear the brunt of a crisis caused by profit-crazed Wall Street crooks and the periodic crisis of capitalism.

Since the start of 2009, over 80% of mass transit systems are in financial crisis, and 84% have raised fares and/or cut service. Among the larger transit systems, 57% have laid-off workers, according to the unionfunded Keep America Moving coalition.

The crisis is being exploited by transit officials who demand massive concessions from transit unions. In New York, Chicago and elsewhere, a vicious anti-union campaign has sought to portray transit workers as greedy and lazy. The attacks are directed primarily by Democratic Party administrations, including the state-run New York City subway and bus system. The choking of mass transit funding contrasts sharply with the trillions given Wall Street crooks by the Bush and Obama administrations and the uninterrupted funding of two unjust wars.

Sabrina Greenwood, a New York City subway station agent scheduled to be laid off in June, told Socialist Action, “I don’t know how I’m going to feed my family of five. I’m a single mother. They’re immoral. I left a good job federal job to come to the MTA [Metropolitan Transit Authority]. The way the economy is now, it’s going to be hard to find a job. We need to keep up the fight [against] the MTA and Wall Street.”

The lay offs and service cuts are directed at destroying the living standards of millions of workers, including being able to get to a job. Public transportation is also necessary to obtain health care, especially for seniors and the disabled. Hardest hit are the African American, Hispanic, and immigrant communities. Many transit workers are from these communities.

In Chicago, there were more than 1000 transit layoffs at the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) in February, some 10% of the workforce. Service was reduced on 119 bus routes and seven of eight rail lines. The cuts represent some 18% of service.

In New York City, dozens of bus and train routes are to be slashed or eliminated in June by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. The MTA plans to lay off 1000 workers. In violation of a union-initiated court injunction, the MTA laid-off 260 subway station agents on May 11. Almost all were immigrant, African American, and Hispanic workers, who face near depression level unemployment in their communities.

The MTA is demanding that the Transport Workers Union Local 100, which represents 35,000 subway and bus workers, sacrifice a 3% contractual raise in 2011 to save jobs. So far, Local 100 has said no. Clearly, the attacks are intended by the MTA and New York’s corporate elite to break the newly elected leadership of President John Samuelsen and the Take Back Our Union slate, which has promised to be more democratic and aggressive toward management.

The MTA has also threatened to eliminate free grade school passes, which has sparked organized student resistance.

Defunding mass transit “Mass transit is a public service. And in this recession, the public sector has become the sacrificial lamb,” said JP Patafio, a Brooklyn bus driver and director of Keep America Moving (KAM), a new reform coalition initiated by Local 100 and the Amalgamated Transit Union. In 2009, the federal transportation budget proposal in Congress was slashed from an inadequate $12 billion to $8 billion, with the active intervention of the new Obama administration.

Despite reform efforts, some 80% of federal transrepair, not mass transit, benefiting the auto bosses and destroying the environment. The advocacy group Transit Riders for Public Transportation says that $1 billion invested in mass transit will generate 30,000 jobs, 19% more than highway construction.

In the 1980s, the Reagan administration cut operating funds for transit in cities over 200,000 and diverted it to highway projects. Presidents George Bush I and Bill Clinton maintained the cuts. Under Democrat Clinton all large urban systems lost operating funding in 1998. Following Washington’s lead, city and state operating funds were also reduced.

In Chicago the CTA is claiming a $300 million overall deficit. In New York City, reduced funding exacerbated by the economic downturn, has resulted in a $800 million MTA deficit this year. Since the 1980s, the MTA budget has included massive debt to banks and the sale of tax-free MTA Bonds to the rich. In 10 years, the debt has doubled to $30 billion in 2010.

The MTA payout on tax-free bonds alone—paid mostly by working class riders at the fare box—amounts to about $800 million, the approximate size of this year’s deficit!

Union bureaucrats lie down In Chicago, rather than mobilizing for a fight, ATU Local 308 President Robert Kelly hit a new low when he said, “The ATU locals always understood, unfortunately, that our members would be laid off and our dispute was only about using seniority with the CTA to determine who would be laid off first.”

In New York, a May 4 Transport Workers Union Local 100 rally emphasized the environmental need for “green jobs” and so-called “friends” in the Democratic Party, rather than a worker-based union battle against layoffs. The turnout May 4 was a modest but spirited demonstration of at most 1000 workers. A couple of hundred pushed aside police barricades to march on MTA headquarters where workers railed against layoffs during a brief rally.

The TWU is demanding that the MTA use 10% of supplemental federal funding for construction and repair and use it to save jobs, which is permitted under funding guidelines. Determined to destroy jobs and downsize, the MTA has refused.

The TWU is also supporting the “Public Transportation Preservation Act of 2010,” which provides $2 billion in funding for transit systems that could restore jobs—if its current language remains. Considering the recent health-care “reform” sellout by Democrats that’s a tall order. Introduced by seven Democratic Senators on May 25, the bill may be scandalously attached to a war appropriations bill.

In New York City, where municipal unions face thousands of layoffs, the TWUs Station Division meetings, which represent some 5500 station agents, cleaners and others, has called for a united citywide mobilization of labor with the slogan, “No cuts! No layoffs!” In addition, Station Division voted several times for a local-wide emergency mass membership meeting. Thus far, the Local 100 leadership has not acted on either proposal.

Transit unions should revive the old union demand for a shorter workweek at no cut in pay or benefits. That would spread the available work around and provide jobs for all. It is urgent that transit workers organize mass mobilizations and prepare for strikes where possible. In December 2005, Local 100 struck and shut down New York City for two and a half days.

Key to a winning strategy is ending all reliance on the Democratic Party, the false friends of labor. n