Hundreds of county teamsters will be walking off the job next week unless they get a new offer for raises after months of largely stalled negotiations and a state board ruling the county negotiated in bad faith, carrying big impacts for the county’s landfills and other facilities.
If teamsters walk off the job, that’ll be nearly 450 county employees leaving jobs maintaining the county’s roads, parks, animal shelter and landfills, as well as custodians and mechanics who work on things like all of the sheriff’s vehicles according to Jimenez.
Teamsters who work for the OC Transportation Authority will not be joining the planned strike according to Jimenez.
“Unless a fair contract that we can bring to our members comes before Tuesday, we will be striking the county,” said Eric Jimenez, Secretary Treasurer of the Local 952 Teamsters in a Thursday interview.
The threatened strike comes after staff from the California Public Employee Relations Board, a state agency within the Labor and Workforce Development Agency that oversees public labor negotiations, stated the county “refused to meet in good faith,” along with a host of other charges.
“Respondent engaged in the following conduct: failing to vest negotiators with sufficient authority to conduct meaningful negotiations; failing to provide counterproposals; engaging in dilatory and evasive tactics; failing to prepare adequately for negotiations; and threatening that wage increases for the bargaining unit would result in layoffs,” reads the Oct. 6 letter from Joseph Eckhart, interim general counsel for the relations board, in a letter addressed to the county government.
County officials are required to file an answer to that letter by Oct. 26th, and county spokesperson Molly Nichelson issued a short statement on Thursday afternoon stating that the county “respect the rights of our dedicated employees to engage in lawful strike activity.”
“Our priority remains ensuring the continuity of essential public services for our residents,” Nichelson wrote. “We have contingency plans in place to minimize service disruptions.”
The teamsters are one of three unions that turned down county supervisors’ offer for a one year, three percent raise contract, along with the county sheriff deputies union and the local American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees branch.
Jimenez noted that if the county had brought the three percent raise offer before their contract expired in June, union members might’ve voted it through, but that many rejected it after learning they wouldn’t receive back pay for the late offer.
“You guys don’t want to pay retro pay for something you did, you need to open up your eyes and say we screwed this up,” Jimenez said. “Now you want us to eat two and a half months of no back pay?”
“That’s why our members shot it down.”
Noah Biesiada is a Voice of OC reporter. Contact him at nbiesiada@voiceofoc.org.
