It May Get Stanky Around Here Real Soon . . .

Workers in the private waste-hauling industry — which collects everything that is not municipal residential trash, including garbage from businesses, hotels and, well, basically everything — may go on strike April 1. The Village Voice’s Tom Robbins has more details:

Back on December 19, just as New Yorkers were about to confront a 72-hour pre-Christmas nightmare called the Transit Strike of 2005, another major city employer was prodding its workers with a sharp stick and daring them to walk off the job. Waste Management Inc., the Houston-based mega-corporation that last year did $12 billion worth of business earning some $900 million in profits, told 123 of its employees who drive the city’s streets all night collecting trash from private businesses that it couldn’t afford their health coverage any longer. . . .

After several meetings with leaders of Local 813 of the Teamsters, which represents the workers, the company went ahead and imposed its plan on the workforce. Normally, unions view that kind of action as sufficient provocation for a strike. There was little question the company expected one. Union members watched as Waste Management imported some 80 to 100 potential replacement workers, apparently ready to take over their jobs at a moment’s notice. No effort was made to hide them. “They drove behind the [garbage] trucks all night in pickups, watching the men do their collections,” said Local 813 president Sylvester Needham. “They had them in motels in Queens, just waiting for us to walk out so they could bring them in.”

Faced with that scenario, as well as with a city already in the grip of a mass transit strike, the Teamsters opted to hold their fire and keep working. To keep his members covered in the meantime, Needham had his union benefit fund pay the $305 per month in contributions needed to keep the Waste Management employees covered, while continuing to try to negotiate a new contract. A federal mediator was brought in to try and work things out. No dice.

Three months later, with no progress in the talks, the Teamsters say New York is headed for a garbage strike, its first in more than 15 years. Barring a last-minute reprieve, the Local 813 members expect to hit the bricks on April 1. “That is D-day for us,” said Needham, “We have got to the point of do-or-die.”

There’s some solid trash-hauling history in there if you’re interested in reading the whole article . . .