The evening before a possible strike of hundreds of bus drivers, the Orange County Transportation Authority and the union representing its coach operators were trying one last time to find common ground during negotiations on a new contract for the workers.
After several meetings last week and Saturday proved fruitless, the groups got together again starting Monday afternoon “in a last-ditch effort to reach an agreement,” the Teamsters Local 952, which represents about 600 OCTA bus drivers, said in a news release. A third party state mediator was brought in this weekend to help move discussions forward.
Union and OCTA officials have been trying to agree on a new contract for the agency’s bus drivers for more than a year. The union has threatened to strike as soon as midnight Tuesday, Feb. 15, if the OCTA does not budge on what union officials say have been fair proposals for break time and wage adjustments.
The existing collective bargaining agreement between them expired in April.
Early Monday, about 50 people showed up to a rally outside OCTA’s headquarters as the agency’s board of directors met inside. Some elected officials, including District Attorney Todd Spitzer and Irvine Mayor Farrah Khan, spoke in support of the union’s interests in the negotiations.
Signs hoisted by supporters declared union members were “fighting for a fair contract.” Several drivers said tight schedules with no time to use the bathroom have been a problem for years. One hand-written sign referenced drivers having to urinate in bottles, saying “shame on OCTA.”
Irvine Mayor Farrah Khan said by phone Monday morning that after learning about the situation, she wonders why drivers are having to ask for restroom and meal breaks.
While of course drivers must keep to a schedule, “these are things that you can incorporate into the schedule,” she said. “These are not things that are above and beyond human needs.”
While some drivers do get some down time regularly, “our issue is that not everybody gets a break,” Eric Jimenez, the union’s secretary-treasurer, has said. Extra time is factored into bus schedules, but those minutes could be eaten up by other factors, such as traffic, he said.
Jimenez said he has heard stories of drivers wetting themselves on shifts, or wearing diapers to avoid that.
OCTA spokesman Joel Zlotnik said drivers can stop to use the restroom at any point during their route, adding that “we have a process in place for that.” Coach operators can push a “rest stop required” button before pulling over, he said.
“If a passenger were to submit a complaint regarding a coach operator stopping to use the restroom, it would be deemed non-valid,” Zlotnik said in an email.
He added that the majority of routes have four 15-minute paid break periods carved out per shift, and the rest allot six breaks less than 15 minutes long. The extra time is included in the bus schedule before the drivers turn around to drive back to the start of their route again.
Zlotnik said OCTA “care(s) greatly about our coach operators and our actions are always guided by what’s best for their health and safety.”
In a letter to OCTA’s board of directors last week, Khan also decried drivers not seeing a wage increase in nearly two years even though their jobs have put them “on the front lines during this pandemic.”
She said a strike would hurt businesses and people who depend on OCTA buses to get to work, and added, “it’s really going to shut down Orange County.”
Spitzer said he was in favor of retroactive raises for the drivers as well as proper meal and rest breaks. He also said he supported drivers being able to defend themselves when endangered.
Both OCTA and the union have acknowledged the impact a strike would have on the public, and said they hoped to come to a resolution.
In a statement released early Monday morning, union officials said their negotiating team last week “made several proposals that were both fair to the compact and that would benefit our drivers.”
Jimenez said, “the ball is in Orange County Transportation Authority’s court.”
OCTA has also made a proposal it believes “is very fair and rewards our coach operators for the work they do. And it’s competitive in the region and it’s responsible to the tax payers,” Zlotnik said.
As for the specifics of what the agency and union have proposed, Zlotnik said “we want to discuss that with them at the bargaining table.”
In the event of a strike, 23 bus routes throughout Orange County would be impacted. Those routes represent about 75% of ridership.
OCTA has asked the governor to intervene, hoping he would prevent a strike before it begins. A spokesman for Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office did not immediately respond to a request Monday asking whether he would step in.
The Orange County Business Council is supportive of the agency’s request to Newsom, according to a statement provided Monday by spokeswoman Kathy Corpuz, which added that “a disruption in service would certainly have an impact on our economy, the welfare of the community, and our continued post-pandemic economic recovery.”
The nonprofit “encourages both sides to keep open lines of communication in order to reach a fair agreement as quickly as possible.”
In a 2020 OCTA survey gauging transportation needs, about 74% of the nearly 7,000 OC Bus riders who participated said they took the bus four to seven days a week, a response that “suggests a high level of transit-dependency,” a report by the consulting firm that administered the survey, Moore & Associates, said.
Most commonly, 43%, people were using the bus system for “work/commute,” about a quarter of the passengers surveyed reported their trip was “school related.” And 87% of the riders reported they didn’t have a personal vehicle to make the trip they were on.
Asked how they would have gotten to their destination without an available bus, 29% said they would have taken an Uber or Lyft, while 20% said they would have walked.
Photographer Mindy Schauer and Staff Writer Alicia Robinson contributed to this report.
