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by STEVEN GREENHOUSE
New York City is facing an unusually disruptive week of union actions including a protest rally outside City Hall and strikes by thousands of child care workers and by aides who care for the elderly and ill at home.
The city's largest health care union, 1199/SEIU, has called for a three-day strike beginning tomorrow by 23,000 home-care aides against 11 agencies. The agencies, which rely on state and federal funding, say they can not afford the union's demand for a pay increase to $10 an hour from the current $7, but many agencies still hope to reach a settlement by tomorrow.
Three of the city's most powerful public employee unions - those representing the teachers, the police and the firefighters - plan to hold a demonstration late Tuesday afternoon near City Hall, which organizers predict will attract 10,000 to 40,000 workers. In an attempt to catch up with suburban salaries, those three unions are demanding larger raises than those obtained by the city's largest municipal union, District Council 37, but the Bloomberg administration says it can not afford larger raises.
The union representing 7,000 child care workers in New York City, has called for a three-day walkout beginning Wednesday at 350 centers that care for more than 30,000 children, most of whom are from low-income families. That union, District Council 1707 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, has been without a contract for 42 months and wants to turn up pressure on the centers and on the city, which provides most of the centers' funding.
"The common thread here is these are government employees or quasigovernment employees who work for agencies that depend almost entirely on government funding,'' said Joshua Freeman, a labor historian at the City University Graduate Center. "You can attribute all these tensions to the prolonged period of tight budgets, which we're just beginning to come out of."
Home-care agencies say they have worked hard to make arrangements for the thousands of elderly and ill clients who might be left for three days without the aides who normally care for them. The agencies are hiring replacement workers, using staff nurses to substitute for the striking aides and asking family members of the elderly and infirm to help care for them during the strike.
"We agree that the workers need to be paid more and need to have health insurance, but we need more money to do it,'' said Carol Rodat, president of the Home Care Association of New York State, which represents home-care providers. "There's no way in the world that the entire community of providers in New York City can afford everything the union is asking."
The executive director of the SEIU New York State Council, Jennifer Cunningham, said the union was intent on obtaining raises to $10 an hour by 2006 for the home-care aides. "They're generally making $7 an hour, and it's extremely hard to live in New York on $7 an hour,'' she said. "Through Medicaid and Medicare, the state and the federal government pay these home-care agencies $17 an hour to deliver care, and it's our contention these agency can pay their workers far more than $7 an hour.''
Ms. Rodat acknowledged that many home-care agencies received reimbursements of $17 an hour, but she said much of that was spent on transportation, training, billing, uniforms and payments to subcontractors.
Her group issued a statement yesterday saying that the raise the union wants could be achieved only through higher government reimbursements.
The teachers, police and firefighters are also seeking higher raises, and their leaders say a rally might help to pressure Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.
But City Hall officials, saying the city faces huge financial strains, assert that those three unions should accept the wage pattern set by the D.C. 37 contract: no raise, but a $1,000 payment in the first year, a 3 percent raise in the second year and a 2 percent raise in the third.
Echoing the leaders of the police and firefighters, the president of the United Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, said those raises were too meager to help city teachers catch up with suburban teachers. As a result, she said, the city would continue to have trouble recruiting and retaining teachers.
"We want to send a message that we're not being treated fairly," she said of the rally planned for Tuesday. "The D.C. 37 contract may fit that union's needs, but it doesn't fit our needs. Unlike last time, where we took a step forward in catching up with the suburbs, this would take us backwards."
Bloomberg administration officials said the union rally planned for Tuesday would not pressure them to alter their bargaining position. They insist that all municipal unions should stick to the pattern set by District Council 37, lest there be chaos.
"We wish they'd spend more time negotiating in good faith at the bargaining table and less time engaged in theatrics,'' said an administration spokesman, Jordan Barowitz.
The child care workers say they are angry because they have not had a contract since December 2000. Even though these workers are not employed directly by the city, they usually receive the same raises as city workers, largely because the city provides most of the funding for the child care centers.
The union wants the same 9 percent raise over 27 months that the city gave most of its unions in a previous round of bargaining three years ago. But the Bloomberg administration and the centers say they can not afford that.
Union officials say management has offered a five-year contract with a single raise of 3 percent and annual bonuses of $1,000.
A director of the union, Mike Green, rejected that offer, saying, "Our minimum requirement is to get the same increase as all the other unions.''
The city's Administration for Children's Services said all the unionized child-care centers would be closed during the three-day strike.
"Unfortunately, District Council 1707 is choosing to strike rather than come to the negotiation table,'' the agency said.
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