Union Angrily Breaks Off Contract Talks With MTA : Strike: Labor officials denounce agency chief’s letter to mechanics. Emergency bus service is extended.

The nagging transit strike that has snarled life for more than half a million mostly low-income Los Angeles County commuters seemed poised Friday to drag on indefinitely after secret talks aimed at resolving the walkout collapsed in acrimony.

Emergency service was extended into the weekend on six critical bus and rail lines, the only good news for frustrated riders and transit-dependent shopping districts. But with no new negotiations scheduled, representatives for the striking mechanics abruptly broke off talks with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, accusing the top brass of poisoning the process by going behind the union’s back.

“It’s really a tragedy,” said Jim Wood, secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, which is participating in the negotiations. “They do not want to settle this. They do not want the buses to roll.”

The union’s anger was sparked by a conciliatory letter sent by MTA chief Franklin White to each of 1,900 striking mechanics--part of the agency’s campaign to bypass the unions and take its case directly to the rank and file. In the letter, dated July 27, White promised employees that the agency’s cost-cutting plans would not jeopardize their jobs.

Union leaders, however, did not learn of the letter’s contents until striking employees began calling the union office Friday morning. Finally, about 2 p.m., the letter was faxed to union representatives at the Burbank Airport Hilton Hotel, where negotiations with MTA representatives had been under way for five hours.

Michael Bujosa, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union, said the letter was handed to him while he was eating. “That was the end of lunch,” he said. “We were stunned.”

Wood, who had been told about the letter Thursday, said he assumed it was an innocuous appeal for a quick settlement. Instead, he said, he was surprised to learn that it contained “specific items that were discussed in confidence” at the parties’ last bargaining session--a six-hour marathon Tuesday night.

“If Franklin White wants to represent mechanics, then goddammit he ought to learn how to become a diesel mechanic, give up his $175,000-a-year job and stand for election,” said Wood, who described the letter as a breach of negotiating protocol.

In a news conference Friday evening, White said he had cleared the letter beforehand with the MTA board and its legal advisers, who told him there was nothing inappropriate about directly contacting his own employees.

“This is customary,” said White, who took over as MTA chief last year. “The issue is not Frank White. The issue is what are we going to do for the . . . riders in Los Angeles every day.”

In the two-page document, White had sought to allay striking mechanics’ fears about layoffs from subcontracting, saying that anticipated savings would make the agency financially healthier and better able to offer job security. The MTA’s proposed contract, he wrote, “provides two years of job protection, with no reduction in pay,” for all union members whose work has been subcontracted.

“Despite what you may have been told, I want you to know that no current ATU employee will lose his or her job,” White wrote.

County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, an MTA board member, said he had read a copy of White’s letter before it was mailed and saw no breach of confidentiality.

“The ATU needs to have a large dose of reality and live in the real world,” Antonovich said. “The letter was reasonable and allowed members of the union to understand the board’s position. It took away the rhetoric.”

Nick Patsaouras, an alternate MTA board member, added: “The letter is an excuse--it’s not a reason to walk away from the table.”

With the walkout now entering its sixth day, the financial impact of the strike--both the hardships and some unexpected benefits--is also becoming a central issue of the dispute.

While strikers brace for lost wages, the walkout has bestowed a windfall on the MTA, which estimates it has saved about $500,000 each day the bus fleet has been grounded.

The financially pinched agency has been forced to spend about $200,000 a day, most of it on private rental buses, but it continues to take in about $700,000 a day in tax revenues. Even with the large sum that MTA officials have spent on newspaper and radio ads attacking the unions, the transit agency still has reaped benefits totaling more than $2 million since workers walked off the job Monday.

“They’re sitting Downtown and laughing at us,” said Darin Bailey, a striking driver, outside the MTA bus yard in South-Central Los Angeles.

White, in an earlier interview, acknowledged that his agency was “in the curious position of actually saving money,” although he was quick to add: “I hope everybody understands that we’re not failing to agree because we want to save money.”

Ironically, those savings are almost as much as the MTA hopes to recoup through subcontracting and other salary cuts--the key issues behind Los Angeles’ first transit strike in more than a decade.

Larry Zarian, MTA vice chairman, said Friday that the agency hopes to save an estimated $2 million to $3 million a year through subcontracting, the practice of hiring less expensive private companies to perform certain tasks. The agency wants to save an additional $1 million, he said, by lowering the pay for newly hired service attendants from $15 an hour to $10.

Although those cutbacks are at the core of the labor dispute, they represent only a fraction of the MTA’s nearly $3-billion budget.

“They’re doing this on the backs of the people--the people who need transit, and on us,” said Cecil Bard, 47, a mechanic-machinist for the last 19 years. As he picketed outside the Highland Park bus yard, the 47-year-old father of five said his wife had already begun eliminating expensive cuts of meat from her supermarket trips.

“Yep, we’re looking for real deal meals,” Bard said.

The mechanics, who earn an average of $44,000 a year, are receiving no strike pay from their union, whose coffers were depleted during the 1990 Greyhound strike. The MTA’s bus and train drivers, who generally earn a bit less than the mechanics, are getting $8.50 a day in strike pay from their international union. Clerks, who have joined them on the picket line, will begin receiving $20 a day next week if the strike continues.

“I’m calling all my bill collectors and telling them that I’m on strike and I’m hurting,” Tim Shephard, a striking driver, said outside the South-Central bus yard on 54th Street. “They don’t care.”

Renee Navarre, a 40-year-old mechanic from West Covina, tried to comfort him. “We’ll just have to bunk it at each other’s homes,” said Navarre, who is considering moving back in with her mother if the strike drags on.

Union leaders are eager to resolve the dispute before next Friday, when checks will be handed out--minus last week’s wages. Charles Mosby, the assistant business manager for ATU Local 1277, said workers are not too worried now, because they got their last paycheck July 21. But if next Friday’s checks come and workers are still on strike, he said, he feared their resolve might begin to slip.

“Our big concern is trying to get paychecks into the pockets of these individuals,” Mosby said.

Los Angeles’ first transit strike since 1982 began at 12:01 a.m. Monday, when the MTA’s 1,900 mechanics walked off the job. Their picket lines have been honored by 5,000 drivers and clerks, crippling the nation’s second-largest public transportation system.

By retraining veteran supervisors and contracting with private school bus companies, the MTA has managed to put about 20% of its 1,900-bus fleet on the road. The result has been snarled traffic for freeway commuters and major disruptions for the legions of commuters who do not have cars.

Although the MTA originally had planned to suspend service this weekend, the agency announced late Friday that it would offer limited service on several key routes in response to the concerns of Downtown merchants, especially along the Broadway corridor.

Added were: Bus Lines No. 30 on Pico Boulevard, No. 45 on Broadway, No. 21 on Wilshire Boulevard and No. 204 on Vermont Avenue, as well as rail service on the Red Line subway and Blue Line trolley.

Service will be from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and Sunday. Officials expect to return Monday to their weekday strike service, which includes about 30 of the MTA’s 200 routes.

Times staff writer Nora Zamichow contributed to this story.

* LAST BUS: Riders on Wilshire react to the gamble of getting home. A25

The MTA Strike: Day 5

The region’s first transit strike in 12 years began at 12:01 a.m. Monday. Here is a look at Day 5:

* THE ISSUE: Dispute between the Amalgamated Transit Union, representing 1,900 mechanics and service attendants, and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. About 5,000 bus and train drivers and clerks are honoring picket lines. The major sticking point is the MTA’s demand to contract out work. Union members say they believe that it will eliminate jobs and result in poorer quality work.

* THE STATUS: Negotiations broke off Friday.

* WHAT’S OPERATING: MTA buses will operate on four routes this weekend. Limited service continues on the Red Line and Blue Line.

* THE ROUTES:

Portions of these MTA lines will run today and Sunday.

21 Wilshire Blvd.; 45 Broadway; 30 Pico Blvd.-East 1st Street ; 204 Vermont Ave. will have regular service.

60 DASH buses will run on these routes today.

FAIRFAX EAST--Farmers Market to La Brea Ave. and Olympic Blvd.; FAIRFAX WEST--Farmers Market to Melrose Ave. to La Cienega Blvd.; WATTS--103rd St. to Mona Blvd. to Imperial Highway to Avalon Blvd.; SOUTHEAST--Exposition Park to Figueroa Ave. to Vernon Ave. to Slauson Ave.; HOLLYWOOD--Vermont to La Brea via Fountain Ave.; VAN NUYS--Van Nuys Blvd. to Hazeltine Ave., Ventura Blvd, Whitsett Ave., Oxnard St.; CRENSHAW--Crenshaw Plaza to La Brea/Rodeo Road, Martin Luther King Blvd., Crenshaw Blvd., Leimert Park; MIDTOWN--Crenshaw Plaza, Buckingham Road, Adams Blvd., Western Ave., Washington Blvd., La Brea, to Olympic and Wilshire; DOWNTOWN A--Little Tokyo, Bunker Hill, financial district, garment district; DOWNTOWN B-- Chinatown, Olvera St., Bunker Hill, Music Center, financial district; DOWNTOWN C--Financial district, South Park, Exposition Park; DOWNTOWN D--Union Station, Civic Center, Spring St., garment district.

* HOURS: MTA buses will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

* FARES: 50 cents on MTA buses and Blue Line, with no transfers. 25 cents on DASH buses and Red Line.

* FOR INFORMATION: (800) COMMUTE or (800) 371-LINK (for Metrolink information). Recorded information in English and Spanish is available at (800) 870-0MTA.