Strike Delays Ease for Students

On the second day of a school bus driver strike against Los Angeles Unified School District’s main transportation contractor, many buses still ran late and students missed early classes Wednesday, but not as many as the day before.

The district’s ability to deliver about 20,000 students to their campuses could weaken the strikers’ position as federal labor mediation resumes today. The talks will be the first since the strike began against the Laidlaw Education Services bus firm.

School officials said they managed to get 98% of the bused students to class by 8:30 a.m., using district buses and other companies to cover Laidlaw routes. Youngsters’ average wait for a bus was an hour, compared with delays twice and three times as long Tuesday.

The 700 striking drivers, represented by Teamsters Union Local 572, insisted that their bargaining position remains strong in their effort to win a hike in pay, now usually between $8.50 and $15 an hour. They want parity with drivers who work directly for the school district and earn between $15 and $22 an hour.

But some labor observers said the union faces several problems, including the district’s efforts to minimize the strike’s effect.

The union local has no strike fund and its drivers will not receive financial assistance from the national office until they have been out of work for two weeks. And other L.A. unions have questioned striking only 18 months after a corruption scandal prompted the federal government to order a reorganization of the local.

Even before the strike, many drivers said, they lived paycheck to paycheck and filed for unemployment benefits during longer school vacations.

Luis Santiago, 24, has been driving for Laidlaw for five years, picking up shifts for sick employees. He called the strike a “bad dream” but went along because he believes it will help in the long run.

“Hopefully, they will see we are serious,” he said. “We just want to be treated a little better.”

Without his $13.50-an-hour pay, Santiago said he will dip into his $1,500 savings to support his girlfriend and two children.

“I’m going to use that to feed my kids,” he said. “It’s real hard to save money.”

At a picket line outside Laidlaw’s bus yard near Inglewood, union members grilled meat and tortillas and passed out doughnuts. Two drivers brought their children, who were on spring break this week, to help picket.

Many drivers had never been on strike before.

“That’s usually pretty tough because this is an unknown area for them. But for not ever being on strike before, they’re holding together pretty tight,” said Rick Middleton, the local’s trustee. “Their spirits are up and they mean to see it through.” Middleton was appointed by the Teamsters’ national headquarters after the federal probe into corruption allegations at the local.

Another striker, Kristina Parker, 31, is a single parent with four children under age 15. She makes $8.25 an hour. She survives with help from her family--a situation she said is common among Laidlaw drivers.

“I’ve seen people older than me living with their parents to pay the bills,” Parker said. “My kids need clothes and shoes.”

The two sides have been at an impasse since last month when the bus drivers voted down Laidlaw’s offer.

Across the region, labor leaders sympathized with the Laidlaw drivers’ plight but questioned their strategy.

“I understand why they’re on strike,” said Tom Newbery, chief of operations for Service Employees International Union Local 99, which includes the district’s 1,100 in-house school bus drivers. But he said the strike “kind of hit me by surprise.”

On Tuesday, the first day of the strike, about 100 Teamster drivers did their routes as usual because they were unaware of the labor action.

On Wednesday, SEIU 99 President Janett Humphries said her union could not join the Teamsters’ drivers on picket lines anyway because they are under a different contract with L.A. Unified.

David Koff, an organizer with the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees International Union, said he was outraged by the drivers’ current wages. But he said that walking out without a strike fund to sustain their members “is not the best way to do it.”

Harley Shaiken, a UC Berkeley labor studies professor, said it was unusual for a union to walk out amid a federally mandated reorganization.

In September 2000, a federal panel issued a 164-page report alleging that Local 572 officers misappropriated funds, failed to hold regular meetings and engaged in cronyism. Those union leaders were removed and the local’s constitution rewritten. Local 572’s federal trusteeship is nearly over, said Don Owens, a spokesman for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in Washington, D.C.

Owens refused to comment on details of the reorganization because the trusteeship issue “has nothing to do with our present Laidlaw action.”

Los Angeles Schools Supt. Roy Romer said he hoped for a quick settlement. “Now, I’m sympathetic with anybody out on a labor action, but I can’t allow that to affect our students,” he said.

Meanwhile, students and their families said the inconveniences continued Wednesday. Field trips and athletic events were canceled because of the strike.

At Foshay Learning Center in South-Central Los Angeles, some parents lingered in cars or with their children until buses arrived to take them elsewhere in the district. Most buses came on time, about 6:40 a.m., or were about 30 minutes late. But students headed to Nobel Middle School in Northridge had to wait an hour.

“I don’t know why they go on strike,” said Mercedes Tiggs, 14. “It’s worse for us, we’ve got to stand out in the cold.”

Tiggs and most of her schoolmates have no choice but to wait because their parents work and don’t have the 45 minutes to drive them to school. Some parents rely on public transportation to get to work.

“My parents have jobs. That’s why there are buses!” said Jeanine Seguro, 13.