The Streets Were Paved with Gold - Ken Auletta [92]
The Transit Authority’s union contract prohibits part-time employees, ballooning overtime costs. A November 1977 audit by Sidney Schwartz, the Control Board’s Special Deputy Comptroller, sketched how this requirement for a minimum 8-hour day invites abuse: A Staten Island-to-Manhattan express bus driver leaves his depot at 7 A.M., completing his morning run by 8:30. His next run is not until 5:30 P.M. and is completed by 7. In between the two runs, the driver may go home. For 3 hours of actual work, the driver receives 10½ hours’ pay, including 7 hours of what is called “swing time” and one-half hour of “penalty” time. If permitted to hire parttimers—to conform to rider habits rather than worker convenience—the Authority would pay for only 3 hours’ work. Schwartz’s audit disclosed: in 1976, 1,000 of nearly 9,000 bus drivers earned overtime 40 percent above their base pay of $14,800. Built-in overtime is standard for most of the Authority’s 33,000 employees and explains why the Authority’s overtime bill was $54.7 million in 1976–77—more than was spent by all mayoral agencies combined—and more than half the cost of the new 2-year contract negotiated by the transit workers in April 1978. This built-in overtime is used to determine vacation pay and pensions, which is why many transit pensions exceed 120 percent of the employee’s base salary for his final year. The Authority’s new contract with its workers, negotiated on April 1, 1978, allows the hiring of up to 200 part-timers, but since they are prohibited from performing the tasks of full-timers, the ban on part-timers continues.
The city follows what’s called “minimum manning” practices in the sanitation, police and fire departments. All sanitation pickup trucks must carry 3 men, though most cities and private carters use 2, sometimes 1. The city would like to employ 2 men in less dense residential areas—in effect, expanding the work force—but the union won’t permit it. Most cities use 1-man patrol cars in lowcrime districts. For years, the city required 2, and is only now gingerly experimenting with 1-man cars. The fire department once had a contract requiring 5 men to a fire engine company and 6 to a truck company. An arbitrator recently waived that requirement, reducing the number to 4 and 5, respectively. However, because of “minimum manning,” if 1 man is absent the department is required to pay overtime to a fireman from the previous shift. “The number of men on a truck doesn’t matter,” says Commissioner Russo. “What matters is the number of men at a fire.” In proposing the elimination of minimum manning, the Koch administration said the city could save $45 million in reduced overtime over 2 years.
The firemen’s contract contains what is called a “mutual,” allowing some firefighters to commute to work but once a week. Instituted some years ago to “boost morale,” a “mutual” permits a fireman to work at least a 9-hour tour of duty for a friend who wants to take off. The friend has 15 days to return the favor. Since firemen have living quarters in the firehouse, by exchanging several “mutuals” a fireman can compress his work week into three consecutive exhausting days. Thus a fair number of firemen moonlight on a second job—and, fatigued, risk their own and the public’s lives.
Many “managers” hold “seldom-show” jobs. The Board of Water Supply sports two commissioners at $20,000 and a chairman who earns $25,000. Each is rewarded a limousine for this lifetime appointment. Yet each is required to attend but one meeting a week and is permitted a full-time job outside government.* The City Council retains a huge staff, including people who make guest appearances to collect checks. Gerald Esposito, a former Bronx Democratic district leader, receives $18,700 for part-time work on “special research projects”; Murray Lewinter, secretary to the