Philadelphia braces for major city worker union strike as contract talks continue and deadline draws nearer

Mayor Cherelle L. Parker on Monday afternoon detailed where Philadelphia residents should take their garbage if trash collectors stop reporting to work in the event of a city worker strike Tuesday.

Soon after, in earshot of the room where Parker spoke, members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 33 held a rain-drenched rally outside City Hall to reiterate their demands for better wages.

And on Monday evening, representatives from both sides headed to West Philadelphia for an 11th-hour round of contract negotiations to try to avert the first major city worker strike since 1986 — a prospect that felt increasingly dim as a 12:01 a.m. Tuesday deadline drew nearer.

“We are fully prepared to continue negotiating with DC 33’s leadership throughout the day and beyond,” Parker said at a news conference. “We have been and continue to be at the table, and we are prepared to stay at the table as long as it takes.”

The contracts for all four major municipal unions expire just before 12:01 a.m. Tuesday. It is common for negotiations to stretch beyond the end of the previous contracts, and city workers are usually paid retroactively for raises included in subsequent deals.

The unions for police officers and firefighters are prohibited from striking by state law, and the fourth union, AFSCME District Council 47, has agreed to a brief contract extension to continue negotiations.

But DC 33’s president, Greg Boulware, has insisted that he is treating 12:01 a.m. Tuesday as the final deadline for a new deal for his nearly 10,000 members, who include frontline workers across city agencies, such as trash collectors, 911 operators, and mechanics.

» READ MORE: Mayor Cherelle Parker said she’s optimistic Philly will avert a major city worker strike next week

The union says its members make on average between $45,000 and $46,000, and the core issue in negotiations is the schedule of pay raises included in the contract.

As of Monday afternoon, Parker’s latest offer was a three-year deal with annual raises of 2%, 3%, and 3%. The union’s last publicly known demand was for a four-year contract with 5.75% raises each year, although it’s possible Boulware made a new offer in the meantime.

With the two sides inching toward each other and the gap down to a few percentage points, it would appear on paper that compromise was possible. But Boulware has for months broadcast that he is prepared to go nuclear to achieve a game-changing contract for Philadelphia’s lowest-paid municipal union, which he said has been mistreated for years.

“If you appreciate the labor, you have to show that in the wallet for our people because that’s the only way it’s truly going to be meaningful,” Boulware said in an interview. “I’m very steadfast in my position in that if we don’t have a deal by midnight June 30, we’re gonna be on break.”

» READ MORE: District Council 33 could soon go on strike. Here’s what the union does and what would be impacted.

A strike would mean, among other things, an immediate end to residential trash collection, potentially slower repairs to water mains, and a reduction in the number of public pools open this summer.

Though services would be cut back, Parker administration officials insisted Monday that the city was prepared and would not see any threats to public safety. Philadelphia July Fourth events would proceed as scheduled, officials said.

“We’ve been planning for this, we’ve been practicing for this, and we are looking forward to implementing our plans even as we are hopeful” for a new contract, Managing Director Adam K. Thiel said at the news conference.

» READ MORE: Philly’s largest municipal union says it will ‘shut this city down’ if a contract deal isn’t reached soon

Parker on Saturday released a lengthy video on social media explaining the city’s position: Between a 5% raise she gave DC 33 members last year and the raises she is putting on the table for the next three years, Parker is offering the union across-the-board raises totaling 13% or more in her first term, which would be more than any mayor has given DC 33 in one term in the last three decades.

She has also offered to add a fifth step in the DC 33 contract’s pay scale, which could be lucrative for longtime city employees.

The largest cumulative pay increase DC 33 members have received in a single term was 11.5% during former Mayor Jim Kenney’s term, according to the mayor’s office.

“As an unapologetically pro-labor, pro-union, and pro-worker mayor, my administration is working with District Council 33 to achieve what is essential and necessary, and that is a fair and fiscally responsible contract,” Parker said.

Few City Council members have gotten involved with the dispute between the city’s chief executive and its largest collective bargaining unit. Council President Kenyatta Johnson said last week that he’s hopeful the sides will come together.

“The people in the city of Philadelphia do not want to see a strike, so we want both sides to sit at the table as long as it takes,” he said.

Councilmembers Kendra Brooks and Nicolas O’Rourke, who are part of the progressive Working Families Party, said Monday that they “stand ready to support striking workers and all Philadelphians who are impacted by any disruption to services, and we urge the Mayor to avert the strike by signing a contract that puts working families first.”

And progressive Democratic Councilmembers Jamie Gauthier and Rue Landau joined Brooks at DC 33’s City Hall rally, which was attended by scores of members but was hampered by a sudden downpour.

“Right now is about making sure folks have what they need,” said Brooks, who voted against Parker’s budget this year in part because it included business tax cuts. “I saw we are giving budget cuts to corporations as opposed to city workers.”

Retired administrative secretary DC 33 member Tamy Colquatt, who worked for the city for 25 years, attended the protest to support her former coworkers.

“It is long overdue,” Colquatt said in an interview. “Mortgages are going up, taxes are going up, food is going up, but their pay isn’t going up.”

DC 33 member Tanya Ray, 55, who has worked for the city for almost a decade, said she recently began looking for a second job because she is “done living paycheck to paycheck.”

“I need it to be able to live comfortably,” said Ray, a meter shop support clerk in the Philadelphia Water Department. “My daughter is 16, I want to help her go to college, but with inflation in this economy, it’s hard for city employees.”