A tentative agreement has been reached between the local transit union and the city.
The local 966 of the Amalgamated Transit Union and the city reached the agreement at approximately 7:45 a.m. Saturday morning following a lengthy evening of negotiations, ensuring there will be regular transit service on Monday.
Michael Smith, general manager of fleet services and transit with the city of Thunder Bay was optimistic all week that a deal could be struck and said the ball started rolling over the past 24 hours.
“Negotiations really started coming close later Friday night and as we progressed into Saturday morning we felt we were getting closer,” Smith said. “We were pretty confident earlier this morning that we would reach a tentative deal.”
The transit workers were in a legal strike position effective Monday at midnight and had expressed their intent to proceed with job action if negotiations were unsuccessful.
Local 966 president Sheila Kivisto said she was “looking at fair” with the deal that had been reached.
Leaders will present the deal to the union on Sunday afternoon with members voting to ratify the new contract. Transit workers had been without a contract since June 2012.
“To have the end result we have is a relief,” Kivisto said.
“This is something we’ve been working on for 18 months and have it come to an end so we have something we can bring to the membership, who have been very patient, now we have a light at the end of the tunnel.”
Smith said he believes both sides were able to stick to their mandates while fulfilling their duty to the service, which he said provides an average of 10,000 rides every day.
“Both the union had a mandate and city council provided administration with a mandate so there were certainly negotiations back and forth,” he said. “But at the end of the day it was in the best interest for the citizens and users of the service to reach a tentative deal.”
Kivisto was pleased an agreement was reached without having to resort to a strike, and even though the strong stance might have helped add a sense of urgency to negotiations it was never their desired outcome.
“All along we said we didn’t want to disrupt service. I didn’t want somebody to not have a ride or students scrambling to get to school. That was in the back of our minds all along,” she said.
“That wasn’t our intent. We just wanted to make sure we got something fair and the end of it was going to be fair to us.”
Smith said the deal will be presented to city council on Monday.
