Waste Management Wins New Pay Scale After Taking Action!
On August 19, the entire Waste Management department stuck together for a one day work stoppage. Since then, a committee of worker leaders have been meeting with City Manager Patrick Duhaney. One of their main demands has been to completely re-evaluate the payscale, the same as other workers have been fighting for in our petition campaign.
On October 5, Human Resources sent a memo to Duhaney outlining a new proposed wage scale for all Waste management workers! The proposal would include $391,000 in raises, average of about $3,500 raise. However, some more senior workers are concerned that they will get less, whereas newer employees will see larger bene fits. They are still pushing for an overall better wage scale.
Workers across other departments should take this as a valuable lesson when we get organized and act together, we can win serious changes!
Progress of UE petition
We now have almost a majority of all workers in Public Works and Public Utilities signed on to our petition for better pay and fairness. We need everyone’s help to continue to gather more signatures to reach our goal. Then the plan is to present at a City Council meeting in early November.
Workers Action Wins so far:
- $1,500 or $250 hazard pay – totalling $2.4 million
- New WM wage scale – totalling $390,000
- WM rented new trucks to replace old ones.
- Top Management being pushed out! So far Mark Johnson (salary $161,000), Director of Public Works was forced to retire early, e ffective Dec. 1, and Waste Management Top Administrator John Barnes (salary $120,000) was also forced out.
TAKE ACTION TODAY
- Sign petition online – bit.ly/VABeachCity
- Attend weekly organizing meetings – Every Thursday 5:15pm in PA Gateway Park, and every Monday, 7:00pm via zoom