Subway and bus supervisors with New York City’s second largest transit union have a new contract following 15 months of negotiation with the MTA.
Members of the Subway Surface Supervisors Association ratified the contract in a vote certified late Friday.
The deal gives the union’s roughly 4,100 members a 9.5% raise over four years, and lifetime health benefits for active and retired members.
“We fought hard for it, and we were grateful to get this contract done,” SSSA president Michael Carrube told the Daily News.
The SSSA represents supervisors in the New York City subway system and the Staten Island Railway, as well as bus dispatchers and maintenance supervisors in Brooklyn and Staten Island.
The new contract was overwhelmingly supported by the 46% of SSSA members who voted — 1,512 members voted to ratify, with only 358 members voting against the contract.
The contract replaces an agreement that expired in July of 2020, making this the first contract negotiated since the COVID-19 pandemic, Carrube said, adding that the union lost “about 18 members” to the disease.
Under the old contract, spouses or significant others of a member who died would only retain their health care coverage for a year, Carrube said. The new contract gives members and their significant others lifetime coverage.
The 9.5% raise is apportioned over four years, with supervisors receiving a 2% raise in the first year of the contract, a 2.25% raise the following year, a 2.5% raise the third year, and a 2.75% raise in the contract’s final year.
Given that the previous contract expired in 2020, Carrube said he expects the raises to all come at once in August.
The contract also increases supervisors’ overtime cap, meal allowances and death benefits, and includes language for family leave.
The deal comes as members of the city’s largest transit union — TWU Local 100, which represents some 40,000 bus and subway workers — continue to work without a contract amid ongoing negotiations.
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