I support the Golden Gate Bridge Labor Coalition!

Golden Gate Highway & Transportation District Board of Directors

Members of the 13 unions that comprise the Golden Gate Bridge Labor Coalition, including ferry deckhands and captains; bus servicers and mechanics; bridge ironworkers and inspectors; and construction tradesmen and women, are currently holding strike authorization votes. The employees have been working without a contract since July 1.

The Golden Gate Highway and Transportation District, employers of the approximately 450 workers, proposed a three-year contract that would increase the cost of employees’ healthcare premiums, negating a minimal wage increase.

No strike can take place until all the votes have been taken. The Coalition is asking the public to support them as bargaining with the District (begun in April) continues. A comparison of the cost of living increase in the Bay Area with wages earned by coalition members reveals that the coalition is currently 12 percent behind the cost of living. During the recession, employees agreed to lower wages and no raises in response to the District’s financial concerns. Since then, tolls have increased 20%; toll takers were laid off; and coalition concessions led to large reserves and increases in management’s salaries.

Petition by
GGB Labor Coalition
San Francisco, California

To: Golden Gate Highway & Transportation District Board of Directors
From: [Your Name]

Dear Mr. Eddie and the Board of Directors:

I support the members of the Golden Gate Bridge Labor Coalition and urge you and the Board to negotiate in good faith with them.

As commuters and citizens, we rely heavily on the service provided by these members every day as we travel back and forth to work. The Board’s failure to provide them with wages that keep up with the cost of living in the Bay Area, due to increased healthcare premiums, leaves them with little option but to go on strike.

No one wants a strike—not the Coalition or its members; not the District, and certainly not us.

Please do the right thing by helping these workers to keep up with the high cost of living in the Bay Area.