May Day Action Shines Light on Company’s Greed, Highlights State Bill to Close the “Utility Loophole”
New York, N.Y. – May 3, 2012 – (RealEstateRama) — Workers, community supporters and union members gathered across from Con Edison’s headquarters near Union Square on Tuesday to shine a light on Con Edison as a corporation of the 1 percent. In an action timed to coincide with May Day events at Union Square and around the city – and with a giant inflatable rat nesting nearby – workers and their supporters passed out thousands of fliers highlighting a New York State bill that would close the “utility loophole” and force Con Ed to act responsibly towards its contracted building service workers.
Con Edison benefits from its status as a protected monopoly,” said Hector Figueroa, Secretary-Treasurer of 32BJ. “It benefits from the electric rates all of us pay. But it doesn’t pass along those benefits to working people. This bill will close the ‘utility loophole’ and ensure that contracted building service workers at Con Ed sites are paid the predominant private-sector rate for wages and benefits.”
Figueroa and others at the scene called attention to the compensation of Con Edison CEO Kevin Burke compared to contracted building service workers at Con Ed sites. Last year, Burke got an increase in compensation of more than $680,000 to nearly $11 million – for one year. That brought his compensation to about $5,274 per hour, based on a 40-hour week.
Meanwhile, some contracted building service workers at Con Ed headquarters had their already low pay of as little as $9 an hour cut to even less, $8.50. Other contracted cleaners at Con Ed sites make as little as $8 an hour. These cleaners would have to work nearly four months to earn what Burke earns in one hour.
The new bill before the New York State Legislature (A9375), which has 64 Assembly sponsors, would close the “utility loophole” that exempts Con Ed and other public utilities from the law requiring companies that receive public funds to pay service workers the same wages and benefits that predominate in the private sector.
That will benefit taxpayers as well as working families. Currently, some contracted building service workers at Con Ed sites earn so little they have to turn to government assistance. Taxpayers are hit twice – first through their electric bills to Con Ed and then through their having to subsidize health care, food and housing for building service workers at Con Ed sites.
“I work very hard but because I make so little I have to get government assistance,” said Fernando Cruz, who receives food stamps for himself, his wife and two children and Medicaid for himself and the children. Cruz is paid $9 an hour as a contracted cleaner at the Con Edison site at 14th street and Sixth Avenue. “I don’t have enough money to pay for anything. It’s very difficult.”
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With 120,000 members in eight states and Washington, D.C., including 70,000 in New York, 32BJ is the largest union of property service workers in the country and the largest private-sector unit in the state.
Contact:
Maia Davis:
m)201-396-4444; mdavis (at) seiu32bj (dot) org
Eugenio Villasante:
m)646-285-1087; evillasante (at) seiu32bj (dot) org
