Teamsters officials say they are gearing up for a membership drive to add more Denver city workers to their rolls with hopes of asking voters to approve the right to collectively bargain.
“It’s time,” said Ed Bagwell, public-service director for Teamsters Local No. 17, which represents more than 1,000 city employees and wants to increase enrollment to 2,500.
“We’re going to do a big campaign now for the next three months, actively soliciting employees to join the Teamsters,” Bagwell said. “We need to protect them. They need a stronger voice.”
The Teamsters and other unions — like the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — provide representation to city workers but don’t have the force that comes with a collectively bargained labor contract.
Only uniformed personnel in Denver — about 3,100 of 7,200 city employees — are covered by collective-bargaining agreements.
The rest of the employees are under the Career Service Authority, Denver’s official human-resource agency that provides city workers with a full range of compensation services, including regular salary comparison surveys that help dictate pay increases.
Some nonuniformed workers are concerned they have been bearing the brunt of budget cutbacks — furloughs, layoffs and staff reductions, Bagwell said.
On Friday, most non-uniformed city workers were required to take a furlough day — the fourth of five scheduled this year as part of a temporary budget fix.
Each furlough day saves the city about $1 million. More furloughs are likely in 2012, said Mayor Michael Hancock, who will deliver his budget Sept. 15.
Bagwell said the majority of the City Council is sympathetic to the push for collective bargaining. He is hopeful that Hancock, whom the Teamsters endorsed, won’t stand in the way.
Hancock, however, said on the campaign trail that he does not support an expansion of collective bargaining while the economy is suffering.
Adding collective-bargaining rights for non-uniformed city workers would require a voter-approved charter amendment — something that Denver voters rejected in 1980 and 1997.
“We’re going to run it every year until we get it passed,” Bagwell said.
Council president Chris Nevitt said he understands the push for collective bargaining.
“I have been clear all along, I think collective bargaining is something a set of employees ought to have access to if they want it,” he said.
Councilman Charlie Brown said he doesn’t think Denver voters would support it.
“They have tried twice and failed,” he said. “Under the Career Service Authority, the employees get damn good benefits already, and they get prevailing wages in comparison to other municipalities.”
Brown doesn’t think being in a union will protect city workers from the cutbacks that will be coming.
“Michael and the council are going to have to deliver pain,” he said. “I don’t care if there is a union or not. We are all in this together. We have to have a balanced budget. What else are we going to do?”
Political consultant Floyd Ciruli said unions are not faring well these days at the polls.
“I’m having a hard time seeing where this groundswell of support for unionizing employees would come from,” he said. “The (unions) tend to control low-turnout council elections, and obviously they have friends on the council now. But I think all of the trends are running counter to winning an election.”
Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com
