Hundreds of Hamilton’s 3,200 municipal employees, friends, family and supporters rallied in the city hall forecourt late Wednesday just days before a potential work stoppage that could put many on a picket line.
Bargaining has been going on between the city and CUPE Local 5167 since February and the union hopes negotiators will come back Friday with a reasonable offer.
Local 5167 president Jay Hunter said the two sides had “come to an impasse” as of Wednesday afternoon with wages still the main sticking point.
He characterized the current distance between what the city is offering and what the union is asking as “far apart.”
“Still not much closer, ” Hunter said at the rally. “They’ve only come up a very small amount and we’ve come down reasonably more than reasonably, I’ve got to say.”
He says the group is looking for a four-year deal with increases over each year that would be comparable to non-union workers.
“So we’ve asked for a little clarification so that we have a better understanding of who has been given what increases,” Hunter explained.
City workers will be in a legal strike position as of Monday midnight with services like city-run child care, recreation, non-contacted garbage, animal control and bylaw expected to be impacted.
Union members voted in favour of a strike in the spring despite the inclusion of a provincial conciliator assisting both sides on a collective agreement.
Workers were put into a legal strike position after union leaders asked for a “no board report” from the conciliator. That report was issued by the Ministry of Labor on August 4.
In a media briefing on Tuesday, the city’s human resources manager Lora Fontana wouldn’t go as far as to reveal how close or far apart the sides are citing the city wants “confidentiality of the matters at the bargaining table.”
She did admit the main issue was financial.
“We’re going to continue to bargain in good faith and continue to be optimistic that we can have a successful resolve … without the need of having a labor disruption,” Fontana said.
City manager Janette Smith said the city’s negotiators will make efforts to stay at the table with CUPE through the weekend, if necessary.
However, she did suggest residents should “start thinking” about what life might look like on Monday with the work stoppage.
Smith confirmed transit, paramedic services, fire services and long-term care homes are some urgent services that will definitely not be impacted if a deal isn’t reached.
“We have … an operations team that will look at where we have those emergency issues pop up (where) we can move people from non-essential over to those issues,” said Smith.
“That kind of centralized team will manage that on a day by day, hour by hour basis as needed.”
Hunter says even that scenario will probably be “a difficult endeavour” with thousands of the city’s 8,500 employees potentially off the job Monday.
“We don’t want to go on strike, we want to keep delivering the public service that they depend on,” Hunter said in a message to city residents.
CUPE says picket lines will be around “high visible places” that have connections with city services in the downtown core, the Mountain, Ancaster, Dundas, Flamborough and Waterdown.
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