SEIU Negotiator Crushed By Union's Spurning of Concession Deal -- Predicts 'Big-Time Layoffs'

A member of the SEIU Local 1021 negotiating team that reached an accord with the Mayor's Office following a series of marathon negotiating sessions last month told SF Weekly he is shocked and distraught the union's membership voted to turn down the deal -- which would have saved the city some $38  million.

"I'm assuming this means there will be big-time layoffs,'" said the SEIU worker. As for folks in the city other than the 11,000 or so SEIU city workers, "It's going to be a massive cut in services and the cuts are just going to keep on coming -- the city won't recover from this deficit for probably three years; even if the economy turned around today, it would probably take the city a year to catch up with that."

Unlike the initial agreement hammered out in early April, the spurned SEIU deal actually would have preserved scheduled pay raises -- at the cost of mandated furlough days.  
Now, with that offer off the table, the city must scramble to account for scores of millions of dollars it thought it had squared away. The defeated deal came with the blessing of the union's management. The results were tabulated today after a week of voting.

If city officials hoped smaller unions would fall into line after the SEIU approved its give-backs: Well, that's not going to happen. "Most of them were waiting to see what we did," said the SEIU negotiator angrily.

The negotiator expressed disapointment with his union bretheren. While shared sacrifices supposedly would have saved union jobs, one could interpret this vote as workers opting to preserve what's theirs -- come what may.

"I just don't understand," said the SEIU negotiator. "I wish I could sit them all down so they could tell me why. I thought we were supposed to have each other's backs."