a Front-Row Seat for Detroit's Dysfunction

[RGinWA 816]

You're right, it's not just the unions fault, although they did play a role, Some if it was due to an ultra corrupt mayor that was in power for decades, who whenever would get his hand caught in the cookie jar would scream "racism!" Some of it was due to forced bussing. Having to negotiate union contracts with so many different unions was insane as well. They actually found one union in Detroit, that only had 1 member! That means that persons contract had to be negotiated the same as they do with all the other unions.

A union with one member is stretching it.

[Karee 4,191]

A union with one member is stretching it.

DETROIT—To dig out of a fiscal mess, the city of Detroit has reached tentative labor deals with the leadership of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the United Auto Workers and International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

Then it had to win over Herbert Jenkins.

Mr. Jenkins is president of the Assistant Supervisors of Street Maintenance and Construction Association, the union representing the leaders of Detroit's pothole-repair crews.

He also is the only member of that collective-bargaining unit.

Since 2008, Herbert Jenkins has been a member of the union representing the leaders of Detroit's pothole-repair crews. But thanks to recent downsizing, not only is he now the union's president -- he's its only member. WSJ's Matthew Dolan reports.

As recently as last fall, the union was double the size. Then the other guy retired. That left the presidency, uncontested, to Mr. Jenkins, a married father of six who has worked for Detroit for more than two decades.

No ballots were cast, no convention convened. The 49-year-old Mr. Jenkins assumed command by writing a letter to the city, affirming that, as the last man standing, he was the union's new boss. The city recognized him as such.

He concedes that it doesn't make much sense. It is "probably bad for the city," he says from his office at the Department of Public Works' maintenance yard on Michigan Avenue. "Each union should consist of at least more than one."

Such incongruities keep turning up in Detroit's disordered government, which, like the city itself, is shrinking fast. The city of 713,000 now employs 11,000 workers, down from more than 13,000 when Mayor Dave Bing took office in 2009. Another 1,000 workers are scheduled to lose their jobs this year due to budget cuts.

Yet this labor force retains a complex organizational structure, a vestige of a time when it served a population of nearly two million. Workers are represented by 21 unions and 48 bargaining units, several of which now have fewer than 10 members. The five police officers in the city's health department have their own labor council. An independent union for city field engineers has two members.

Then there is Mr. Jenkins, who constitutes the only one-man union recognized by the city. His union could have more members. But because of a citywide freeze on hiring and wages, no one in the Street Maintenance division has been granted the rank of assistant supervisor in years, says Mr. Jenkins, even though several people are doing the job.

The union muddle frustrates city leaders who are trying to negotiate their way out of a $200 million fiscal hole and stave off a takeover by a state-appointed financial manager. Mayor Bing is seeking $102 million in cost savings, including labor concessions, to prevent the city from running out of cash by this spring.

"This is inefficient and not productive," says Kirk Lewis, a top aide to the mayor. He says the city has tried to get unions to develop coalitions for bargaining, but more needs to be done to encourage smaller unions to merge.

Other shrinking industrial cities face similar challenges. In Cleveland, the city's 31 separate collective-bargaining agreements include pacts with individual unions representing four plumbing inspectors, three box-office cashiers and two seasonal ticket sellers. In Chicago, a glazer, a heat-frost insulator and a journeyman plasterer are all one-person unions.

It is tough on Mr. Jenkins, too. "It's strange, because you don't have anybody to help you out with any questions or any negotiation," he says. "I have to do a lot of thinking on my own."

Mr. Jenkins started with the city more than 20 years ago as a Teamster-represented garbage-truck driver. He heaved the trash cans himself. "You had to pick up 27,500 pounds of garbage by yourself in one day," he says. One perk: If he finished his round early, he would still get paid for a full shift.

The seasonal job ended in a layoff. Mr. Jenkins found his way back into city government months later as a laborer with the Department of Public Works. He toiled on jackhammer duty for five years. Since 2008, he has been managing the crews who resurface miles of Motor City roads, fill potholes and clear snow and ice.

When Mr. Bing took office in 2009, the Assistant Supervisors of Street Maintenance and Construction Association had four members. The union president would call a meeting by phoning up the other three.

"We just met at the yard," says Mr. Jenkins. There was no set time, no reading of minutes, no formal agenda. "We would just discuss whatever the president heard when he went downtown to meet with the city."

The downsizing started that year, when that president retired. The next year, one of the rank and file died, leaving just Mr. Jenkins and Jerry Graham, who had taken over as president.

The two men would meet once in a while to discuss a contract when it came up, but otherwise didn't talk much, Mr. Jenkins says. So it was a surprise last fall when Mr. Graham announced his retirement, elevating Mr. Jenkins to the presidency.

When Mr. Jenkins came home with the news, his wife thought it was a joke, like something out of a Hair Club for Men ad.

"I said, 'Well, I'm a member of my unit and I'm the president,'" Mr. Jenkins recalls. "And she said, 'There's only one of you?' And then she started laughing."

Earlier this winter, a coalition of 25 bargaining units represented by the federation of municipal workers reached a tentative accord on concessions with Mayor Bing, followed by the city's police and firefighters in February. Union members must still ratify the agreements.

In a private meeting last month, Mr. Jenkins says Detroit's human-resources director showed him a copy of the contract that the other unions tentatively agreed to. It calls for a 10% wage cut by ending furlough days and an increase in health-care costs borne by employees. Mr. Jenkins decided to accept the deal, calling it fair despite the givebacks. As one of the last unions to sign and the only one with one member, he figured he had time to think it over.

"The other unions still have to get the agreement ratified," he says. "But that's not a problem for me."

Source:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204778604577241060521354078.html?mod=djemCJ_h

Mr. Jenkins is president of the Assistant Supervisors of Street Maintenance and Construction Association, the union representing the leaders of Detroit's pothole-repair crews.