by Sanashihla
Sewerage and Water Board (S&WB) workers are right to collectively demand pay increases and safe work conditions. Too often the Mayor of New Orleans and the Executive Director of the S&WB (whose yearly pay recently increased from $265,000 to $295,000) hold press conferences touting “their” great work, but it’s the labor of the workers that really move the city forward.
The workers ought to be the ones administering the city-wide utility service. Their knowledge and expert skills make them the best authority to decide how the city’s resources are best used to meet the needs of the community.
In August, it was revealed that a private contractor named Olameter was hired to increase meter readings. A local reporter exposed that, “the contract calls for Olameter to be paid $37.97 per hour for each of the 20 workers being provided under the contract, with an expenditure cap of $500,000 over three months. S&WB meter readers are paid $13 an hour, though S&WB’s spokesperson, Courtney Barnes, maintains that the utility has been working to get the city’s Civil Service Commission to raise wages.
It’s not the workers who benefit when city contracts are awarded to the friends of city officials. The workers are cheated again when high utility bills cut into their already low wages. The way out of this exploitive situation is not to gripe about how bad things are, but to organize.
The S&WB workers shouldn’t wait on the Civil Service Commission to give raises. Raises can be won through worker solidarity and an organized effort to push workers’ demands. To wage this fight, the workers need an independent union.
“Where there is no union, fight for one. Where there is a union, fight to make it fight!”
It is the legal right of workers to unionize, even in a right to work state. Organized, the workers could decide that instead of hiring 20 temporary workers to be paid at twice the rate of full time workers, all employees would be hired full time on a permanent basis, with living wages and safe work conditions.
The S&WB workers don’t need the Civil Service Commission, nor private contractors, nor high paid overseers to direct and control them. The S&WB would operate so much more efficiently if the workers were in control.
Public support for S&WB workers is present, because this is the same S&WB that is notorious for guesstimating bills and overcharging residents. Support for S&WB workers will only rise when the workers unite in solidarity across departments and job roles and fight for their collective rights! When we fight, we win!