RTC tries to get drivers, CAT managers together

Wednesday, June 5, 2002 | 9:21 a.m.

Regional Transportation Commission officials said Tuesday that they are working behind the scenes to try to push together drivers and the system managers to end a bus strike now in its third week.

Clark County Commissioner Bruce Woodbury, who is also chairman of the RTC board, said the agency with overall responsibility for the system can do little because federal law and the agency's contract with management company ATC forbid direct involvement in the labor dispute.

But the agency is asking "third party intermediaries" to push for negotiations, he said.

Frank Opdyke, president of Amalgamated Transit Local 1637, said he believes the RTC board and other elected policymakers in the region are trying to ease the acrimonious situation.

But ATC spokeswoman Valerie Michael said the company knows of no outside effort.

"I know of no third party intermediaries," she said. "It is the ATC and the ATU."

Michael said the company's effort to hire permanent replacements for about 800 striking bus drivers is paying off with about 50 applications daily.

The company could be covering 90 to 100 percent of routes by the weekend, although riders will need to check on the frequency of buses, Michael said.

The effort and the union's vow to keep to picket lines could mean a long, hot summer for bus riders.

"If they start hiring permanent replacement workers, this thing is never going to be settled," Woodbury said.

The union opened one potential avenue for a settlement Tuesday, but the company could reject the option. Opdyke said the union has asked for and still welcomes binding arbitration to settle the strike.

But Michael said binding arbitration is a tactic best employed between government employees and government administrations.

"They have made no formal request for binding arbitration," she said. "I don't know if the company would welcome it or not. I'd say probably not."