City Council Rallies Behind Civil Custodians

"Weve got your back" and "kids safety is key" are the messages that the City Council recently conveyed to Local 891 School Custodial Engineers. Announcing its support for the unions fight to quash the Department of Educations (DOE) plan to privatize custodial operations in Regions 3 and 8 (Queens and Brooklyn, respectively), councilmembers unanimously passed Resolution 37, which urges the city to abandon the plan to replace civil servant custodial engineers with private contractors.
Robert Troeller, president of Local 891 School Custodial Engineers, was joined on the steps of City Hall by more than 100 custodial engineers, councilmembers and supporters, including Ernest Logan of the principals union, after the resolution was passed.
"The support gathered here today sends an important message to Chancellor Klein that New York City wants its schools in the care of qualified licensed school custodians," said Troeller. "The passage of this resolution shows the City Councils unwavering commitment to protect the best interests of students, teachers, principals, parents and taxpayers."
The crux of the matter remains the DOEs review of proposals for the facilities management services of more than 200 schools throughout Queens and Brooklyn, with implementation set to go into effect on July 1. The companies under review are Johnson Controls, Temco Services, TMC Services and Controls, Inc. The city has maintained that the private companies will provide the same services at a lower cost. But members of Local 981 stress that, because they are civil servants, they seek to maximize service to each school with the available funds and return any unspent money.
Resolution 37 urges Mayor Michael Bloomberg and all city agencies to comply with Charter Section 312(a), requiring agencies to conduct a cost/benefit analysis prior to making a decision to privatize city services. Specifically, it asks the city to abandon its current efforts to privatize the custodial workforce in New York City schools and to rehire union custodians who have already been replaced in schools by privatized companies.
According to a report compiled by Local 891, in recent years, the civil service custodians have returned as much as $5 million systemwide per year.
"Since our hearing for civil service and labor and contracts on March 30, the administration has not proven that the privatization of custodial operations would be more cost effective to the city," said Councilman Joseph Addabbo Jr. "We should never compromise cost for the safety of our children and the quality of work we currently get from Local 891 custodians."
Throughout the evolution of this issue, Troeller and his supporters have called for an emphasis on child safety, noting that private companies are not required to do background checks on their employees. This fact was highlighted last month when a custodial manager who had been working in a Bayside public school was fired when it was discovered that he had a 10-year-old felony conviction for possession of an unlicensed weapon. Jaime Montes, who started at Middle School 74 in August 2003 under Temco, did not undergo a background check until March 12. Temcos application asked only for felony convictions within the last seven years.
Responding to this news at a press conference, Councilman David Weprin said, "I will not allow the Department of Education to jeopardize the well-being of our children through a pilot program that has clearly demonstrated that safety is not a priority."