Tell Mayor Ballantyne to give our City union a Fair Contract now
Mayor Ballantyne has not given the Somerville Municipal Employees Association a pay raise for three years
Somerville Municipal Employees Association (SMEA) Units A, B, & D unites our librarians, public works laborers, traffic officers and more. (Police, teachers, & firefighters are not in SMEA and they are in their own unions.)
Mayor Ballantyne let their contract lapse in 2022. And the mayor hasn’t given them pay raise since 2021.
Some union members work over 80 hour weeks to pay for rent, groceries, and hospital bills.
Meanwhile rents have risen. And inflation has eaten into their paychecks.
Some have left for other higher paying jobs in nearby cities.
If you want to fix our potholes, repair our inaccessible sidewalks, and prevent flooding, Mayor Ballantyne needs to pay SMEA fair wages now!
We must pay our city union workers fair wages with good benefits in a new contract now!
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ballantyne understaffs our city services
If we can’t pay our union members, we can’t hire or retain skilled workers.
Since June 2022, we’ve had a net loss of union members, who can get paid more in other cities or in the private sector.
We should have over 300 SMEA workers. Instead we have fewer than 250.
If you want well-rested, well-supported city workers with full teams, we need to pay them fair wages.
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ballantyne overpays external contractors
When we need to fix our water & sewer lines, Ballantyne chooses to overpay Tim Zanelli Excavating (TZE) rather than having our own skilled city union do the work.
The non-union workers of TZE cost the city over 300% more than paying SMEA to do the same work.
Similarly, she also chose to use thousands of COVID-recovery money to start privatizing Union Square. She gave a grant to Block-by-Block via Union Square Main Streets to monitor & clean the square. Why pay them when our union can do the same work & are out of contract?
Until we change state law Prop 2 1/2, we can only tax landlords so much. We need to use our money carefully. Paying our union fair wages is the smart fiscal decision.
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Ballantyne causes city worker displacement
Every worker deserves fair pay.
Parking clerk Courtney is facing another rent increase. As a Somerville-native and 43-year resident, does the mayor want Courtney to stay in Somerville this fall? What about after that?
After immigrating from Haiti, traffic officer Jean Eddy used to love living in Somerville. Due to rent increases, he moved to Manchester, NH.
Each day he drives to MA and works 4 hours as a home health worker. Then he works 8 hours on our streets. Then he works another 4 hours as a home health worker. He works 16 hours each day and he still can’t afford to live in Somerville.
To solve the housing crisis, the whole region needs to change its zoning.
But until then, Ballantyne must slow displacement by paying our workers a fair wage.
Support SMEA 