INTRODUCTION & SUMMARY - Start Here

Here we chronicle the plight of Florida's Bridge Tenders in our struggle to stop exploitation and profiteering at the hands of the ISS & ICA middlemen. We demand wages and benefits consistent with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, improved safety and legal protection.

 

Welcome ISS, ICA, FDOT, NLRB welcome all! This blog provides historical information to ISS (our direct employer), ICA (holds the bridge staffing contact with the FDOT and subcontracts our services from ISS), the FDOT (owns the bridges), the U.S. Coast Guard USCG (regulates bridge operation), Federal, State and Local Officials (the buck stops here?), the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the press, the public and our fellow bridge tenders about our battle to stop wage theft. 

 

BACKGROUND: ISS currently pays bridge tenders just pennies above minimum wage to start, after a year (and a struggle to get the only promised raise) we're now paid $8.25/hr. south of Tampa Bay, $8.75/hr. north of Tampa Bay, $10.00hr in Jacksonville and $10.50 in Delray Beach. The benefits are as capricious as the wages, some get 5 paid holidays others 0 (State employees get 7, Federal 9), some get paid vacations, some get sick leave, others nothing at all. But we all work for the same company, perform the same job under similar Agreements in the same State. It seems we're paid depending on how much local pressure ISS receives. In Jacksonville and Delray Beach it took union pressure to win their raises and benefits. The majority of Florida bridge tenders are seniors held captive at the poverty level. Our wages are an outrage and an insult. We are organizing under the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) to stop wage theft by ISS and ICA.

 

Initial Demands. In April we demanded equal pay for equal work, the same rate throughout all of Florida, that was all. After being stonewalled we were forced to circulate a petition to West Coast tenders in an attempt to organize. A sample literature package was sent as a courtesy to ISS with notice of our intent. We wished to be transparent and above board. The ISS response was their illegal confiscation of our literature. It polarized our relationship, forced us into secrecy. In response to their delaying tactics we increased our demands to include the back pay differential plus interest.

 

National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The National Labor Relations Act gives us the right to join together to improve wages and working conditions including the right to form a union where none currently exists. Examples of our rights include:

• Forming, or attempting to form, a union in your workplace;
• Joining a union whether the union is recognized by your employer or not;
• Assisting a union in organizing your fellow employees;
• Refusing to do any or all of these things.
• To be fairly represented by a union

ISS violated our rights with their heavy handed confiscation of our literature forcing us to file charges against ISS to prevent future interference with our rights (see NLRB).

 

Department of Labor - Bureau of Labor Statistics. We then discovered the mean wage rate for our job description is reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics here. The Federal government reports the hourly mean wage at $19.04/hr for bridge and lock tenders in Florida. The Service Contract Act (SCA) demands that "no less than the wage rates and fringe benefits found prevailing in the locality". We deserve no less.

 

David vs. Goliath. ISS World according to their website is a multinational corporation with over 530,000 employees in facility management, cleaning, support, property, catering and security services, headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark. They are a giant among outsourcing facility service companies. This isn't the first time Florida bridge tenders were exploited.  See the Sun Sentinel article here. Either ISS, ICA or both are taking more than their fair share of our pay and we asked FDOT to audit their contractors (a right they claim in their contracts).

 

We are not facility cleaners! The following is quoted from the FDOT manual. "The State of Florida has entrusted to your care thousands of lives and a valuable piece of machinery, the proper operation and care of which is of primary importance to the people using the highways and waterways of Florida. “ ISS should refrain from higher level outsourcing if they don't recognize the need to provide adequate protection, fair wages and benefits to more responsible positions. FDOT should protect their bridge operators from profiteering and exploitation at the hands of their contractors.

 

See for Yourself. All our correspondence is posted here. Start at #1 (in April) you'll see we begged for a fair and easy resolution. It didn't have to go any further. Click on the numbered correspondence links to get the full picture. You'll see we offered concessions in an effort to reach an early resolution and repair the damage. After more than 5 months of stonewalling those concessions are now off the table and we organizing under the IBEW (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers).

Delay is a polarizing tactic. Stonewalling made things worse by building and strengthening the adversarial relationship. It also uncovered a growing number of weaknesses. During the delay an unfortunate incident disclosed a lack of clear indemnification from personal legal liability while on the job. Under their Agreement, ICA indemnifies the FDOT but who indemnifies us? It turns out we are performing our job at personal financial risk and deserve personal indemnification.

 

There's a conflict of interest Operators working for ISS are discouraged from writing reports critical of ICA. It's a case where the subcontractor is protecting the prime contractor. Many bridges suffer the ravages of deferred maintenance and obsolescence but bridge tenders are discouraged from volunteering deficiencies to inspectors and risks remain unchecked. The FDOT suffers from two filters between themselves and their bridge operators.

 

ICA Responsibilities. ICA is on record. They have a fundamental responsibility to prevent exploitation by their subcontractor and can no longer feign ignorance nor look the other way. Could this be a case where ICA and ISS are in complicity - both engaged in wage theft? It needs an audit to uncover the facts but FDOT is hiding behind the verbiage in their contract.

 

FDOT. We ask you again to find out who's taking more than their fair share of our pay. You have the right to audit and discover the differential between what you pay ICA and the wage and benefits we receive. Please allow us to influence any new Agreement that outsources bridge tenders to insure that we are unshackled from being employed "at will" so you receive candid direct reporting from your operators. Safeguard the wages of hundreds of seniors being exploited by the profiteering of ICA and ISS by including "no less than the wage and benefits found prevailing in the locality" in your next outsourcing Agreements.

 

Progress. Their days of wage theft are coming to an end. The IBEW has filed a petition with the NLRB who will mail secret ballots to every bridge tender in early January. ISS temporarily forced us into a period of silence while we organized. Now, we can again openly voice our opinion. When you get your secret ballot be sure to vote YES. Follow the instructions on completing and mailing back your ballot carefully. Thank you for your support. 

The Organizing Committee

 

FDOT Response

"You may choose to look the other way

But you can never again say you did not know"

All we ask... Just Do What's Right

September 19, 2013

Mr. Michael E. Sprayberry, P.E.

State Administrator for Maintenance Contracting

Florida Department of Transportation

Dear Mr. Sprayberry,

Thank you for your response to our email of August 26^th. We trust you are the individual responsible for negotiating, letting and managing the movable bridge Contractual Services Agreements with ICA and ISS in Districts 1&7 and again please ask you for copies of the completed Agreements in force between yourselves and the above parties in the above districts. We would also appreciate an update on the current stage of negotiations, the expected date for signing the new Agreements and the vendors under consideration.

May we also ask that, while assigning all operation and management responsibilities and not retaining authority to direct employment or sub-contractor employment policies, your department does not overlook blatant exploitation nor ignore profiteering when brought to your attention.  We remain confident that equity is a fundamental principle embraced by our government, one that cannot be dismissed by the adroit crafting of contractual clauses and will remain the touchstone prevailing throughout our discussions and your negotiations.

Thank you for your concern and voicing your opinion on the McNamara-O’Hara Service Contract Act (SCA). We are bridge tenders not lawyers and are certainly not qualified to argue the appropriateness of the SCA in this instance. We do have reasonable confidence in the verbal opinion received from the Employment Standards Administration’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD). This obviously bears further scrutiny.

Your Contractual Service Agreement contains your right to audit (3H) and we ask you to use that right to uncover the details of the wage theft we suffer under our employment by ISS. Please discover and disclose the poisonous pie chart of misappropriation that has us living on the edge, while enriching middlemen empowered and emboldened by a lack of accountability.  This is the untenable situation we ask you to prevent in the future, both your department and we operators will benefit from the next Agreement specifying:

1). All contract employees to be retained under a “for cause” (not the current silence-instilling “at will”) relationship. This simple protection solves the previously disclosed conflict of interest. It opens the floodgates of direct reporting to your inspectors yielding a clearer picture of bridge condition with suggestions for safer, more efficient operations.

2). Operators to be indemnified against personal liability stemming from actions, errors or omissions incurred while performing our job. ICA indemnifies you, why not us?

3). Operators to be paid “no less than prevailing local wages and benefits” stopping the temptation for contractors and their sub-contractors to exploit us. While not formally enforceable, it’s the spirit of the Davis-Bacon Act we ask you to respect.

Your audit will prove the need for adding these protections to your next Agreement. They are in your power and best interest to give. They are demanded by fair play. We thank you for your consideration and look forward to your positive response.

The Organizing Committee

exploitingtenders@gmail.com

www.bestbridge.blogspot.com

Union Organizing Starts Today! Thank You IBEW.

Fellow Bridge Tender,

It’s clear we’re not being treated fairly and over the last 5 months we tried reasoning with ISS and ICA in an effort to convince them to be fair (www.bestbridge.blogspot.com). They resist and we won't be stonewalled any longer. It’s clear the only way to change their policy is to force them into collective bargaining. If enough of us agree to be represented by a union we can improve our wages, benefits and working conditions. The greater the percentage represented - the greater our bargaining leverage. Please consider the following and then we’ll ask you to sign a card.

It's WAGE THEFT! Your organizing committee was formed after discovering ISS Bridge Tender wages ($8.05-$10.75/hr) and benefits (0 – 5 paid holidays, 0 - 2 weeks vacation, etc.) varied widely across Florida. Further research showed the highest wages and benefits were paid only after union bargaining. We found Jacksonville (Electrical Workers) and Delray Beach (Operating Engineers) received wages and benefits far better than ours. We also found that the Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics reports our job description should pay $19.04/hr in Florida. Clearly, ISS and ICA are pocketing more than their fair share of our pay.

A Union Response. After our committee tried to appeal to reason for five months we learned that a union’s knowledge, experience and legal resources can make the difference between success and failure. Management must negotiate in good faith with an authorized union representative or be forced into mandatory arbitration, it’s the law. So, we interviewed the Electrical Workers, Operating Engineers and Steel Workers, five locals in all. We chose the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) as our best fit. Your committee members already signed cards appointing the IBEW as our personal representatives. Both IBEW negotiators and some of your fellow bridge tenders will be part of the negotiating team. We urge you to sign the card that forces ISS to bargain with us in good faith.

Sign Up. Signing an authorization card is NOT a vote to join the union. The cards only appoint the IBEW as our representative, to bargain on our behalf (yep, even before we’re members). The cards are secret and ISS will never see who signed. A strong showing will force ISS to negotiate a fair contract - one you’ll vote on before it’s approved. If a contract doesn’t increase your take home pay and improve your benefits you won’t approve it and if you want to revoke your card at any time you can. We don’t have anything to lose but the IBEW does and we must be fair to them.

It's Guaranteed. IBEW won’t ask us to join their union or pay dues until after a contract is approved by us, one that puts more money in our pockets, gives us paid holidays, vacation and sick time. Then… join we must, because we’re only as strong as the percentage represented. Fair play also demands we join to repay the IBEW for providing all our organizing, negotiating and legal resources (see: "Not One Red Cent"). Don’t cheat yourself, don’t cheat your fellow bridge tenders, don’t cheat the IBEW and don’t sign a card if you don’t plan to pay dues (far far less than what you’ll gain). If you want a higher standard of living – sign a card! It's the surest way to improve our quality of life, the more who sign the more sure it becomes.

Please print and pass this to fellow tenders who don't have web access. The sooner a majority sign - the sooner the negotiating process can start. But, be prepared for this to take time as there are about 120 of us and we want to talk to you all. Be patient, remain committed to improving our pay, benefits, safety and working conditions. ISS is wrong and refuses to do the right thing voluntarily. It's our responsibility to respond to their wage theft. History shows they must be forced into respecting us. With your patience and unbending support we can't be stopped. Spread the word.

Your Organizing Committee

exploitingtenders@gmail.com

www.bestbridge.blogspot.com

Collective Bargaining - We won't be stopped.

Neither ISS nor ICA responded favorably to our five month long appeal to reason. It's clear that only collective bargaining will change our circumstances. Individual employees have appealed in the past and ISS has either ignored them or responded with a token response. Only under union pressure has there ever been significant change. The higher % represented – the greater that change. Your support is very important and we want to count you in the % represented.

ISS recently responded with a characteristic token response. In their lowest paid District One they raised pay 25¢ (see letter below). We’ll take it as a demonstration of good faith and encourage management to continue in that direction while reminding them that $19.04/hr is the mean hourly pay for our job description in Florida as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

In FDOT District Four the union negotiated a contract giving ISS bridge tenders four (4) paid holidays. In FDOT District Two a different union negotiated a contract giving ISS bridge tenders five (5) paid holidays. In compaarison State workers receive seven (7) and Federal workers get nine (9). But, in FDOT Districts One and Seven we get zero (0) paid holidays and are paid at a subsistence level. Only organizing and negotiating can stop wage and benefit theft at the hands of ISS & ICA.

But it’s far more than pay and benefits. We wish to improve bridge safety, enhance operational efficiency and insure we're protected while on the job. We need indemnification from lawsuits that could be filed against us personally due to job related issues. We want to be free to report risks without fear of reprisal. We need to be free from ISS pressure not to rock the ICA boat (a conflict of interest that FDOT needs to fix). Management must respect our right to organize, collectively bargain under the law and STOP interfering with our rights. It's more than doing the right thing, it's the law.

Bridge Tenders: Stand up for your rights. Don't surrender literature to supervisors, don't tell them about it. Pass it from hand to hand, don't leave it on the bridge. If asked to surrender anything refuse. It's your property and it's your protected right to organize. We're now in communication with Districts One, Two, Four and Seven and thank our fellow bridge tenders for their solidarity. Please share this web address with ALL bridge tenders — help us spread the word.

ISS: Stop your exploitation! Stop your profiteering! Stop your wage theft! We object to your capricious policies. Your attempts to isolate and compartmentalize are no longer effective, dependence on ignorance is lost to the web. Stop alienating us. Face facts and do the right thing.

ICA: Stop protecting ISS (it's them, right?). You know right from wrong. You can't hide, get your head out of the sand. Intervene or accept the guilt by association that outrages and polarizes your workforce. We want to work together and you need to earn our cooperation with your support.

FDOT: We have alerted you to the travesties occurring under your blanket Agreements with ICA/ISS/C&S. We ask you audit the payment path to your operators and then stop the unjustifiable disparity between today's wage and the clearly published wages prevailing in our locality. It's more than following the letter of the law, it's about fair play. Give us the protection we deserve in your next round of Agreements. You deserve a closer relationship with us, we want to work closer together.

11. First Request for FDOT Intervention

 

Bridge Operators Organizing Committee

FDOT Districts 1 & 7

www.exploitingtenders@gmail.com

August 26, 2013

Florida Department of Transportation

Office of Maintenance

ATTN. Mr. Tim Latner, Director

605 Suwannee Street

Tallahassee, FL 32399

Dear Sir,

When choosing to outsource bridge operators we doubt your department envisioned the rampant profiteering and exploitation that ensues under ICA and their subcontractor ISS. We, the bridge tenders of Districts 1 & 7 suffer under their abhorrent and capricious employment policies. The following disparities, bully tactics and conflicts of interest threaten the safe and reliable operation of your bridges. We ask for your kind intervention.

Wages and benefits cause us great personal pain. Please refer to the latest Department of Labor (DOL) Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report to see the mean wage for bridge and lock tenders in Florida reported at $19.04/hr. Our gross pay in District One is $8.25/hr and in Seven it’s $8.75/hr. In at least two other previously unionized Districts ISS pays up to $10.75/hr with benefits that vary according to the union contract.  In Districts 1 & 7 we receive no holidays, sick days or personal days - virtually no benefits at all.

History shows only when bridge tenders collectively bargain with ISS is there meaningful change. Our attempt to gain standing and collectively bargain was met with the unlawful confiscation of our petition when ISS demonstrated a blatant lack of respect for our rights under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Our offers of concessions and appeals to reason are stonewalled. We non-union-represented operators are employed “at will”, a relationship that creates fear of dismissal and demands our anonymity. ICA was notified and shows no concern.  It’s documented since 04/01/13 at: www.bestbridge.blogspot.com .

We are filing charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) for unfair labor action. After asking the Employment Standards Administration’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) for an opinion, we believe FDOT-ICA-ISS are in violation of the McNamara-O’Hara Service Contract Act (SCA). We believe the spirit of the Davis Bacon Act (DBA) should prevail Statewide “subcontractors must pay no less than locally prevailing wages and fringe benefits in the area” and ask this protection against exploitation and profiteering at the hands of contractors and subcontractors is included in your next Agreement.

You too suffer from these middlemen with their inherent conflict of interest. Because ISS is dependent upon ICA for the contracting of and payment for their services they are obliged to maintain a cordial (preferential) relationship with their contractor. That obligation impedes our open reporting by ISS employees to FDOT inspectors. We are encouraged not to volunteer anything to FDOT inspectors and Drawbridge Malfunction Reports are completed only with supervisor approval. Please require that operators are employed under the “for cause” (currently “at will”) relationship necessary to speak freely and openly, making us full partners in the safe and reliable operation of your bridges.

We ask you to disclose the wage and benefit sum factored into your District 1 & 7 Blanket Services Agreements for operator services and if it includes a 3% annual increase. If not an explicit sum please give the parameters you use to measure, define and evaluate those costs.  While questioning the fundamental social morality of the State outsourcing our job, we recognize middlemen are entitled to costs plus fair profit. We are also entitled to what is fair including “indemnification from operator errors or omissions” in the next Agreement.

In summary, we respectfully ask you to:

1.              Audit ICA and ISS to uncover and stop profiteering.

2.              Insist operators are employed under a “for cause” relationship.

3.              Protect operators with indemnification against errors and omissions.

4.              Require no less than prevailing local wages and benefits be paid to operators.

5.              Disclose the basis on which you calculate and pay for operator remuneration.

It’s your right and your duty to stop this exploitation and end relationships that engender silence. Help us earn a modest living wage with benefits and protect your operators so we may better protect the safety of the public and the reliable operation of your bridges.

Sincerely,

The Organizing Committee

www.exploitingtenders@gmail.com

P.S. We regret the temporary need for anonymity, to be lifted once our charges are filed with the NLRB after which we may speak more openly and directly. Meanwhile please respond to our committee via email.

A 25¢ raise. Really? - A letter from a bridge tender.

Dear Jake,

I cannot seriously believe that they (ISS and/or "the Powers That Be") think that this move will keep us pacified. What an insult! A $.25/hour SURPRISE RAISE (since most of the tenders in our district have NO idea *what* has transpired since Mr. Hartman demanded that the initial 8-page document from our group be removed from all bridges)? Is this what they feel will make up for the disparity between what the South Florida bridge tenders have been earning ($10.50) since December, 2012?

I believe that the majority of our fellow workers would be GREATLY excited to hear that the most recent information from the Department of Labor Statistics informs us that  this group is now RIGHTFULLY asking for $19.04 per hour. And yet ISS thinks that $.25/hour will keep us quiet? I think not; our raise to $8.25 doesn't even come close! To me, this only further fans the flames of my anger. Especially since ISS once again showed thoughtlessness in their decisions.

When they gave us "all" $.25 more per hour, they omitted that "equal pay raise" for the employees of Blackburn Point Road Bridge. Blackburn Point Bridge has always been a "special" bridge, which is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. It is a one-lane swing bridge located on Blackburn Point Road in Sarasota County. This bridge requires that tenders go outside, in all kinds of weather, to operate the bridge from the center of the span. For that extra hazardous duty, the tenders on that bridge (used to) get $1.00 more per hour than the rest of the tenders working for our company in our area. But, for some reason, when EVERYONE ELSE (who has worked for the company for more than one year) got $.25/hour more, these folks on Blackburn Point Bridge did not get anything.

So now I am not only angry for myself, as an employee of the state-wide Florida bridge tenders' system run by ISS, but more humanely, as a fellow member of this district of which most of us got a measly raise and a select few did not. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT? You talk about disparity ... wow.

A Sunshine State Bridge Tender

(who does not feel very sunny...)