Building workers authorize citywide strike with Mamdani’s support

CITYWIDE — Roughly 1.5 million New York City residential tenants may be left holding the bag — that is, the garbage bag — after members of 32BJ SEIU on Wednesday voted at a Park Avenue rally to authorize a strike, if a new contract agreement isn’t reached by the deadline. 

The union’s four-year contract with the Realty Advisory Board expires at the end of Monday, and 32BJ SEIU says building owners want to roll back hard-won gains, in what they call an “insulting” contract offer.

In the event of a strike, roughly 34,000 doormen, porters, superintendents, handymen and other residential workers would walk off the job at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday. This would leave tenants in 3,500 residential buildings across the city (except for the Bronx) bagging their own garbage and compost, manning the front desk, cleaning and managing deliveries.

Many building management offices have sent notices to tenants warning that the usual services — including FedEx and UPS deliveries — would not be available in the event of a strike, and that tenants would have to bring the garbage to the curb by 6 a.m. three days a week. Some larger buildings are hiring security guards — but the guards would not be allowed to carry out duties normally performed by striking workers.

New York City Department of Sanitation workers may refuse to pick up the garbage at striking buildings, leading to the possibility of bags of refuse and compost piling up on sidewalks across the city.

Top city officials back the union

On Wednesday, top New York City officials, including Mayor Zohran Mamdani, City Council Speaker Julie Menin, Comptroller Mark Levine and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, joined the roughly 10,000 32BJ SEIU members at the Manhattan rally.

“Under our administration, New York is, and will always be, a union town,” Mamdani told the crowd. “We are sending a clear message to every building owner that the hardworking members of 32BJ will not be pushed around by anyone.”

According to a release from the union, RAB’s proposals include: shifting the cost of health care onto workers via premium sharing; the introduction of a lower-paid “Tier II” workforce; the expansion of temp workers; the weakening of labor contract enforcement; and the lack of a commitment to pension improvements. 

The union claims that the real estate industry is enjoying “record high rents, high property values and historic low vacancy rates.” 

Manny Pastreich, president of 32BJ SEIU, said Wednesday. “While the residential real estate industry is booming, working New Yorkers are fighting to keep up with the skyrocketing cost of living.”

RAB said on its website, however, that the industry “is confronting existential threats, including the imposition of 0% rent increases on 1 million rent-stabilized NYC apartments, which would severely constrain the industry’s ability to provide wage increases.”

Hasan “SunnyD” Dibra, a concierge at 30 Main St. in DUMBO, told the Brooklyn Eagle last week that RAB was trying to install a two-tier system, where new workers would start out with lower pay than current workers do. 

“We’ve never had that before,” he said. “I’m doing this almost 30 years in the city and in Brooklyn, and it’s not something we want. I mean, our families, we’re already struggling as it is.”