Township Council Talks Teamster Contract

The Township Council has introduced an ordinance related to Teamster Local 469 salaries, after months of negotiations.

The township's attorney in the negotiation, Art Thibault, said that under the terms of the agreement with the Teamsters, which affects the township's 19 current supervisory employees, the supervisors will receive a 2.5% cost of living raise for four years, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2012. The Teamsters accepted the agreement in the early summer.

New hires will come in at a lower salary, and five-step yearly increases "go away," under the terms of the negotiated contract, according to Mayor Stephen C. Acropolis.

Several residents raised objections to the raises, noting that in the private sector, particularly during this difficult economic time, most residents will not be getting the same salary increases, but are being asked to support these increases through monies paid in their taxes.

Township Administrator Scott Pezzaras noted that in this contract, the Teamsters are spreading out the contract's current step up program from five years to 12 years, and one of the key "givebacks" was under the previous contract, "regardless of when you were hired, you got longevity ... Anybody that moved from the TWU to the Teamsters, if the person was hired after 1998, they'd already get longevity, they'd' get scaled up, that is now not the case."


Councilmen Joseph Sangiovanni and Domenick Brando voted against both the resolutions that authorized the acceptance of the Teamsters agreement, and the introduction of the ordinance that established the Teamster salary wages at last night's Council meeting.