Bus firm's workers vote to join union

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.thnt.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070921/NEWS010214/709210447/1001

Home News Tribune Online 09/21/07

By RICHARD KHAVKINE
STAFF WRITER
[e-mail]

SOUTH BRUNSWICK — Em- ployees of the Monmouth Junction affiliate of a national school bus company voted 90 to 33 Thursday afternoon to join a Teamsters local.

A union organizer, Matt Emmick, said the nearly three-to-one vote by drivers, mechanics and attendants in favor of collective bargaining sent Cincinnati-based First Student, the nation's second-largest school bus company, a clear message.

"That tells us that the workers are ready for a change in the workplace," Emmick said.

"They've now won the voice they've been lacking, and I think they sent an overwhelming mandate to this company."

The National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency that supervised the secret-ballot vote, will review the result. If confirmed, the Monmouth Junction employees would represented by Hazlet-based Local 469 of the Utility & Transportation Contractors Association.

Employees and union officials will discuss which concerns and issues they want addressed prior to any formal contract negotiations with First Student, Emmick said.

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