(The following story by Keith Laing appeared on The Herald Tribune website on December 2, 2009.)
SARASOTA, Fla. — House leaders on Wednesday appeared unwilling to address concerns about passenger rail legislation raised by a major union, even as they acknowledged that labor’s concerns could fracture the tenuous coalition supporting the train deal before the special session leaves the station.
The 500,000 member AFL-CIO has labeled the special session “a union-busting” effort and vowed to block attempts to approve the 61-mile central Florida commuter rail known as SunRail.
But speaking with reporters Wednesday in advance of the special session slated to start Thursday, House Speaker Larry Cretul said that he did not know if the labor tiff would tip the vote balance against the rail bill in the Senate, a chamber that narrowly voted down the plan last year.
“Certainly there have been some issues raised by labor,” Cretul said after being asked if the Senate would again derail the SunRail bill if labor’s concerns are ignored. “I don’t know. That’s a Senate issue. We’re working the House side.”
Supporters of the SunRail bill have always counted on some of the 14 Senate Democrats signing onto the plan to compensate for staunch fiscal conservatives in the 26 member Republican caucus who will not get on board. But several Democrats have long appeared hesitant without union approval.
Lawmakers are hoping approving a rail bill will convince federal officials to approve the state’s $2.5 billion application for the first leg of the long proposed Tampa-Orlando-Miami bullet train. The proposal on the special session agenda allows for the development of central Florida’s SunRail, provides funding for south Florida’s Tri-Rail and creates a statewide rail panel.
The state also has separate stimulus applications in for $70 million for Atlantic Coast Amtrak passenger service between Jacksonville and Miami and $432 million for buying tracks for SunRail from CSX Corp., all of which would come with strings attached protecting labor unions.
But the House sponsor the bill that will be taken up Thursday appeared to be taking a hard line on the labor issue.
“We’re talking about one particular union – the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen,” Rep. Gary Aubuchon said. “They state there are six to eight workers in central Florida whose job as signalmen would be at risk. If the agreement goes through and FDOT is responsible for operating the commuter rail portion, the responsibility for signalmen would be put out for competitive bid, as we competively bid everything.”
Aubuchon, R-Cape Coral, said that the union members would be given the choice to take other Florida jobs with CSX Corp., which owns the tracks that SunRail would run on. If they chose not to transfer to other jobs, he added, they would be given six years severance pay and if they accept jobs with other companies, they could return to CSX within a year and not lose their seniority.
“In this environment, with over a million Floridians out of work, how many got that opportunity?” he said. “Nothing prohibits union workers and union companies from bidding. What this does is it doesn’t guarantee. In this environment, I still find it remarkable…that somebody would want a guarantee that they would keep their job in perpetuity.”
Aubuchon would not say the union protection language was a deal breaker, though there were newspaper reports Wednesday that several Senate Democrats who had pledged to support the plan indicated it might be.
“I’m not going to pre-suppose whether something is a deal breaker or not,” he said. “We’ll have to see how this thing shakes out … the next three days. We’ll have to see how that whole situation evolves. Last year that was a condition that caused problems in the Senate, and ultimately it didn’t pass. I can’t speak for where the Senate is today. The House has been where the House has been for the last two years on that issue.”
A spokesman for the House Democratic Caucus said that its members had been hearing from the AFL-CIO that significantly higher numbers of jobs could be affected by the rail bill – the union said nearly 1,000 could be impacted earlier this week – and the Democrats were listening.
“A goodly number of our caucus members are going to be very sensitive to those arguments,” Florida House Democratic spokesman Mark Hollis told the News Service. “I fully expect amendments, if they’re not able to be offered in committee, to be offered on the floor. Several of our members have indicated that they’re meeting with labor about appropriate amendments to be filed.”
But Hollis said it was unlikely, in the House at least, that the Democrats will put the brakes on the rail legislation en masse.
“No one has postured themselves to be completely against this,” he said. “It is unlikely to be a caucus-type position. This is one of those things that goes far beyond any type of partisanship.”
With their hard-line stance on the labor issue, Cretul and Aubuchon appeared Wednesday at least to be counting on Democrats in the House and Senate taking the long view on the rail legislation and not getting too bogged down in the details to reach the end of the line.
“I don’t know if any of you have had the opportunity to ride a high speed rail anywhere,” Cretul said. “I had the opportunity once and let me tell you, it’s good. The opportunity in the future whether its high speed, whether its commuter, whether its connecting the northern Florida to the southern part of Florida or the east or the west coast, the time is probably the best its ever been.”