Union employees are fighting the effort in favor of better benefits and working conditions, as well as keeping public costs down

Kewanna Battle Mason has worked for the privately operated bus service, the DC Circulator, in Washington DC for 10 years. But she has campaigned as a union activist against any attempt to privatize the capital’s giant public transit system – even after she suffered a stroke last year. After all, she believes life is much better for transit workers outside the private sector.

“We want to be city-owned, have city benefits, in the long term, not just by contract. You can’t have that with these contractors,” she said. “We should be a city-owned company, we provide a city-owned service.”

The fight over who owns and runs public transit in Washington DC has been a long struggle that has seen an ebb and flow of privatization efforts in the fourth largest public transit system in the United States. In the 1970s, the capital’s Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) took over private bus operations in the wake of rampant abuses and safety issues caused by private contractors.

But now WMATA has increasingly shifted back toward favoring privatisation of some of its operations. In August, WMATA’s Metro Bus entered its first contract under a private contractor; a five-year, $89m contract with TransDev, a French-based transportation company. Union members opposed the deal, and fear it could pave the way to further privatization.

WMATA is also looking to make its Silver Line extension the first subway line in the United States to be under a private contract. The line is currently considering proposals from private contractors to operate and maintain the six-station line scheduled to open in 2020.

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These contracts with private corporations come at a cost to the public, argue drivers and labor organizers fighting to keep the DC transit system public.

Within WMATA’s MetroAccess Paratransit service – which helps disabled people access a shared-ride service – drivers cite high employee turnover, forced overtime hours and lower benefits after it became one of the first operations to come under private contract.

“They just keep hiring because they keep firing. They can’t keep anybody,” said Kimberly Wilson Lynch, a MetroAccess Paratransit driver for six years.

According to a WMATA spokesperson, turnover in 2017 for MetroAccess drivers was between 8% and 13%.

Drivers are scheduled to work in 12-hour shifts, but Lynch noted she often goes beyond that time, sometimes up to 16 hours in a single shift.

“You get an hour break, and we’re supposed to get two 15-minute breaks, which we don’t get,” she said. Lynch also explained drivers have to call in to ask permission to stop to use the bathroom during their shift, which dispatch frequently won’t authorize.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘The way they treat the drivers is unbelievable,’ said Genoa Greene, a MetroAccess Paratransit driver. Photograph: The Guardian

“The way they treat the drivers is unbelievable,” said Genoa Greene, a MetroAccess Paratransit driver for 12 years. As a union steward, Greene explained she often has to fight wrongful terminations of drivers, and drivers often work sick due to only receiving two days of sick leave per year.

Greene noted riders are negatively affected by how the private contractor runs the paratransit service. According to Greene, clients are often still scheduled for rides after death, or wrongly listed as using a wheelchair because it is profitable for the private contractor. “I go to this client’s home. The wife was livid. I go knock on the door. She said the client has been dead for five years,” Greene recounted.

A WMATA spokesperson told the Guardian in an email: “Metro is committed to ensuring the best possible paratransit service for our MetroAccess customers, something we enforce through rigorous standards, including those related to safety, performance, and efficiency, outlined in each contract.



“We use contractors to facilitate the scheduling and delivery of trips on MetroAccess, but maintain full oversight and responsibility to ensure our providers adhere to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for all aspects of MetroAccess service.”



TransDev did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

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Private contractors have won contracts from WMATA under promises of saving money. But unions claim the contracts result in lower wages for workers and poor maintenance of the transit system. They also point to service cuts in communities where the ridership is predominantly people of color from a low-income background.

“We got involved in the transit fight because it was wrong on so many levels. It was an attack on the livelihood of middle-class folks, in particular, black middle class because the majority of the drivers are African American,” said the Rev Lionel Edmonds, a pastor at Mount Lebanon Baptist church and co-founder of the Washington Interfaith Network.

“Most of the lines being talked about cutting are in poor areas,” added Edmonds. “They say it’s going to make the city better but they never say who it’s going to hurt.”

Some religious leaders were inspired to action after bus routes in their communities were slated for cuts.

In suburban Vienna, Virginia, a bus line was cut that served hundreds of low-incoming housing units. “This bus route was the only way for them to get groceries, get to work. So I started meeting with parents. I had moms walking four miles round trip just to get to the grocery store,” said the Rev Austen Almaguer from Vienna Baptist church.

That bus route is still in the process of being revived after Almaguer’s congregation gathered hundreds of public comments and met with Fairfax county department of traffic officials, but a temporary service was put in place in the meantime.

Marjorie Green from St Mary’s Episcopal church in Arlington, Virginia, was also outraged after drastic bus route cuts were proposed in her community. “I think we as a society, especially from the nation’s capital, do we want to live in an area where we would inflict this kind of pain on people?” she said.