All garbage cans in the City of Los Angeles have been emptied, some several days late, after about 60 percent of the unionized garbage collectors stayed away from their job for two days in a labor dispute last week, the city said Sunday.
The backlog of trash had all been hauled away late Saturday, said Bureau of Sanitation spokeswoman Tonya Durrell. “We concentrated on the black bins fist,” she told City News Service.
All types of bins — blue, black, brown and green — had been emptied by the end of the day Saturday, some up to 24 hours late, Durrell said. The city worked to clear a backlog from the two-day job action Wednesday and Thursday.
The union that represents about 10,000 Los Angeles city workers — including trash truck drivers, tree-trimmers and street repair crews — disavowed any hint of an organized action. The trash driver work stoppage was “not a union-sanctioned activity,” said Coral Itzcalli, spokeswoman for SEIU Local 721.
“If there’s something happening today, it’s news to me,” Itzcalli told City News Service Friday.
But the job action came the day after the union members began voting on whether they will go on strike, should negoitiations with the City of Los Angeles collapse. Itzcalli declined to say when the voting would be completed.
‘Workers are extremely frustrated because of the lack of movement at the bargaining table,” Itzcalli told City News Service on Wednesday.
Mayor Eric Garcetti had criticized the sanitation workers’ action, saying that “the (negotiating) table is the best place to resolve any grievances you have.”
An estimated 90 percent of Los Angeles sanitation drivers were on the job Friday, playing catch-up in collecting trash left over the prior two days by drivers who skipped work out of frustration at stalled contract talks between their union and the city.
On Wednesday, only about 40 percent of the city’s 500 sanitation workers reported for duty, creating a backup of trash containers throughout the city, officials with the city’s Bureau of Sanitation said.
The number back on the job rose to about 80 percent Thursday, with workers concentrating on first picking up black waste containers holding solid waste.
— City News Service