60 Workers at New York Public Library AFSCME DC 37 Awarded $200,000

Sixty workers at the New York Public Library were awarded a total of $200,000 in retroactive Sunday overtime pay under a July arbitration ruling.

The arbitrator ordered the library to reinstate its longtime practice of premium pay for voluntary overtime work on Sundays and give the affected members back pay from Aug. 1, 2010, when the union filed the grievance, to July 19, the date of the decision.

The dispute erupted in the summer of 2010 when the library reneged on its commitment to resume paying workers overtime on Sundays, even if they did not work 40 hours during the week. Local 1930 had agreed to a temporary deferral of the practice earlier that year as the library claimed to face a cash shortage as well as deep budget cuts in the coming fiscal year.

After the library refused to reinstate the practice, the union filed a group grievance.

Local 1930 President Valentin Colon, retired member Irene Pietraszeski and Library Technical Aide 2 Lillian Cohen, the LTA rep on the local's executive board, testified at the arbitration hearing. Cohen explained that she relied on the extra pay to cover the educational expenses of her son, Cedric Bolden, who is studying business administration at Bronx Community College. Former Council Rep Lisa Riccio gathered information for the grievance.

DC 37 Sr. Assistant General Counsel Steven Sykes argued the union's case that the Sunday premium pay was an established past practice that the library was obligated to continue. The Sunday premium pay is not guaranteed under the local's contract with the library, but, Sykes explained, once an employer follows such a policy for a long time, it becomes a binding "past practice"-just as binding as contractual benefits.

"For the members it was a slap in the face that management decided to deny the overtime pay after they sacrificed to help out the library in a budget crisis," Riccio said.

Colon praised the members' patience as the dispute dragged on, noting that they had continued to work Sundays without the overtime pay because of their commitment to their jobs and confidence that they would eventually be properly compensated.

"It's great," Cohen said of the arbitration ruling. "Times are bad. So people really felt the loss of the extra pay."