‘The strike is over’: Workers’ union reaches tentative deal with city of Philadelphia; trash pickup to resume Monday

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“The work stoppage involving District Council 33 and the City of Philadelphia is OVER,” Mayor Cherelle Parker announced on social media early Wednesday morning.

A marathon negotiation session Tuesday between the city and its blue collar workers’ union responsible for trash pickup and other duties around the city has resulted in a tentative contract agreement.

Greg Boulware, president of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 33, was exhausted after the 12-hour negotiation session and said they did what they had to do.

“There’s a lot of factors involved in what was going on and we ultimately did what we thought was in the best interest of all of our membership,” Boulware said.

The deal appears to be a complete win for the city because it got just about everything Parker wanted with a 3% raise in each of the three years of the deal. It’s a deal the Parker administration is calling “historic.”

When adding in the 5% increase the city agreed to last year to extend DC33’s contract by one year, the increase for the union over Parker’s four-year term will total more than 14%. Workers will also get a $1,500 signing bonus. The increase is still well below the 32% total pay increase the union was fighting for.

Parker didn’t declare victory in a Wednesday morning news conference at City Hall, but she congratulated her team, saying they did what she wanted to do when she took over the city.

“I understood when I ran for mayor I needed a team around me and I needed them to go to war with the status quo,” Parker said.

Chief Deputy Mayor Sincere Harris said now is a time of healing for the city.

“There is no winning when there is a strike,” she said. “The city of Philadelphia doesn’t win, the members of District Council 33 and their employees don’t win, and most importantly the residents and the citizens of Philadelphia do not win.”

“Your union stood up and fought for you and we did the best we can with the circumstances we had in front of us,” Boulware said.

Those circumstances include workers expecting to miss a paycheck Thursday.

Union officials have told workers to return to the job pending a ratification vote.

Nine thousand union members went on strike July 1. The strike has resulted in massive piles of trash piling up on city streets and around trash drop-off sites designated by the city.

The strike also resulted in changes to the city’s annual Fourth of July concert, with headliner LL Cool J and city native Jazmine Sullivan both dropping out.

When does curbside pickup resume?

Even though the strike is tentatively over, the city won’t be ready for curbside pickup until Monday, according to Carlton Williams, director of the city’s Clean and Green initiative.

“We are in the process of transitioning back to a normal collection process,” Williams said. “We’re asking residents for just a little bit more patience as we get back to a normal schedule.”

Over the next few days, sanitation workers will clean up all the temporary dumpsites where residents dropped off their trash during the strike. Williams added people should stop dumping their bags at the more than 60 locations.

“In the meantime, we know that message won’t reach everyone, so we will have round the clock staff with compactors again with city forces so that any trash brought to those locations is removed immediately,” he said. “We will be continuing cleaning efforts at those locations.”

The sites will be monitored by video cameras, with fines of up to $5,000 issued for people dumping at the locations.

The city’s six sanitation convenience centers will be running with extended hours through Friday from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. After that, they’ll return to regular hours from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.