Elected BRU representative Manuel Criollo is interviewed at a BRU demonstration at the L.A. County Board of Supervisors regarding the MTA's reasons for refusing to settle the present Los Angeles bus strike, the impact of the strike on riders, the demand of the BRU for an elected MTA Board, and what concerned members of the community can do to force the MTA back to the bargaining table.

Following this interview, bus riders entered the building and demanded to speak with Supervisor Zev Yaroslavky, the intransigent chair of the MTA Board. Yaroslavsky refused to meet with the riders, who then occupied the entrance to the building for more than an hour while chanting demands that Yaroslavsky settle the strike.

Running time: 6:04. Chanting Bus Riders can be heard in the background.

This content was posted by the person who created it, and permission is hereby granted to all to redistribute and/or broadcast this content, in whole or in part, without charge and without credit to the author. You may contact the author at brusupporter@moraluniverse.org for further information, but this is not required.

error

error

error

and pathetic.

Why not go demonstrate in front of the Mechanic's union headquarters? They don't seem to want to settle this either. It's not only up to Zaroslavsky.

The Bus Riders Union simply is a shill for the Amalgamated Transit Union. BRU does not care if MTA has NO money to give a $100 million increase to the ATU. BRU has a lot of brainless ideas that they
keep pushing. Settlling a strike without respecting the cost to the taxpayers is the hight of irresponsibility.

The ATU could simply go back to work and allow the bus service to continue while they work our their differences with the MTA. Of course the ATU and the BRU decided to screw the public and remove service.

Eric and Lian Mann, the Legal Owners of the BRU make over $320,000 per year, while their organizers all make close to $20,000 per year. The Mann's should chip in all their excess income to the ATU to settle the strike.

It appears now that MTA is going to return bus service to the streets with the money they don't have to waste on the ATU. What is best is that the service is free.

MTA might just show the unconscious ATU that others
can provide bus service that is just as good or better than the ATU or BRU has ever done. And FREE.

!!!

The BRU is just a eric man thing he doesnt
care about the MTA the BRU thinks MTA can get rid of rail and only provide Bus services ONLY -plus
they always mislead the media. they never give the
full truth to the media and I witness proof of this
at one time MTA switch to sticker for their disable riders
of course the BRU came and told the media
that OH MTA doesnt care for their disable riders
as MTA is NO LONGER SELLING PASSES FOR THEIR
DISABALE RIDERS (when all MTA did was switch to
stickers for their disable riders to place on their
disable ID cards!
to me BRU really stand for
B-Bullshit
R=RIDCOULUS
U=UNGRATEFULY

Regarding why Yaroslavsky was the target:

As mentioned in the interview, the amount of money in dispute was tiny compared to the MTA's overall budget, and certainly compared to its budget for train construction and operation. By refusing to settle this strike the MTA was saving itself a million dollars per day that would have gone to operate buses, and they can funnel that money into rail construction, awarding contracts to their political contributors and supporters. So where is the downside for them if the public is not aware and mobilized? It also serves the MTA to discourage ridership, which an interruption of service accomplishes with a vengeance, because the fewer people there are using the bus system the less money they have to spend to operate and maintain it. That is why Yaroslavsky was targeted - he was the sticking point. The union was already strongly motivated to settle in order to get back to work before money and strike pay ran out.

Regarding the second comment :

The MTA is only short of money because it has spent money on extremely inefficient train systems while neglecting the much more cost-effective bus system that serves 93 percent of its ridership. BRU has consistently demanded the shifting of funds from trains to buses for that reason. They have had a lot of success in pushing those demands and that is why the bus system is still hanging together today.

You're saying that the union should go back to work while negotiating, and so evidently it has failed to register that the strike occurred as a result of a breakdown of negotiations. Since withholding labor is one of the few effective weapons that workers have your suggestion amounts to telling the union that it should concede. This is just an anti-labor attitude rather than a reasoned argument.

I have no idea how much money Eric and Lian Mann make but if you look at the pictures accompanying this article you will see that the BRU consists primarily of poor people who depend upon the bus system to survive. Your attempt to distract attention from that fact by making unsupported claims about Eric Mann implies that poor people of color are not capable of thinking for themselves and standing up for their rights - otherwise why would Eric Mann be such a focal point for you? If you had any direct experience with the BRU you would be forced to re-think that and might even find that racist and classist assumptions were the underlying cause of that attitude. Especially telling is your remark that Eric and Lian are the "owners" of the BRU, which is a democratic organization that elects its own governing body each year. There *are* poor people of color in this world *without* white "owners" in case that fact has not yet reached your particular corner of the world.

Finally, the ATU and BRU are not reponsible for providing bus service - the MTA is. We, the taxpayers pay for this to happen. Bus service is accomplished through public subsidies because mass transportation is a public good. The MTA is responsible for ensuring that the money we have all paid through our sales and other taxes is used to create a functioning transportation system. Their lack of interest in settling this strike showed a tremendous delinquency in the carrying out of that public trust.

I believe I have already answered the issues raised in Mark Panitz' comment except for the unsupported attacks at the end which appear to reflect a general hostility and which are irrelevant to the question at hand.