New York City Postpones Layoffs for 22,000 Workers
Union leaders urged Mayor Bill de Blasio to postpone the job cuts to allow more time to find alternative cost-saving measures
New York City will delay sending layoff notifications to 22,000 government workers, officials said Monday, after union leaders urged Mayor Bill de Blasio to postpone the job cuts to allow more time to find alternative cost-saving measures.
Workers across all city agencies were expected to be notified Monday if they would be laid off by Oct. 1. The layoffs are considered a last-resort option by the city, which faces a financial crisis brought on by the new coronavirus pandemic.
The city needs to balance a $9 billion deficit over the next two years. It also has to fill a $1 billion labor gap in its budget for the current fiscal year, and $4.2 billion for next fiscal year, according to officials.
“Unions are working hard to find creative solutions, and asked for more time,” mayoral spokesman Bill Neidhardt said in a statement about the postponement. He didn’t say when the layoff notifications would be sent to workers.
As an alternative to layoffs, Mr. de Blasio has asked the state legislature to grant the city the power to borrow $5 billion, but Democrats who control the state Senate have so far objected. New York City council members and union leaders have recently joined the mayor in his push for borrowing authority.
“To stop these layoffs altogether, there is a simple solution: long-term borrowing,” Mr. Neidhardt said.
The city, which has a workforce of nearly 325,000 employees, is required to provide a 30-day notice to employees who are in danger of losing their jobs.
Labor leaders had urged the city to delay the process as they continued to negotiate with the city on ways to save money within their contracts. They said their workers were on the front lines during the pandemic, and have framed their opposition to the layoffs in moral terms.
“If we’re going to get together and go through the most difficult things to be done, you can’t do it under the threat of layoffs,” Henry Garrido, the executive director of District Council 37, the city’s largest public-employee union, said in an interview last week.
Good-government groups have said some of the layoffs could be avoided if the city shifts more health-care costs to unionized city employees, or by initiating retirement for some of the city’s workforce.