City claims stalled contract talks factor in transit woes

The City of Saskatoon is warning that service problems with public transit may continue until an agreement is reached with the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU).

In a transit update, posted on-line, City Hall suggested that stalled contract talks with the ATU have created “uncertainty and anxiety” in the workplace, and that this “affects customer service.”

ATU President Jim Yakubowski said the city's message is disappointing.

"There's nothing further from the truth," Yakubowski said. "When our members are cancelling vacations and working overtime to try and get buses fixed, as many as possible, and then to be insinuated publicly that we're somehow to blame for this fact, that they don't have enough buses on the road, is just truly disappointing.

"This is an effort to deflect all the blame directly onto the backs of our ATU members who have been working diligently through this, even though we have still yet to conclude bargaining," he said.

Saskatoon Transit has been slowed due to a mechanical backlog that has forced a number of buses off the road. That forced transit to cancel a number of routes to high schools and to the University of Saskatchewan.

Meanwhile, the City of Saskatoon's director of human resources Marno McInnes said the transit update was never meant to target workers, or infer that they were to blame for the slowdown.

However, McInnes said recent labour trouble has meant it's been difficult to recruit new workers.

"We've had some of the challenges associated with using 2012 wage rates in order to attract people to fill jobs," he said. "And some of those lagging issues are difficult."

Saskatoon Transit is now waiting for some old refurbished buses to arrive to prop up the city’s ailing fleet. In its latest update, the city noted that three additional buses are back on the road, and that the customer service centre has not been flooded with calls.

Yakubowski said ATU members are committed to the best level of service to the citizens and said the city is the one who failed.

At the same time, there have been numerous notices this week on Twitter that buses on some routes were filled to capacity and would no longer be able to pick up passengers.  The city’s update also noted that some passengers did have to wait for the next bus, sometimes as long as 30 minutes.

The update also said that citizens have every right to be frustrated with the lack of full transit service, and that City Hall shares that frustration.