As an LIRR strike nears, here we go again

‘The strike is over. Long live the next strike.”

That’s what the Newsday editorial board said in 1994, after then-Gov. Mario Cuomo intervened to end the last work stoppage on the Long Island Rail Road, the nation’s largest commuter rail. That strike lasted for two days.

The board knew then what has become painfully clear now: Each time LIRR workers go on strike, and each time that strike is resolved by giving the unions what they want, the potential for a future strike looms even larger. No governor has been willing to endure the political pain of a strike, especially when legacy federal law permits the labor action.

So, here we are again — just days away from another crippling shutdown of the public transit lifeline between Long Island and New York City. If the five LIRR unions, representing less than half of all railroad workers, go on strike, it will adversely impact hundreds of thousands of Long Island commuters, businesses and the region’s economy.

We’ve said it again, and again, and again, every time there’s the threat of a work stoppage.

“This is a strike against the public interest,” the editorial board said in 1960.

“Here we are again . . . and the consequences are predictably devastating,” the board wrote in 1987.

NEW FACES, SAME ISSUES

While the names and the faces in Albany, and at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and its unions have changed, many of the broad issues — primarily salary increases and the efforts to eliminate costly work rules — are the same. And the potential consequences are the same, too.

Last week, the unions and the MTA started talking again, with the participation of the National Mediation Board. Unfortunately, an agreement remained elusive. Making matters worse, union officials seem tone deaf to the concerns of riders rather than doing whatever it takes to find a compromise.

With just six days to go, this is a pivotal moment. More than half of the railroad’s workers have already reached agreements, but these holdouts refuse to agree to the same terms. If those five remaining unions get sweeter deals, all others — including NYC subway workers who’ve just begun their own negotiations — are going to want the same, ratcheting up the cost and impact.

The MTA and the remaining unions have agreed on terms for the first three years of a contract and the MTA has agreed to the notion of a fourth year. That’s where the disagreements begin. Union representatives want a 5% raise in that fourth year, without agreeing to any changes to lucrative but antiquated work rules. The MTA has offered a 3% raise, or more if work rules are on the table. Union officials told the editorial board that last week, the authority offered an alternative scenario: the 3% raise, plus a lump-sum payment. That idea, one union official said Friday, “does not get this across the finish line.”

The notion of a lump-sum payment could move the immediate conversation away from addressing problematic out-of-date practices that must not be ignored. In 1945, the editorial board noted that work rules were a factor when a prior strike was settled. More than 80 years later, work rules — albeit different ones — are still at issue, as the unions are hanging on to rules that make no sense in 2026.

The most egregious example: Locomotive engineers still get an extra day’s pay for flipping a switch on trains that operate on both diesel and electric power. In some circumstances, they then can receive another day’s pay for moving a train to the railyard. That’s three days of pay for one day’s work.

COSTLY WORK RULES

Changing such old, unnecessary and costly rules must be on the table now and in the future. If they’re not, union officials shouldn’t expect the pay bumps they seek. An alternative lump-sum payment is more than fair. Taxpayers and riders must come first.

Nonetheless, even the threat of a strike has in the past led governors, including most recently former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in 2014, to avoid the political costs and cave to union demands to avoid a stoppage. Especially in an election year, Gov. Kathy Hochul clearly will want to avoid one, too. She previously has voiced support for the MTA; she must stay strong.

The only reason we’re in this predicament — again — is because the LIRR unfortunately falls under the federal Railway Labor Act, which allows for strikes when disputes can’t be resolved. New York’s Taylor Law does not allow for such strikes.

The century-old Railway Labor Act was initially established to cover labor relations for interstate rail and the airline industry. The LIRR has been a part of that federal law dating back to when it was owned by the private Pennsylvania Railroad, before the MTA’s control. The LIRR isn’t alone; other commuter rails like NJ Transit fall under the federal law, too, resulting in a damaging three-day strike just last year.

In contrast, the Taylor Law, which governs labor relations for most other public employees in New York, including New York City Transit workers, prohibits those workers from going on strike. It provides a variety of superior pathways to resolve labor disputes, including mediation, fact-finding and arbitration.

For more than a half-century the Newsday editorial board has called for the LIRR to fall under state law, rather than federal jurisdiction. This latest strike threat, which does nothing to help most LIRR workers, since they don’t fall within these five unions, and only harms Long Island residents, should be the alarm our congressional representatives need to hear.

Only then could Long Islanders stop worrying about the “next strike.”