After layoffs of more than 1,000 Chicago Transportation Authority workers, Amalgamated Transit Union Locals 241 and 308 are proposing concessions instead of layoffs to close the $95 million budget gap for the CTA. The Craft Coalition, which represents maintenance workers has already agreed to give concessions and return to work next week. Officials are hopeful that the larger unions will follow this path, but the union leaders say that they need some assurances that this sort of mass layoffs will not happen in the same way again. Conditions fr CTA passengers could worsen, however, with a major snowstorm expected to hit.
See "'No major delays' after first day of cuts, CTA says", Kim Janssen, Chicago Sun Times, February 8, 2010