CWA State Workers Strike Tentative Deal with Gov. Christie

In a fight with the most anti-union governor in their history of their contract, CWA New Jersey state workers successfully preserved the integrity and enforceability of decades of collective bargaining.

During the year-long negotiations, CWA — representing about 60,000 public workers statewide — boldly withstood a barrage of attacks at the bargaining table and struck a tentative deal, which now must be ratified by CWA members. Republican Gov. Chris Christie's administration had sought more than 90 concessions from the union, eliminating significant chunks of their agreement.

"It is a lean economic agreement in lean times, but it is a robust agreement when it comes to collective bargaining, enforceability, and unity," the bargaining team wrote in a letter to members.

"As you will see, when you read over the final bargaining report, we did not allow the administration to divide us between those earning below $55,000 and those earning above, or between those who work at state colleges and those who don't, or between intermittent workers and full time workers. As you will see, we stood up to all of the worst language demands and did not allow the administration to cover our contract with 'for information purposes only' or whether or not something is left to the 'discretion' of management or the governor. A contract is a contract and Governor Christie knows what every other governor before him has learned: With CWA, if we make a deal, we will live up to it and when you make a deal, we will insist that you live up to it too."

In the beginning, the governor came into negotiations demanding a 3.5 percent rollback in salary and the elimination of all annual step increases and no across the board increases for the life of the contract.

By the end of the negotiations, CWA achieved the continuation of all annual step increases, as well as small, additional across-the-board increases in the third and fourth year of the agreement.

CWA members have been working without a contract since July 1.