Mark Hancock, the national president of CUPE has called on Mayor Don Scott and council to force Wood Buffalo Housing (WBH) back to the bargaining table.
WBH issued a lockout notice on May 6, forcing all 46 of its employees to the picket lines.
Henry Hunter, president and CEO of WBH said in a statement that getting mayor and council involved won’t help move the matter forward.
“We have always been willing to get back to the table with the union to negotiate and have been trying to do that since we initiated bargaining last October. Unfortunately, to date, they haven’t put forward any ideas on how to reduce our deficit and that is why we are here now at the lockout. If they want to get back to the table now and start negotiating and putting forward ideas, then we welcome that opportunity.”
Hunter said the mandate of the non-profit is to become financially sustainable and to eliminate the projected deficit of nearly $1.5 million by 2020.
He said the new business model would help to eliminate that deficit.
He notes that rental rates have dropped from over $2000 for a single bedroom apartment to between $1100 and $1300 causing revenue to drop below expenses.
In a statement, Hunter said the workload “peaks and valleys” and that local contractors have been used previously for what he calls “a maintenance backlog.”
“We can never tell any day how many work orders we get in. So, with contractors we can ramp up and we can ramp down quite quickly. That gives us a lot of flexibility that we don’t have now because we have permanent employees and we obviously want to try to keep them as busy as possible.”
Hunter said while the negotiations continue, management is doing administration work and local contractors are being used to maintain the properties.
Meanwhile Lou Arab, communications representative with CUPE said that they have other ideas to save almost $1 million a year.
“We are suggesting that council, who appoints several members of the board of WBH, exert some influence over their appointees and ask them, in the interest of the community to make every effort to resolve this lockout.”
Arab said WBH has been unwilling to listen to proposals brought forward by the union.
He referred to the contractors as “fly-by-night”, which Hunter insisted is inaccurate, explaining that they’d use contractors who live and work in the community.
When asked if this changes CUPE’s opinion on the situation, Arab said the company being used isn’t local as they bring in contractors from out of town.
