BART Strike Ends Temporarily: Service Began After Urged by Gov.

By Jobs & Hire Staff Reporter | Jul 05, 2013 10:39 PM EDT

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Residents at Los Angeles were relieved today of the crazy transportation phenomenon; however, the BART Strike might still resume in later August.

The management and the unions reached an temporary agreement late into the night on Thursday due to the pressure by Gov. Jerry Brown's secretary of labor. The new deal agreed for the workers to temporarily resume their work for 30 days, with the same contract that had expired almost a week ago.

"If they don't come back to the table, there's going to be a problem," Antonette Bryant, the president of the Amalgamated Transit Union, noted.

The workers had returned to work on Friday at 3pm to begin providing service to the 200,000 people who depend on the BART every day.

The two sides of the argument remained distant and still lacking much compromise. ATU president Byrant is exclaiming the union strikers' strong resolve against BART's treatment to the workers.

The 30-day temporary agreement allows the mediators sent by Gov. Jerry Brown to decide the schedules to meet, and also promises that union leaders who negotiate will be allowed to participate in those meetings as paid time.

Bryant however claims that the union members are returning to work due to their care for the suffering public and not because they were giving up their resolve due to the lack of compensation.

He claims that if a deal is reached, any pay increases, pension, and health care benefits should be retroactive to July 1, 2013.

Many commuters are claiming that the strike was almost costing them their jobs. "I almost lost my job. It was an extreme inconvenience," Oakland chef Lucas Gorman said as he spent the whole week begging his friends for rides.

A Standford labor law professor, William Gould, said: "I think the unions calculated wisely that a stoppage of greater duration would antagonize the public and probably they would be the object of the public's ire."

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