By Susan Todd
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Published: December 29, 2007
Union leaders for some 7,000 custodians who clean hundreds of buildings across the state announced an agreement yesterday on a four-year contract that creates more full-time jobs and provides expanded health-care and wage benefits.
"This new contract moves New Jersey office cleaners closer to the American dream," said Kevin Brown, the state director of Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union.
On Thursday, about 200 union members rallied outside Newark's Penn Station, drawing attention to the impending contract deadline. The union had authorized a strike if an agreement was not reached by midnight Monday.
Under the terms of the agreement, custodians working at buildings larger than 400,000 square feet will be provided full employer-paid family-health coverage by the end of the four-year contract. The provision effects roughly 1,500 office cleaners and their families, many of whom were previously without health insurance or covered by state-funded health care.
The majority of office cleaners will reach a wage of $12 an hour -- an increase of as much as 22 percent in some cases -- over the course of the new contract. Part-time workers also won health benefit improvements, including a prescription drug benefit, the union said.
The union struck the tentative deal with a negotiating team representing building cleaning contractors. A spokesman for the negotiating team could not be reached for comment.
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