Vincent D'Onofrio and wife attend Bpeace 10th Anniversary gala celebration

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BY Danielle Kimiatek
 April 23rd, 2013  Leave a comment

Law and Order: Criminal Intent’s Vincent D’Onofrio and his wife Carin van der Donk with Sandy DiPasqua and Pat Bates
(Photo Credit: New York City Photography)

Last week I had the pleasure of attending Business Council For Peace’s (Bpeace)‘s tenth anniversary gala celebration atThe Ritz-Carlton New York, Battery Park. The evening was filled with delectable hors d’oeuvres, free-flowing drinks and a live and silent auction that included everything from a luxury, all-inclusive Cancun vacation to a Stuart Weitzman Shoe Wardrobe.

The anniversary gala marks ten years of Bpeace creating employment in conflicted countries including Afghanistan, El Salvador and Rwanda. The honorees of the evening included the U.S. Department of State, UN Women and founder of dressbarn Roslyn Jaffe.

The Late Show with David Letterman’s Alan Kalter and his wife Peggy arrive at the Bpeace (Business Council for Peace) 10th anniversary Gala at the Ritz-Carlton New York, Battery Park (Photo Credit: Jim Powell)

The evening was a success with over 300 people in attendance. Celebrity auctioneer Alan Kalter raised more than $105,000 in fifteen minutes from the organization’s loyal supporters.

Since 2002, Bpeace’s coalition of business volunteers, host companies, and donors have aligned behind the belief that creating jobs creates peace. The organization works with entrepreneurs in conflict-affected countries to scale their businesses, create significant employment for all, and expand the economic power of women.

'School Bus Drivers Gearing Up for Planned Strike'

NEW YORK CITY — Thousands of school bus drivers were preparing to report to picket lines Wednesday morning, as both sides continued to dig in their heels hours before a threatened strike that would leave 150,000 students without rides.

DNAINFO.COM

A day after a press conference announcing their plans, Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1181 president Michael Cordiello said it members still intend to strike, beginning at 6 a.m.

“The administration has still made no attempt to come to the table,” Cordiello told reporters during an afternoon conference call.

“We tried every option to avoid a strike, but our members feel their back is to the wall."

Instead of boarding buses, the drivers and matrons represented by the union intend to gather at bus depots to picket what they argue is an attempt by the Bloomberg administration to strip employee protections they say ensure experienced drivers don't get pushed out.

The strike, which has been threatened for weeks, stems from the Department of Education's decision to bid out new driver contracts for the first time in 33 years on 1,100 bus routes for children with special needs.

The city's busing costs have spiked from $71 million in 1979 to $1.1 billion today, according to the DOE, which argues the approximately $6,900 per student could be better spent in the classroom.

But the union is furious the new contracts would eliminate guaranteed job protections for their 7,700 existing workers — protections city officials insist they are legally barred from offering, because of a previous court ruling.

The union, however, disagrees, and says it plans to strike until the administration changes its tune.

Leaders have declined to say how long the strike could last, but noted the last strike lasted 14 weeks.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg reacted to Monday's threatened strike with outrage, calling it "irresponsible and misguided."

“With its regrettable decision to strike, the union is abandoning 152,000 students and their families who rely on school bus service each day," he said in a statement, noting that the city is now beginning to put contingency plans in place.

School bus companies have also spoken out against the strike, which they claim isn't fair because drivers work for them — not the city.

The New York City School Bus Contractors Coalition called the ATU strike "an unlawful secondary strike" and said Monday it would unfair labor practice charges.

The impending strike has left parents across the city scrambling to figure out how to get their children to school.

Already, many have been keeping their kids home from school this week for fear of a mid-day strike, said Sarah Valeri, an art therapist at the Jewish Guild for the Blind where she works with special education students who are transported by DOE buses.

Administrators there are expecting no more than ten kids to attend classes tomorrow out of a class of 50, she said.

"I know it's going to be a huge difficulty for parents," she said.

Carin van der Donk, a parent and founder of Common Sense Busing, said she and others parents had been communicating via a giant email chain, trying to work out a carpooling plan.

“It is going be intense," she said. "There’s a lot of people trying to figure out if they can get a couple hours off from work in the morning."

Read more: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20130115/new-york-city/school-bus-drivers-gearing-up-for-planned-strike#ixzz2IEx2olJU

NYC School Bus Strike Imminent

NEW YORK CITY — The school bus drivers' union plans to strike on Wednesday morning, leaving more than 150,000 students without rides to school, union leaders announced Monday afternoon.

“While we remain optimistic that we can reach an agreement, we are here today to announce that Local 1181 will strike effective Wednesday morning," at 6 a.m., said Michael Cordiello, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1181, which represents school bus drivers.

“This is not a decision that we have arrived at lightly, but an action we must take," Cordiello said.

The strike, which has been threatened since late December, is the result of a labor dispute between the bus drivers' union and the Department of Education, which is trying to save cash by bidding out new contracts for the first time in 33 years on 1,100 bus routes for children with special needs.

The city's busing costs have spiked from $71 million in 1979 to $1.1 billion today, according to the DOE, which maintains the approximately $6,900 per student could be better spent in the classroom.

But the union is demanding the new contracts include job protections for their 7,700 existing workers — protections city officials say they are legally barred from offering.

The union argues the city is wrong and warns the plans will leave the most vulnerable children in the care of private transit providers with unqualified drivers who don't have the training and experience that union drivers have.

"This is about safety and experience," said Cordiello. ”We handle and transport the most precious cargo in new York City," he said.

Cordiello argued that the city had not made a good-faith effort to negotiate, and called on the administration to come back to the table. Union leaders declined to say how long the strike could last, but noted the last strike lasted 14 weeks.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who appeared at a press conference earlier Monday, reacted to the announcement with outrage, calling it "irresponsible and misguided."

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott speaks at Tweed Courthouse January 13, 2013, in a planned announcement regarding a possible school bus strike.

(DNAinfo/Paul Lomax)

“With its regrettable decision to strike, the union is abandoning 152,000 students and their families who rely on school bus service each day," he said in a statement, noting that the city is now beginning to put contingency plans in place.

Earlier, he blamed the union fully for the impasse.

"This isn't about safety. It's about job protections the city cannot legally offer," he told reporters.

"In the year when our students have already missed a week or more of school because of Hurricane Sandy we certainly don't need to make it more difficult to get to school."

School bus companies also spoke out against the strike, which they claim isn't fair because drivers work for them — not the city. The New York City School Bus Contractors Coalition called the ATU strike "an unlawful secondary strike and we will immediately file unfair labor practice charges and civil lawsuits," in a statement.

"While we are the employers, this dispute is strictly between the Union and the City regarding the removal of the Employee Protection Provision from the upcoming bids," said a spokeswoman.

"Our hope is that a strike will be averted for the sake of the children and all who rely on this essential service."

The impending strike left parents across the city scrambling to figure out how their children would get back and forth to school.

Carin van der Donk, a parent and founder of Common Sense Busing, who attended a briefing in Midtown Monday morning with union officials, said she and others were preparing.

“Everybody acknowledges this is going to be very hard for the kids and the parents,” she said.

“It’s nerve-racking at this point," she said of the back-and-forths between the city and the union. “It’s been going on for a couple weeks now,” she said.

She said she and other parents have already been communicating via a giant email chain, trying to work out a carpooling plan.

“It is going be intense," she said. "There’s a lot of people trying to figure out if they can get a couple hours off from work in the morning."

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who also attended the morning meeting at the Sheraton Hotel on Seventh Avenue said she had not yet taken a position on the union's demands, but wished both sides would sit back down to talks.

"I personally really wish that everyone could get back around the table," she said.

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said the city has been preparing a contingency plan to try to make parents' lives easier.

"Our goal is to make sure students get to school, and to pursue contracts that are safe and more reasonably priced, so that we can direct those savings in the classroom where they belong," he said in a statement.

Read more: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20130114/new-york-city/school-buses-rolling-moday-but-strike-threat-looms#ixzz2I4WfPeSN

Carin van der Donk talks to NBC4NEWYORK

Possible school bus strike impacts all

NY TIMES

The possibility of a strike by the city’s school bus drivers inched closer on Sunday, with the schools chancellor, Dennis M. Walcott, detailing contingency plans for the 152,000 public and private students who could be affected, as, steps away, hundreds of bus drivers, union leaders and parents noisily protested the loss of job security in new contracts.

The City Education Department said that a strike could begin this week and that it wanted to warn parents.

“They’re playing our children in an unfortunate way as far as making them not know what will be happening with school,” Mr. Walcott said at a midday news conference at the department’s headquarters, at the Tweed Courthouse in Lower Manhattan.

But at a rally outside City Hall, just south of the old courthouse, Michael Cordiello, the president of Local 1181 of the Amalgamated Transit Union, representing 9,000 bus drivers, urged the city to negotiate, saying a strike would be “the last card we want to play.” 

At issue was the department’s announcement last month that it would be accepting competitive bids for 1,100 of its routes — about a sixth of the total — for children with disabilities. Though the other routes are not affected and some bus companies are nonunion, the department said any job action could spread.

Drivers, union leaders and many parents object to the lack of job security measures, known as employee protection provisions, in the new contracts, and said broader issues, like safety and the competence of drivers and onboard matrons, were at stake.

“I stand with them. These jobs need to have respectable wages,” said Carin van der Donk, who, with her husband, the actor Vincent D’Onofrio, has a son with disabilities and is an advocate for improving bus transportation. “They need more training, not less.”

Mr. Walcott insisted that drivers hired under new contracts would receive proper training and accused the union of preying on parents’ fears.  

The department hopes to drive down busing costs, which it says hover around $1.1 billion a year, or $6,900 per child, the highest in the country. By comparison, according to Mr. Walcott, the cost in Los Angeles is $3,124 per student.

Money saved by the new contracts would, he said, be devoted to classroom needs.

Among the backup plans the department is making are these: children who take yellow buses could receive MetroCards through their schools; parents of younger children could be given MetroCards; and those whose schools were inaccessible by public transportation could be reimbursed for mileage or cabs.

School bus drivers last went on strike in 1979; the 13-week walkout ended after the protections were put in place.

Until the summer of 2011, the Bloomberg administration argued in a lawsuit brought by nonunion bus companies that the job protections, which require companies to hire drivers and other employees based on seniority, should be preserved. The city even drafted a bill in Albany that would have enshrined the protections in law. Mr. Walcott said a ruling that year by the State Court of Appeals legally prohibited the city from including the protections in new contracts. But a lawyer for the union said the decision applied only to contracts for prekindergarten students.

Mr. Cordiello said the union was not opposed to competitive bidding, as long as the protections remained.

Dwight Daniels, 60, of the Bronx, who has been a driver for 35 years and remembers the strike, said he could not imagine being able to keep his job without the protection provision. “It’s impossible to live as it is,” he said.

Carin van der Donk, founder of Common Sense Busing and parent to a special needs child, speaks at a rally held by school bus drivers and parents, calling on city officials to take action so bus drivers don't strike. van der Donk is concerned that replacement bus drivers won't be able to accommodate special needs children. (Benjamin Chasteen/The Epoch Times)

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