Worries Going into Birmingham Union Contract Negotiations

With the new contract negotiations coming up between Birmingham and four of its five unions, some are concerned about certain issues that might pop up. As a former political consultant who dealt with management and union negotiations, I can speak to some of these issues.

First, there is a new city manager for Birmingham who will be working on these negotiations. This falls in the favor of the city as the unions most likely will not have become acquainted with him or her yet. (At the time of this writing, no replacement had been found.)

The Birmingham City Commission has made it clear that they are going into this negotiation trying to get all the money that they can out of the unions. With the recent economic issues that the city has faced, the unions are going to be fighting an uphill battle.

Chances are good, though, that during these contractual negotiations, the city workers unions will have a lot more support from the residents of Birmingham than they usually do. With the impacts that the economic downturn had on so many people, more have found themselves in favor of those who are facing losses of jobs or income.