Police union's picket line halts work on convention (Democratic)

[JI7]

<Democratic National Convention organizers were forced to shut down the start of FleetCenter construction yesterday after some construction workers and delivery trucks refused to cross a picket line led by Boston police officers outside the arena. More construction problems were expected today, as city and convention officials scrambled to cope with the unanticipated disruptions.

Several nationally prominent Democrats spoke by phone with local convention officials yesterday, plotting strategies for ending the labor problems. The chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Terry McAuliffe, spoke with Mayor Thomas M. Menino, while John Sasso, Senator John F. Kerry's primary liaison to the DNC, called Jack Corrigan, Kerry's main convention planner. They spoke about making a push to settle the city's contracts with firefighters and the Service Employees International Union, according to Democratic Party officials. Such a move is seen as isolating the police union and blunting the impact of its picket line.

The calls by McAuliffe and Sasso were the first direct involvement by top party officials and the Kerry camp in the city's union negotiations.

The extent of yesterday's disruptions caught convention organizers off-guard. They had assumed that most members of the building and construction trade unions would cross the picket line without incident; refusal to cross was expected only from a union that represents Verizon telephone and data-wiring electricians, and Menino had begun making plans to find other workers or another telecommunications supplier, if necessary.

Instead, firefighters and service employees joined the picket line, and about half the 50 carpenters and other workers who were to begin construction yesterday, members of a local carpenters union and Laborers Local 133, chose to not cross. The workers who did show up entered the arena about 6:30 a.m., but trucks carrying lumber and other supplies halted short of the FleetCenter, as Teamsters refused to cross the picket line. FleetCenter workers who are members of SEIU Local 615 also honored the picket line. And with an angry crowd hurling insults at them, the workers who had entered the FleetCenter left after about four hours, having accomplished virtually no work.>

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/conventions/articles/2004/06/09/police_unions_picket_line_halts_work_on_convention/