T chief reveals 33 more raises
Pay to managers for merit, equity
The MBTA's general manager, Daniel A. Grabauskas, said yesterday that he awarded 33 pay raises to executive employees since July 1, 2005. Raises for the T's managers and other nonunion employees have been a contentious issue over the past month.
Grabauskas said the raises - which averaged about $5,000 - were handed out mostly for merit or because an employee was earning less than a subordinate or a colleague with similar job responsibilities.
"The vast majority [of the MBTA's 273 nonunion employees] had no change in pay, and none of them had had a cost-of-living adjustment," Grabauskas said.
Pay raises at the heavily indebted transit agency have been at the center of a political debate for much of the past month. Grabauskas awarded 9 percent cost-of-living increases to 273 managers and other nonunion employees last month, only to rescind them under pressure from Governor Deval Patrick's administration.
Instead, nonunion employees earning less than $70,000 were given 3 percent raises. Grabauskas declined his own $10,000 salary increase due under his contract.
In defending his initial decision to grant the 9 percent pay raises, Grabauskas said it was a matter of fairness. He said union employees were receiving a similar 9 percent cost-of-living adjustment after an arbitrator settled the largest union contract, following three years without a pay hike.
The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority generally uses its contract with the Boston Carmen's Union, Local 589, to establish a pay pattern for all 6,300 employees.
In an Aug. 15 interview, Grabauskas said: "There were no blanket raises, no cost-of-living adjustments. Everybody waits just like everybody else, to get their increases."
He said yesterday that union employees could have been entitled to the same type of raises - either for merit or to match the pay of a colleague with similar duties - during the two years they went without a contract, if they had filed grievances over their pay.
"We make adjustments if we find that there are inequalities regardless of whether you are in a union or not in a union," he said.
Grabauskas said the raises "were a minuscule distraction" in the context of the financial problems the T faces in balancing its $1.4 billion annual budget.
The salary issue has been a thorny one. The MBTA has been dipping into reserves to cover operating expenses. It has also been threatening a substantial fare increase in 2010 unless the Legislature agrees to help with its multibillion-dollar debt.
Patrick's transportation secretary, Bernard Cohen, who also chairs the MBTA board, called on Grabauskas to rescind the raises last month, saying it was important to "leave no stone unturned," given the financial pressures facing the state's transportation issues. But Cohen's spokesman conceded that 195 employees in the executive office of transportation have received merit raises every year and have not been asked to forgo them.
At the same time, rescinding the cost-of-living adjustment raises at the T has caused some morale problems. There are now 46 managers who make less than their subordinates, according to MBTA records. The 153 subordinates who earn more than their bosses have higher salaries because they are part of a union and received the 9 percent pay raise as part of the recent arbitration.
Grabauskas said that makes it difficult to persuade people to accept promotions. But he said he has not raised those managers' salaries, given that Cohen instructed him to freeze the cost-of-living adjustments.
"I haven't sought any guidance on what we should do in those situations," he said.
Noah Bierman can be reached at nbierman@globe.com. 