with negotiations seemingly stalled between NJ Transit and its engineers union the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen the two sides are taking to the media to make their case NJ Transit leader Chris Kori saying their wage demands are unrealistic while the union says they want parody in their pay Ted Goldberg spoke to both sides about what it would take to get a deal done With one week to go until a possible strike NJ Transit and the union representing its engineers don't sound any closer to a deal There is no point in making a deal that will eventually lead to the bankruptcy of this organization That is what these folks are seeking Those 450 members called bull on on what they were offering NJ Transit and the BLE both say they want to avoid a strike and they're both blaming the other side for negotiations taking this long I negotiated with him good faith We came to an agreement He shook my hand Not just that he put out a joint press statement And what did the joint press statement say it was a fair and fiscally responsible deal That agreement was overwhelmingly voted down by the union with nearly 90% of members voting against it The BL tells me that they and NJ Transit actually agree on 95% of the language needed to make a deal The last sticking point is wages And a big problem here is neither side can agree on how to calculate the average wage of an engineer $135,000 a year Does it include overtime absolutely This is simply not the case reviewing publicly available data for all locomotive engineers in 2024 The average was only $113,000 per year And that's and and a substantial number of locomotive engineers fell well below that average They keep moving the cards around till they get to a number that they now like The base salary for an engineer is around $90,000 And the union says there are four engineers earning north of $200,000 that inflate the average We put on the table something that we feel is fiscally responsible and fair to New Jersey Transits engineers It would increase our base wage over time to in 2000 in the year 2027 It would have brought us up to around $120,000 which would be comparable to what most every other passenger railroad engineer in the United States is earning BL chairman Tom Hos spoke to passengers who might be affected and directly to call today casting doubt on the numbers that have been thrown around publicly If you're listening if you're watching this if that offer for $172,000 a year base wage is on the table I'll come upstairs and sign it right now NJ Transit's contingency plan is more buses heading to New York City but they'll only cover about 20% of the 100,000 daily rail riders NJ Transit is telling folks to work from home if they can People I spoke to at Newark Penn Station today were split on if they think a strike will actually happen Probably will Who knows bunch of things going on these days I spoke to um several NJ Transit workers in the Eerie Lacawana train station this morning Everybody said it's not going to happen In my opinion it's wrong to do the strike but in a way they voices need to be heard What they did agree on is the massive inconvenience that they'd have to deal with I have family of North Jersey so I could I have to change my patterns uh to to make it work I'm not going to see you for a minute or uh just other means of transportation or just flood the uh flood the highways with cars I know I rely on it every day you know Monday to Friday So you know I don't know how I would get to where I'm going I don't own a car so it would it would definitely affect my life every Friday I I don't know what I'd do I mean I'd have to pay way more money for an Uber I would probably more than likely have to go the long route with the bus and then take a car service a cab which is very much inconvenient cuz it's extra money to be spent The National Mediation Board has invited both sides to come to Washington DC to hash things out on Monday Caller and union leadership both say they'll be there trying to avoid a work stoppage that could make it much harder to move around the state in Newark I'm Ted Goldberg NJ Spotlight News