Get Rich Off the MTA

LIRR workers rack up hundreds of thousands in OT

No wonder the MTA is strapped for cash. Some of its mechanics are making nearly as much as the guy who runs the place.

Six mechanics at a Queens Long Island Rail Road facility earned more than triple their base incomes last year through lots of overtime and other perks, according to payroll records obtained by The New York Post. They each raked in more than $200,000 – earning a combined total of $1.5 million.

Ronald Dunne, a train car repairman, topped the charts. The grease monkey brought home more than $280,000 in pay in 2008 – making him the fifth-highest paid worker in the transit system, according to the Post. Only MTA chief Eliot Sander – who earned $364,989 in salary and perks – and a handful of presidents of agency subdivisions made more, the paper reported.

Overtime's the name of the game. Dunne's base salary was $62,976, but he drew in a whopping $220,397 on top of that, most of which came from working extra hours. The 23-year-old mechanic was rolling in so much dough, he went out and bought himself a nice set of gold-plated wrenches, according to the Post.

LIRR fares will go up this month to close a yawning budget gap at the MTA, which also oversees New York City buses, subways and Metro-North commuter trains. Taxpayers were forced to help foot the bill, shelling out $2.3 billion to the agency. A 10-percent across-the-board fare increase approved by the MTA takes effect at the end of June.

An LIRR spokesman attributes the steep overtime payments to union contracts.

"Antiquated work rules in collective-bargaining agreements have led to excessive earnings at our Richmond Hill maintenance facility by some employees with high seniority," spokesman Joe Calderone told the Post. "The LIRR is addressing this issue through a series of management initiatives designed to reduce overtime."

But MTA critics say it's the management that's causing the problems. When you've got someone quintupling their base salary through overtime, it raises serious questions about cost- and work force-efficiency, some say.

"Whenever you see something like that, it does raise a red flag," Bill Henderson, executive director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA, told the Post. "That's a big difference. It seems like that needs to be looked at."

This isn't the first time LIRR finances have come under scrutiny. Last year, The New York Times reported that more than 90 percent of LIRR retirees applied for disability benefits, and nearly 98 percent were approved by an obscure federal board, generating an average of $26,000 annually for each retiree.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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