There are a lot of "ifs" in the agreement that was crafted between the Port Authority management, the Amalgamated Transit Union, and the Commonwealth that held off service cuts and reductions that were scheduled to happen at the beginning of September. If the RAD board agrees to fund PAT, if the County comes up with money from the drink and car rental taxes, if the state finds the money etc., etc.
The PAT website has a summary of the executed agreement between PAT and the ATU and it states that there are essentially three events that could trigger one of the parties to void the agreement and reverting back to the prior contract. "In the event funding is insufficient" and either:
- 1. A bus garage is forced to close (there are five operating divisions in the County) or
- 2. More than 5% of the current bargaining unit workforce is laid off (as of June 30, 2012 there were 2,106 ATU employees according to the PAT budget) or
- 3. More than 5% of the 2,300 bargaining unit is laid off over the life of the four year contract
Note that the most recent "doomsday" projection for September 2012 would have shuttered the Collier garage and resulted in layoffs that would have hit the PAT workforce (not all were represented by the ATU) to the tune of 23%. Based on the conditions above the range of headcount reductions would be 105 to 115 employees. Seeing that the PAT board and management has historically been inclined to avoid any interruption of service it is unlikely that they would be the party that would void the contract if one of the above did indeed occur.