The union representing dozens of Jackson bus drivers and other transportation workers issued a 72-hour strike notice Friday, even as the union said it would continue trying to reach an agreement with MV Transportation, the Texas company under contract to run JTRAN.
If both sides cannot reach an agreement by Sunday, the union plans to go on strike at 4 a.m. on Monday, according to a statement released Friday by the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1208.
“We care about our riders whom we transport each day and do not want this strike to happen,” the local’s president and business agent, Charles Tornes Jr., said in a statement.
Union members voted last month to authorize a strike.
JTRAN represents a lifeline for low-income and disabled Jacksonians who use the bus to get to work, medical appointments or the grocery store. Though JTRAN is a publicly funded service, its unionized employees work for MV Transportation, which calls itself the largest privately-owned transportation company in America.
The two sides have been negotiating a collective bargaining agreement out of public view since a previous version expired in December. The union has been seeking competitive pay raises, while MV Transportation has proposed a number of changes to JTRAN, including new safety policies and the ability to hire drivers without commercial licenses to operate smaller vehicles for on-demand “microtransit” services.
But in late May, tensions came to a head after the union learned that Mayor John Horhn and his administration were presenting the city council with a plan drafted by MV Transportation that would trim 20% of JTRAN’s roughly $9 million budget.
The cost-cutting proposal would eliminate two fixed routes, cease Saturday service and shorten the work day by two hours. It would also use the city’s existing fleet of paratransit vehicles to expand the microtransit services, raising concerns among a vocal contingent of disabled riders who rely on JTRAN.
The union, which has more than 60 members, previously went on two-week strike in September 2024 over job security, job safety and what it called “unfair treatment.”
