NEW SCOTLAND — During a specially scheduled meeting this month, the New Scotland Town Board ratified a new contract with 15 members of the town’s Department of Public Works Blue Collar Unit.

In July 2023, the workers from New Scotland’s highway, water and sewer, mechanic, transfer station, and parks departments signed a letter asking the town to voluntarily recognize their right to unionize. 

The town did so a month later, with the Civil Service Employees Association acting as the bargaining agent for the workers. The negotiation played out over the past year, which is not an unusual amount of time for contract talks to take.

“That’s because you’re starting from scratch,” Therese Assalian, a CSEA communications specialist, told The Enterprise in August. “You’re building a contract.”

It’s the first collective bargaining agreement for both sides, Assalian explained; with established contracts, the focus is updating already-agreed-upon provisions. Brian Selchick, a labor attorney retained by the town, described the first contract as “establishing the entirety of the universe.”

The contract establishes the labor-management framework, setting up formal channels for communication and dispute resolution while implementing disciplinary process safeguards, union representation guarantees, and a benefits structure. 

The three-year contract, which takes effect Jan. 1, establishes a salary schedule while guaranteeing bargaining unit members an annual raise of 3 percent. Of the 12 union members on the town payroll in 2023, six saw an hourly raise over 9.5 percent this year, one received a 6-percent raise, and six got a 3-percent pay bump.