The staff of the New York Transit Museum is expected to vote to unionize Friday under the banner of District Council 37.
If approved by a majority of the 40 eligible members, the union would represent the museum’s full- and part-time educators, archivists and marketing and development staff.
“(It’s) as much of a wall-to-wall union as it can be,” said Ava Dennis, 27, a part-time educator at the museum who has been involved in the unionization efforts.
The museum, which is based in the old Court St. IND subway station in Downtown Brooklyn, chronicles the history of New York City’s rapid transit systems. The museum also manages the MTA’s vintage subway fleet, as well as the transit system’s archives, runs “nostalgia rides” on vintage trains throughout the system, and organizes tours throughout the system.
The bulk of the museum’s staff is employed by the Friends of the New York Transit Museum, a nonprofit entity incorporated in New York.
Other museum workers — like the retail workers who run the gift shop — are employed by the MTA and were recently recognized as members of the Transport Workers Union. They would not be included in the new DC 37 bargaining unit.
Dennis said the staff was seeking to unionize in order to achieve better pay, just-cause protections and guaranteed hours for part-timers.
The union ballot closed Friday evening. In order to unionize, a simple majority vote is needed. Official results were not immediately available at press time.
“Transportation in New York City is so reliant on organized labor,” Dennis said. “That’s a history that we are keenly aware of at the Transit Museum, and that we talk about in our collections and in our stories.”
“We deserve that same kind of treatment at the museum,” she added.
A spokeswoman for the museum did not respond to the Daily News when asked to comment on the unionization effort.