<\/p>\n
Members of the 32BJ SEIU union vote to authorize a strike during a rally on Park Avenue, in New York, Wednesday, April 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n
Members of the 32BJ SEIU union vote to authorize a strike during a rally on Park Avenue, in New York, Wednesday, April 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n
New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani reacts while he is introduced during a union rally on Park Avenue, in New York, Wednesday, April 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n
New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a union rally on Park Avenue, in New York, Wednesday, April 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n
Members of the 32BJ SEIU union and their supporters rally on Park Avenue, in New York, Wednesday, April 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
Seth Wenig\/AP<\/p>\n
NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Thousands of New York City apartment building doorpersons, superintendents and other workers voted to authorize a potential strike Wednesday after contract negotiations snagged over issues including health care and pensions.<\/p>\n
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A strike would be the first in 35 years and would affect 1.5 million renters, co-op owners and condo dwellers across the city, according to the workers’ union, called 32BJ SEIU. Residents could have to take on such tasks as staffing doors, sorting packages, mopping hallways, sweeping sidewalks and hauling trash to the curb.<\/p>\n
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If no contract deal is reached, a strike could start as soon as midnight Monday, when the current contract expires.<\/p>\n
The union says building owners are trying to squeeze 34,000 workers who already are struggling to afford the pricey metro area on salaries that average about $62,000 a year for doorpersons; averages vary for other jobs. Building owners, represented by an umbrella group called the Realty Advisory Board on Labor Relations, want the workers to start paying health insurance premiums and want new hires to come in under a new job classification that the union says would be lower-paying.<\/p>\n
Union President Manny Pastreich said the owners’ association “wants to cut costs on the backs of workers.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe won’t allow it!\u201d he added in a statement ahead of the rally and vote Wednesday afternoon. Pastreich emphasized that the city \u201cis becoming more unaffordable for working people every day,\u201d even as building owners have hiked rents in recent years \u2014 at least for market-rate apartments, in Manhattan especially.<\/p>\n
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While battling owners\u2019 health care and new-hires proposals, the union is pushing to increase pensions and increase wages, although it has yet to make an exact proposal on pay.<\/p>\n
The Realty Advisory Board says building owners are facing a squeeze themselves, particularly in light of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s push to freeze rent on the city’s roughly 1 million rent-stabilized apartments. The board notes that few U.S. workers enjoy health benefits without paying premiums.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithout meaningful movement to address costs … the long-term sustainability of the industry and its workforce is at risk,” board President Howard Rothschild said in a statement. He called for negotiating “a contract that reflects these realities and supports a viable path forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mamdani and other elected Democrats joined the union\u2019s demonstration Wednesday on Manhattan\u2019s Park Avenue, home to a classic stretch of tony apartment buildings that boast doorpersons \u2014 many New Yorkers still call the mostly male workers \u201cdoormen\u201d \u2014 and other staffers.<\/p>\n
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While \u201cdoorman\u201d might conjure a white-gloved fellow ceremoniously opening an ornate door, the job often involves other functions (and uniforms aren’t always quite so formal). Besides providing basic security in buildings that can have hundreds of residents, doorpersons field package and food deliveries that have mushroomed since the COVID-19 pandemic and help people with strollers and walkers navigate lobby stairs. In some buildings, the workers also clean, shovel snowy sidewalks and wrestle bins of refuse out of basements and alleys for pickup.<\/p>\n
Superintendents, meanwhile, oversee maintenance and repairs in buildings that may be a more than a century old.<\/p>\n
Some building managers already have told residents they may need to postpone renovations, moves and major deliveries and minimize deliveries and visitors, among other steps, if there is a strike.<\/p>\n
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The union’s last strike, in 1991, lasted 12 days. Over the years since then, the union has at times voted to authorize a strike but then reached contract deals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Members of the 32BJ SEIU union vote to authorize a strike during a rally on Park Avenue, in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":198628,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[79043,75,53278,9,79042,24,55,54,56,833,834,3065,2336,828,829,830,831,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-198627","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-howard-rothschild","9":"tag-manhattan","10":"tag-manny-pastreich","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-building-workers-doorpersons-strike-vote","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-new-york-city-headlines","15":"tag-new-york-city-news","16":"tag-ny","17":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","18":"tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","19":"tag-product-30083-ap-new-york-city-news-no-weather","20":"tag-product-30085-ap-new-york-state-news-no-weather","21":"tag-product-30597-ap-business-news-f-wire","22":"tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","23":"tag-product-31995-ap-online-general-financial-business-news","24":"tag-product-31998-ap-online-national-news","25":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/198628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}