By Kevin Brown and Steve Sweeney
At the end of 2020, the airline industry emerged battered but alive after the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The industry’s continued viability was by no means guaranteed. Only a few months before, the nation’s airports were on life support.
The miraculous survival of an industry worth billions of dollars was due in no small part to airport workers. Serving on the frontlines of the worst public health emergency in our lifetime, these essential workers ensured that the nation’s airports remained functioning and safe.
At the time, subcontracted airport workers at Newark Liberty Airport, had minimal to no healthcare benefits. This was an unfair burden to bear for a workforce facing a global pandemic at one of the busiest transit hubs in the nation.
As New Jersey’s Senate President and the New Jersey leader of 32BJ SEIU, which represents nearly 3,000 airport workers in the state, we sought to change the status quo. We did this by working together to fight to pass the Healthy Terminals Act, legislation that would improve wages and expand healthcare benefits to airport workers.
Our argument was simple: The HTA would provide long overdue investments in the working New Jerseyans so vital to our travel industry and economy. Mobilizing countless airport workers and building a wide political coalition, we worked within and outside Trenton to pass the bill.
Simultaneously, we found a true partner and leader in this fight in the Port Authority. Working with the PA, we deployed a concerted legislative and advocacy effort resulting in Governor Murphy signing the HTA into law, raising airport workers’ wages to $19 per hour and expanding healthcare benefits to thousands of New Jerseyans.
However, as we both have learned from our decades of advocacy in New Jersey, every victory is only another stepping stone on the path of improving lives.
Three years after the HTA’s passage, the increased cost of living has fundamentally changed the definition of a living wage for New Jerseyans.
One example is Fatiah Marrow, a 32BJ SEIU member and Cargo Agent at Newark Airport, whose current hourly wage is $19 an hour. She cannot survive on that salary, when her rent, car payments, groceries, and just about every other living expense in our state exceeds the national average by as much as 30%.
Indeed, according to MIT, the hourly wage an individual without children would need to earn to support themselves in the Newark-Jersey City metro area is $22, and $44 for a parent.
Fortunately, we can build on the groundwork we laid with the HTA to deliver Fatiah and thousands of other airport workers a living wage. Just as we did during that fight, we will collaborate with the Port Authority, whose leadership proved so vital in 2021.
As we learned after the passage of the HTA, when we have better working conditions for airport workers, turnover goes down, while customer service and safety go up. The research backs this up as well: A 2018 Port Authority report drew a direct line between improved compensation leading to improved training, vetting, and emergency preparedness.
We are committed to continuing what we started with HTA - to win higher wages and better benefits for the essential workers who keep our airports running and are so vital to this state’s tourism and travel industry.
Kevin Brown is New Jersey State Director and Executive VP for 32BJ SEIU, which represents service workers.
Steve Sweeney, the longest serving Senate President in NJ history, is the Founding Chairman of the Steve Sweeney Center for Public Policy at Rowan University.
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