Transit Local Driving for Change

     Jackie Jeter likes being in the driver’s seat. She’s also accustomed to getting where she’s going. The first female president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689 started out driving DC buses in 1979 and switched to Metro trains in 1987. She became a shop steward in 1994, moving on to become the local’s first female assistant business agent, the first female vice-president, and the first female financial secretary before being elected President of the local last year. Acknowledging the series of firsts, Jeter modestly brushes aside her historic achievement, noting that “Sarah Owens (the first black female bus operator) paved the way in 1967, and paved it well.” And while Jeter says female Metro drivers still face urgent issues, including maternity leave and lack of accessible daycare, Jeter and her leadership team – elected to a 3-year term last December – are focused on quickly ramping up the relevance and impact of the area’s largest transit local.
     Transit workers have been members of Local 689 since they were piloting streetcars around the city nearly a century ago. Chartered in 1916, the local’s streetcar drivers gave way to bus drivers and then were joined by subway drivers after the Metro subway system was built in the 1970’s. Although the most visible members of the local’s 7,500 active members are the 2,400 bus drivers and nearly 1,000 Metro train operators and station managers, the majority of the membership works behind the scenes maintaining and cleaning the fleet, keeping the trains and buses running.
     While Jeter plans to increase the local’s political leverage around transit issues – “Our jobs can be wiped out with a stroke of the pen,” she says – she’s intent on building participation by more of the local’s 10,000 members. “We need to have more than a few hundred people” involved in shaping the future of the local, she says. “We can’t forget that what we have we had to work for, and we must be more active members of the local labor community.”
     The local’s team of 39 paid shop stewards are Jeter’s key to activating a membership that’s grown “perhaps a bit too comfortable with letting someone else take care of their interests,” says Jeter. “We’re committed to getting out in the field and building and expanding communication systems to get good, reliable information out to our members quickly.” In addition to a popular monthly newsletter, the local maintains a regularly updated website and is working to build a email network to reach a large membership that’s spread out throughout the metro Washington area “spread thin over 10 bus barns, 9 rail locations and multiple maintenance locations.”
     Safety – long a primary concern of the union – has been in the news lately, with deaths and injuries of commuters and workers. Jeter’s years as a driver are obvious as she animatedly describes the everyday hazards of driving a bus in a congested metro area with hazards around every corner, “from car drivers putting on makeup or talking on cel phones to pedestrians wearing ipods and unpredictable road conditions from day to day.” While Jeter says “Drivers have to be careful,” she faults Metro management for “a habit of disciplining workers instead of retraining them.”  “Hundreds of thousands of commuters count on us every day to get them where they’re going,” says Jeter. “The future of mass transit depends on us.”  Jeter, 52, has been married for 5 years to fellow ATU activist and leader Roland Jeter – “we share a deep love for each other and the union” she laughs – and the two have five children and five grandchildren. Jeter’s hobbies include spending time with her kids and grandkids, gardening and reading mystery novels. Photos by Chris Garlock