By Hank Russell
A coalition of five rail unions at the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) has written to the White House to formally request that a second Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) be appointed to resolve a nearly three-year contract dispute with the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA).
The Long Island Railroad Bargaining Coalition — which includes the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET), the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen (BRS), the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAMAW), the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), and the Transportation Communications Union (TCU) — cited the Railway Labor Act in its request for another board.
The Railway Labor Act, the century-old law that controls labor relations at railroads and airlines, includes a provision for a second PEB when the disputes involve commuter railroads. The federal law allows labor, management or, in this case, Governor Kathy Hochul, to ask the White House to intervene.
The first PEB was also requested by the unions. As previously reported in Long Island Life & Politics, the union representing Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) engineers has decided not to go on strike this week. Rather, they called on President Donald Trump to bring in a National Mediation Board. BLET members, along with the members of four other rail unions, have been without a pay raise for over three years. The LIRR offered a 9% pay raise over three years, but BLET wanted an additional 6.5%. According to the LIRR, a possible strike would have affected 270,000 daily riders.
ABC News reported that 99% of the unionized 529 LIRR engineers voted for the strike, but BLET is calling on the federal government to intervene. If an agreement is not reached by May 2026, the engineers will walk off the job.
“Our coalition’s proposals are not extreme, and they are supported by the findings of the first PEB,” said Michael Sullivan of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen. In its report, the board recommended raises of 14% over four years along with other improvements.
“We felt compelled to request a second PEB because of LIRR and the MTA’s refusal to bargain in good faith,” said Gilman Lang, the general chairman for the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers & Trainmen at the LIRR. “During this entire process, the employer has chosen delay, obstruction and political maneuvering over meaningful negotiation and resolution.” No direct negotiations between labor and management have been held since July 2025, according to the coalition.
The new PEB will make its report in approximately 60 days, in mid-March. If those recommendations are not accepted or a voluntary settlement isn’t reached over the next two months between LIRR management and the coalition of labor unions, a 60-day cooling off period will begin. Under the rules of the Railway Labor Act, if no settlement is reached at the end of the 60 days in mid-May, the coalition of unions would then be permitted to legally go on strike or MTA could lock out its workers. The Railway Labor Act does not contain a provision for a third PEB.
“We didn’t agree with everything in the first PEB, known as Presidential Emergency Board 253, but those recommendations should have been used as the foundation for further negotiations,” said the national vice president of the Transportation Communications Union, Nick Peluso. “We are only asking for what’s fair and consistent with agreements reached across the rail industry.”
The unions said the law is designed to keep trains running and avoid strikes, but the MTA and Hochul have flipped the script by trying to provoke a strike by failing to ask for a PEB last year and again this week. A request for a PEB by management would have automatically kept trains running and avoided a strike, instead neither Hochul nor MTA requested a PEB, the unions said. LIRR management through press releases, flyers left on train seats and signage, stirred up strike fears last fall.
“The Carrier’s recent conduct has been deliberate,” said Jeff Klein, the general chairman for IBEW at LIRR. “Faced with its own failures at the bargaining table, the MTA/LIRR has chosen provocation over progress. Its goal is transparent: to push the workforce toward a strike.”
The members of five rail unions, comprising a majority of LIRR’s unionized workforce, have been without a pay raise for over three years, since April 2022, despite the rising cost of living on Long Island.
The contract dispute between the employer and the coalition of rail unions has been in National Mediation Board-sponsored mediation since February 2024. NMB released the parties from mediation on August 18, triggering a 30-day cooling-off period under the Railway Labor Act, ending at 12:01 a.m. on September 18. The labor coalition requested the first PEB at that time.
“Management should quit playing politics, meet with our five unions and hammer out a fair agreement, one that’s not concessionary, using the recommendations of the Presidential Emergency Board as a basis for further negotiations,” said IAM General Chairman – District 19 Shaun O’Connor. “Let’s get this done, craft a new agreement and keep the trains running.”
LILP reached out to the MTA. LIRR President Rob Free said in a statement, “We have said repeatedly the best way to settle this is at the negotiating table, which we’ve been ready to do. We look forward to them showing up to negotiate a contract that includes meaningful improvements to work rules so we can better serve LIRR riders.”