JTRAN employees will return to work Monday after a tentative agreement with MV Transportation ended a monthlong strike, Local 1208 said. The union said the proposal was ratified Thursday by a 29-9 vote and includes an immediate 5% increase in base pay and an additional 3% over the next two years.
Under the previous contract, starting pay was $17.18 an hour and senior workers earned $23 an hour, Mississippi Today reported. The final agreement is set for a vote next week, the union said. A spokesperson for MV Transportation was not immediately available for comment.
The agreement preserves routes 70 and 20, which serve the Ellis and Woodrow Wilson neighborhoods, and keeps Saturday service, Mississippi Today reported. It limits MV to hiring five drivers without a commercial license for microtransit services, with the cap rising to seven if JTRAN falls below 40 active workers. The contract also adds Martin Luther King Jr. Day to the holiday calendar and creates an accident review board that will include one representative from the Amalgamated Transit Union and one from MV Transportation.
Union leaders said compromises were made. Local 1208 President Charles Tornes Jr. said the union did not win mandated lunch breaks and that employees placed on administrative leave will remain unpaid under current provisions. “We’re just glad that it’s over,” Tornes said, adding, “It’s hot out there in Jackson, Mississippi, weather.” He told Mississippi Today some issues remain a work in progress.
JTRAN employees have worked for Texas-based MV Transportation since 2024 under a $9 million contract with the city that runs through Dec. 31, 2027, Mississippi Today reported. Negotiations began in December and escalated in late May after union members learned the mayors administration planned to present MV’s proposal to the city council, prompting the strike. MV officials told a July 15 paratransit meeting that 11 of 12 fixed routes were operating and that buses were about 50% on time on the first day of the strike, Mississippi Today reported. JTRAN workers previously struck in September 2024, halting service for two weeks before ending the walkout after mediated talks, Mississippi Today reported.
Jon Ross Myers is the executive editor and publisher of the Mississippi News Network, Mississippi's largest digital only media company. He can be reached at editor@tippahnews.com
