Improve Public Safety

The security officers at the Philadelphia Museum of Art lack adequate training. The orientation, which ranges from one to three days, does not cover the most dangerous aspects of being a security guard such as emergency, fire, terrorism or first aid. Additionally, there are not annual refresher courses. Some security officers on the property have not been through a fire drill in years!

A union contract will not only guarantee that the Philadelphia Museum of Art reaches for a higher safety standard, but that the union will have a direct role in continually improving public safety by having a legally binding voice to raise safety concerns.

Improve Worker Retention

One of the biggest hazards at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is the high turn-over rate. Seasoned security officers provide better security. The main job of a security officers is to “look for anything strange.” A security guard who has been posted at the museum for a long time knows the other museum staff, sub-contractors, property lay-outs and vehicles. This level of familiarity greatly improves the safety of the public, the art and the guards.

Because these jobs pay wages below the federal poverty guidelines, and fail to offer affordable, quality health care. Trained security guards often times quit. We lack pathways to career opportunities and respect from our employer.

Our plan is to lower turnover by improving working conditions, training, pay and benefits. Our plan to create a graduated training program will give all of us the chance to move up the ladder by mastering key security skills instead of the current norm; moving up the ladder through nepotism and favoritism.

Only a union contract will improve work force stability and retention.

Improve Public Health

Currently 40% of the security workforce cannot take off a single day of work to get well if they are sick without loosing pay.

With annual wages averaging $16,000, we cannot afford to miss a day’s wages to recover.

Our job is to protect the public. We take this commitment seriously.

Our collective bargaining proposal will lower health risks by improving the sick day policy at the museum.

Longevity Incentives = More Stable Workforce and a Safer Museum

The security guards at the Philadelphia Museum of Art face one of the strangest pay packages that you will find anywhere.

Before we won our union election in October 2009, every single guard, whether you had a few months experience or if you had been working at the museum for 18 years, earned $10.03 per hour.

After we started campaigning for a union, our expected wage increases of $.25 per hour were canceled.

Shortly before we won the election, we were informed that newly hired guards would now start at a lower wage of $9.13 per hour, everyone else would remain at the $10.03 per hour.

The current wage rates do not respect the dedication of long-serving security officers or guards that work difficult shifts like the overnight shift.

The PSOU contract proposal will create incentives for guards and encourage long-term employment at the museum. Long-serving guards are better guards. This will improve safety at the museum.

Equality for Women

Almost half of the security force at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is comprised of women. Many of them are single mothers and the primary care takers of their families.

Though they too lack adequate sick-leave, unfortunately, their difficulties are compounded by the fact that they must care for their children when they get sick.

This leads to disproportionately high turn-over among female workers. Women are valued security officers to the Philadelphia Security Officers Union.

The contract that we want to win will include improved paid sick leave, personal time and maternity leave, which will lower the disproportionately high turn-over among female employees.

Affordable Health Care

The current HMO that we can purchase though our employer is exceedingly expensive. Fewer than half of the security guards at the Philadelphia Museum of Art can afford to purchase the plan.

This means that the tax payers, are subsidizing the profits of AlliedBarton. If we get sick or hurt, we end up depending on tax-funded, public health clinics.

Our proposal will give security guards the opportunity to purchase better quality insurance that provides benefits at lower out-of-pocket cost.

Protecting the Protectors

Being a private security guard consistently ranks among the most deadly jobs in the nation. Only police officers have a higher likelihood of being murdered on the job.

Last year, security officer Stephen Tyrone Johns was shot to death in the U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C.

If something terrible happens at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, guard’s families will not be taken care of by our employer. The current death and dismemberment plan ($10,000) barely covers the cost of the average funeral and leaves the family of the guard left to fend for themselves.

Only a union contract can adequately protect the families of security guards should the unspeakable happen.

First-Class Customer Service

During a shift, a security officer in a gallery will be asked anything from accurate directions to the restroom to background on the art.

Customer service is one of the most frequent complaints made against security officers. This also is due to inadequate training.

The union strives to have all security guards better trained on customer service. We want to develop a relationship with the Philadelphia Museum of Art to educate security officers on basic facts about the art that they protect. This basic knowledge will vastly improve our ability to give museum patrons an unforgettable experience.

The union contract is the only way to guarantee that security officers can improve the relationship with patrons of the Museum.

The Museum and AlliedBarton Prevent Progress

Since 2007, an organization of security guards and the community organization Jobs with Justice have advocated to improve public safety and working conditions at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Every appeal to museum leaders and the company have been dismissed, ignored or met with retribution.

We could take it no longer. Last year, after we had exhausted every possible appeal to museum and corporate leaders, we took the hardest road to progress by forming our own union.

We won a union election fair and square. Unfortunately, leaders from the Philadelphia Museum of Art and AlliedBarton have colluded to stall the improvements that we want to negotiate in a collective bargaining agreement. For months they have filed legal challenges to the election. The National Labor Relations Board dismissed the challenges and encouraged AlliedBarton to sit down with us and make plans to fix the security and employment problems. AlliedBarton, despite their public claims of wanting to work with the union, has filed another round of challenges.

Everyday that museum leaders and AlliedBarton avoid meeting with us is another day that the general public, the museum collections and the museum workforce are unnecessarily at risk.