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The city’s nearly 82,000 private security officers would gradually begin to see increases in their pay, benefits, training and paid time off, according to City Council legislation introduced this week.
The Aland Etienne Safety and Security Act, named for the security guard who was among four people killed in Midtown July 28 by a Nevada gunman, looks to improve the guards’ working conditions as well as lower the sector’s annual turnover rate of 77 percent.
City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, flanked by members of 32BJ SEIU to which Etienne belonged, said the city’s security guards, who earn a median income just over $40,000, are underpaid and overworked and that the city does not support them enough. Security guards “deserve better,” Adams said.
“Once this legislation becomes law, we will attribute this historic law to its namesake, whose fierce love and commitment to New York City will be remembered forever,” she said at a City Hall Thursday press event. “We look forward to moving this bill through the Council’s legislative process.”
A report from the UC Berkeley Labor Center published in August, found that pay for the city’s private security officers does not “reflect their significant role” and that many of them live paycheck to paycheck.
It also found that nearly 38 percent of the security guards lack health insurance through their employer or that of a household member. The 77-percent turnover rate is up from just over 69 percent in 2019.
The Council’s bill would direct the city’s Department of Consumer and Worker Protection to set the wage, benefits and PTO rates needed to attract and keep experienced and trained security guards. The requirements would be phased in over four years.
It would also establish a security officer training standard for the city, which currently does not exist. Security employers would supplement the existing state standard with a 16-hour training covering active shooter response and emergency preparedness, among other topics.
Manny Pastreich, 32BJ’s president, called the bill “good public policy.” It’s about protecting New Yorkers, he added.
“The soul of this legislation is about standing with first responders, as New York always does,” Pastreich said. “We honor our fallen heroes.”
Etienne was unarmed at 345 Park Ave., an office building and skyscraper home to the National Football League headquarters, when the shooter burst into the lobby and fatally shot him with a rifle. After killing three other people, among them NYPD Officer Didarul Islam, the shooter killed himself.
The shooter, Shane Tamura, a Las Vegas casino security worker, was carrying a handwritten note in his wallet that claimed he had chronic traumatic encephalopathy, known at CTE, investigators said. He accused the NFL of hiding the dangers of brain injuries linked to contact sports.
Etienne, 46, worked for McLane Security and was beloved by those who interacted with him in the building’s main lobby and his family, who are from Haiti.
His younger brother, Smith Etienne, previously called for legislation to protect security officers. The security sector workforce deserves better pay and additional training, especially when “gun violence is becoming a norm,” he said at the City Hall event.
“We don’t want the next son, the next father, to be in that same position that my brother was,” Smith Etienne said.
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MARIANNE.PIZZITOLA
If the speaker can find it in her heart and in her brain to support security guards and improve their working condition, she should be doing the same thing for EMS workers.
As a reminder, the shooter drove across country because no one was listening to him that he believed he had CTE, a mental health disorder. Had he been provided to healthcare that he needed at home, and the NFL listened, maybe this tragedy could’ve been prevented.
The speaker has a habit of contradicting herself, and making moves without recognizing she’s talking about both sides of her mouth.
Her own daughter is an EMS worker and she stated on the record she understands and recognizes the issues EMS faces, and yet she’s done nothing to support the 2001 city Council legislation that provides uniform status for EMS workers in improving their bargaining or their pay.
A recent article in the Daily News acknowledges the Adams administration showed disdain for EMS, while the Mayor campaign on giving them parity in 2021.
This is the same speaker mind you, who has ignored New York City Retirees urging her to pass intro 1096 and she won’t even give it a hearing. That’s not democratic and it’s not common sense. We need better politicians, actually we need civil servants to enter the political realm because they have a better understanding of what we do and we don’t play political games with peoples lives.
One has to ask why she is giving security guards this much attention and not EMS when this has been more of an issue on her plate since 2017.
Maybe she’s planning for her post council employment
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