Deal reached to end Jersey City teacher strike

A deal was reached Sunday night on a new contract for Jersey City's teachers, paving the way for them to return to classrooms Monday morning after striking on Friday.

The tentative contract agreement would end an eight-month dispute between the 29,000-student district and its 3,100 teachers. It must be approved by the nine-member school board and members of the teachers union.

Virtua averts nurses' strike with new contract, increased staffing

About 1,500 registered nurses have voted to accept a new contract with Virtua, calling off a threatened strike that would have affected the health system's locations in Voorhees, Marlton, Berlin and Camden, as well as its visiting home care nurses.

The new three-year agreement addresses many of the nurses' concerns about staffing, time off, wage increases and pension contributions, according to the union representing the nurses at the negotiating table.

A state mediator assisted during negotiations after the nurses' contract expired Feb. 28, but union members authorized a strike vote on March 6.

Both parties reached a tentative agreement at 4 a.m. Wednesday, and the nurses' bargaining unit voted to approve the contract late Thursday. 

The nurses' primary concern centered on staffing needs. Virtua recently hired 65 additional nurses and is actively recruiting to hire 100 more nurses, said Virginia Treacy, a registered nurse and lead negotiator for the union, JNESO District Council 1, IUOE-AFL-CIO.

Pitt to challenge grad student union election petition

Pitt administrators have told the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board they plan challenge the graduate student petition to hold a union election, organizers said Wednesday.

Pitt will look to convince the board that graduate students aren’t employees. The labor board in February ruled that graduate students at Penn State were considered employees and could unionize.
In a post on Facebook, the Graduate Student Organizing Committee called the move an “attempt to drag out the process in hopes of busting our union.” 

New lawsuits could delay Mariner East 2 pipeline project

PHILADELPHIA >> On Wednesday, Clean Air Council, the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, and Mountain Watershed Association, Inc. filed two new lawsuits against the Department of Environmental Protection and Sunoco Pipeline L.P. for what these organizations say is unlawful conduct related to Sunoco’s Mariner East 2 pipelines.

On Feb. 8, DEP and Sunoco entered into a consent order and Agreement that allowed Sunoco to resume construction activities that had been shut down by DEP on Jan. 3 because of what these organizations say is a mounting list of Sunoco’s willful and egregious permit violations.

Blatstein returns focus to Northern Liberties with plan for remaining brewery parcel

Developer Bart Blatstein wants to build a complex of nearly 1,200 rental apartments in Philadelphia’s Northern Liberties neighborhood in what would be his final project on a cluster of properties he began assembling in the early 2000s centered on the former Schmidt’s brewery site.

Blatstein’s plan for a long vacant lot at Second Street and Germantown Avenue calls for six connected buildings with 45,000 square feet of lower-story shops and restaurants around a central plaza. The project would occupy the 4.4-acre lot south of the Shops at Schmidt’s retail building and across the street from the Piazza at Schmidts — now Schmidt’s Commons — apartment and shopping complex, both of which he developed and later sold.