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City Workers, Calling Nutter a Grinch, Demand Progress on Contract Talks

By Mike Dunn

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Two thousand angry postcards, and perhaps even a lump of coal, were delivered today to Philadelphia mayor Michael Nutter by city workers unhappy over their long-stalled contract talks.

They even devised a song for the occasion.

"The Twelve Days of Nutter" was composed and delivered by a group of about twenty members of District Council 33, District Council 47, and community activists -- including one dressed as the Grinch.

nutter grinch
(Union workers handed out cards portraying Mayor Nutter as "The Grinch.")

"On the 12th day of Christmas, Mayor Nutter said to me,
Thanks for paying for China,
I'm really Republican,
No feeding the homeless,
I killed paid sick days,
Lower corporate taxes,
I'm cutting services,
Contract out our work,
I don't like working people,
Shut libraries,

No money,
Rolling closures,
And the rich keep their tax abatements!"

Then they delivered a large bag of cards to the mayor's office.

"It's two thousand postcards from our members telling him that he needs to be the mayor of the 99 percent," said DC 47 member Dave Mora.

The unions have been without contracts since 2009.  Talks are mainly stalled over Nutter's desire to start a two-tier pension system for new hires, to lower the pension system's costs to taxpayers.

 

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