Metro Costs For Overtime Are Up 56% Since 2002

Metro officials also declined to comment on the accidents because the investigations are ongoing.

In 2004, after a Metro train rolled backward and slammed into another train at Woodley Park, federal safety officials concluded that the operator of the first train did not brake because he was probably asleep. He had slept poorly the night before the accident, was finishing an overtime shift when the accident occurred and had worked overtime shifts on nine of the 19 days in the month before the accident, according to the NTSB.

Metro's overtime provisions have been part of the contract between the agency and the union representing about 7,000 of the agency's more than 10,000 workers for decades. Pension benefits date to the late 1940s and predecessor transit systems. The vacation terms were negotiated in 1989, said Tom Roth, a financial adviser to Amalgamated Transit Workers Union Local 689. Some other transit systems, including New York's, have similar vacation provisions.

Management has made proposals to cap overtime, Roth said, but the two sides could not agree on a plan. The issue will probably come up again next year when the union's contract expires, officials said.

Unlike truck drivers and railroad workers, Metro employees are not covered by federal rules governing hours of service. Metro's rules, which are similar to those of other transit agencies, limit bus and train operators' on-duty time to 16 hours in a 24-hour period. Operators must have at least eight continuous hours off between shifts. Bus drivers are not allowed to drive for more than five hours and 45 minutes without a break.

Catoe has assigned his top deputy, Gerald C. Francis, to head an overtime task force. Metro also needs to plan better for predictable ridership increases, such as during baseball games and Fourth of July celebrations, Catoe said.

Catoe said he also plans to end the practice of paying overtime to regularly scheduled bus drivers on standby for emergencies.

"Do I think that we have, from a management perspective, controlled [overtime] from the standpoint of best financial policies? No," Catoe said. "Do I think we have controlled it from the best safety practices of the organization? No. But that's not the employees' fault. That rests with me. That rests with management."

For the long term, he said, Metro needs to train and recruit more drivers, operators and rail mechanics to fill vacancies and increase staffing, the main reasons for overtime.

Metro has about 2,400 bus driver positions, but last year there were 150 vacancies, officials said. There are 538 train operators and 118 vacancies.

The average pay for bus drivers is about $21 an hour. Overtime, which kicks in after eight hours a day or 40 hours a week, is paid at 1.5 times hourly rates. A seventh day in one week pays double time.

First dibs on overtime go to a pool of 300 senior bus drivers, known as the "extra board." Their regular assignment is to cover for sick and vacationing workers. Their average pay is higher, about $26 an hour, and most average 20 hours of weekly overtime, officials said, or roughly $40,000 in overtime pay a year. On the rails, Metro is so short-handed that there is no "extra board," which means "every time someone is absent, every time someone is called off for training or whatever, we have to cover that on overtime," Catoe said.