Strike Averted as Office Cleaners Agree to New Contract

The union representing thousands of office cleaners in the District, Montgomery County, Baltimore and Northern Virginia tentatively agreed to a new four year contract Sunday night, just 24 hours before the contract was set to expire. Union members must still ratify the tentative agreement.

The new contract will provide cleaners from the Service Employees International Union with an average yearly pay increase of 4 percent over the next four years, according to the union’s bargaining committee.  The agreement was reached with the Commercial Building Cleaning Contractors Association, an organization representing the area's major commercial cleaning companies.

The contract covers nearly 12,000 office cleaners at buildings in our area, including Georgetown’s Washington Harbor, the Chevy Chase Bank Building and Discovery Building in Montgomery County, the USA Today building in Northern Virginia and the Bank of America Building in Baltimore, according to SEIU officials.