Editor’s note: Most weeks, Rich Miller uses this newspaper column to highlight a story that’s appeared in his subscriber newsletter, Capitol Fax. This week’s column was written by his associate Isabel Miller.
Rep. Marty Moylan, D-Des Plaines, recently told me he was “astonished” by some Chicago Transit Authority employee paychecks.
Moylan, chair of the House Transportation: Rail Systems, Roads & Bridges Committee, is heading into the transit funding discussions armed with a 1½-thick binder filled with CTA salary data. The agency’s gross payroll for all employees in 2024 was close to a billion dollars.
Eight unionized CTA workers made more than $300,000 last year, and about 160 made more than $200,000, according to documentation posted online by the Regional Transportation Authority.
One of the CTA’s top-paid employees, a line worker with a base pay of $62.10 an hour, earned $347,363.11 in 2024. Normally he’d earn $129,168 per year for a standard 40-hour workweek. To reach his 2024 total payout, the line worker would have had to work an extra 45 hours each and every week at time-and-a-half or an extra 34 hours at double-time every week to reach his final 2024 income level.
These are all rough estimates which don’t account for on-call/standby payments, holidays, vacations or bonus pay.
An ironworker was paid $287,602.34 at $59.26 per hour last year. That employee would’ve had to work an extra 35 hours at time-and-a-half or 27 hours at double-time each and every week.
Another employee, a customer service representative earning $40.38 per hour, was paid $273,593.30, putting them at an extra 60 hours per week at time-and-a-half, or an extra 45 hours every week at double-time.
The Chicago area’s mass transit agencies are facing a combined “fiscal cliff” of $730 million in fiscal year 2026 that will rise to $1.2 billion over the next five years. But, declared Moylan, “This is going to be very hard for them to make the case that they need a billion dollars if there is no accountability on overtime.”
“I think there’s vast amounts of mismanagement here,” Moylan said. “Some people are taking advantage of the system. We need to get to the bottom of this, especially if they’re asking for a billion dollars.”
Moylan said he wants more transparency on overtime, including an explanation for why supervisors are signing off on so much of it.
Last month, Moylan submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to each transit agency requesting the total amount paid for overtime, remote work and their operating budgets. Moylan claimed he’s heard some workers are “getting overtime for [being on] standby for 12 hours a day.”
A CTA spokesperson denied Moylan’s claim, stating no CTA employee is “ever paid time-and-a-half or double-time to be on standby,” adding, “A limited number of employees are strategically deployed at targeted times to be on call as needed to maximize service delivery to customers.”
Moylan said the CTA must change “immediately.” He has repeatedly said in the past that he will not call any transit bill for a vote without significant agency reforms.
“We’ve had numerous complaints about [train safety]. They’re not clean, there’s smoking, crime,” Moylan said.
Chicago Federation of Labor President Bob Reiter told the Senate Transportation Committee later in the week that the CTA needs better management and coordination and more workers to reduce reliance on overtime.
“Overtime is driven by not having enough folks to do those services,” Reiter said. “Believe me, the amount of overtime you have to work to make the kind of money that people say is like ‘Oh my gosh,’ and get sticker shock. That person’s making a lot of sacrifice in their personal life.”
Amalgamated Transit Union Local 308 President Pennie McCoach followed up by telling the committee that CTA employees are often “pretty much forced” to stay beyond their shifts.
“[It’s the] policy that is put in place by CTA. If you are working eight hours and the next person doesn’t come to work, then you’re forced to stay there another eight hours, so it’s more so the policy of CTA, not the workers,” McCoach said.
The CTA spokesperson described the CTA as a “lean and efficient” organization and said the CTA has the lowest operating cost per vehicle revenue hour and lowest public funding per trip compared to its peer agencies.
CTA trains have only gotten slower, forced to travel well below their typical speeds across more and more sections of the “L,” agency data shows. Several factors can cause these so-called slow zones, but most often the restricted speeds are due to the condition of the track, often as it ages or deteriorates.
In February, slow zones covered some 30% of the rail system, up from 13% five years earlier. One of the most severely limited stretches of track is the Forest Park branch of the Blue Line once regularly taken by Hoskins, which the CTA has targeted for an overhaul. But speed restrictions can be found on every train line, also plaguing the Green Line, Brown Line and sections of the Red Line subway downtown.
Slower trains mean slower trips for riders, yet another source of frustration the CTA must contend with after years of complaints about service, conditions and safety. It is also one more hurdle for the CTA to overcome as the agency faces ridership that has still not returned to prepandemic levels, talk of transit reform in Springfield and looming local and federal financial concerns that could affect funding for work to bring trains back up to speed.
“It can be much more than an inconvenience,” said Jim Merrell, managing director of advocacy for the Active Transportation Alliance. “When you’re trying to get to work or an appointment, it can be a real setback for folks.”
- Felonious Gru - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 8:54 am:
On the one hand, it is interesting that a pro-labor Democrat like Moylan is going after union wages and contracts.
On the otherhand, I really hope that he and the budget staff know what they are talking about and have not for example conflated vacation day buyouts of retiring employees in their salary data.
I do not doubt there is some contentious overtime in the CTA spending just like with the Police department.
However these are jobs like air traffic controllers where you can’t just have the chair vacant.
- Sir Reel - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:05 am:
Union workers making $200-300K/year is just not right, regardless of OT rules. Hard to ask taxpayers to shell out more.
This tells me CTA management caved to the union on contracts. So let’s give them more money?
- Incandenza - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:10 am:
== So let’s give them more money? ==
It’s not that simple - there is obviously need for capital improvements which requires more money. The devil is in the details of how you appropriate and for what.
- Amalia - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:20 am:
Congrats to Isabel for that very informative story on the CTA. Astonishing details that illuminate need for change. Good on ya, Isabel!
- Gravitas - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:28 am:
Moylan is correct: the Chicago Transit Authority is badly mismanaged.
One of the stupidest decisions was to eliminate conductors on the elevated trains. The train operators simply cannot manage passengers and drive the trains simultaneously.
At the same time, the train stations have automated options for passengers to pay fares while staffers, who no longer accept cash fares and make change, sit and stare at the walls all day long.
- Larry Bowa Jr. - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:29 am:
“However these are jobs like air traffic controllers where you can’t just have the chair vacant.”
Having been a user of the system for most of my adult life, I couldn’t disagree more. You can definitely leave a ‘customer service’ chair vacant, and they usually are. Sometimes they’re functionally vacant even when they have a person in them. If the public’s choice is between vacancy and paying someone $300k/year to occupy that particular chair, vacancy is preferable. It’s not like the employees can troubleshoot Ventra’s machines or do anything else useful to customers.
- Back to the Future - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:33 am:
On Sunday my daughter texted me about this article. She is a big fan of these columns in the Times. She was also an English major in college and very picky on writing.Have to agree with her that this was a very well written article.
It’s the kind of journalism that you can only find in a major big city paper.
Hat tip to the Sun Times and Isabel Miller on the article.
- Henry Francis - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:37 am:
For god sake, a CTA bus driver died at a CTA terminal while sitting behind the wheel of her bus and no one noticed for almost an hour. If that doesn’t tell you what a criminal level of incompetence and lack of oversight/accountability has permeated CTA, then nothing will.
What the hell is the CTA board doing?
- Just Me 2 - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:51 am:
=== One of the stupidest decisions was to eliminate conductors on the elevated trains. ===
How do you fund those positions?
- 312Lawyer - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 9:55 am:
A CSR making more than a doctor is such a gross example of mismanagement that you could only find it in Gov.
If JB wants to have a chance in 2028, he must show progressive states can run efficiently. Don’t give the CTA another nickel until the entire thing is overhauled.
- Big Dipper - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:01 am:
Now maybe a Chicago rep should audit Des Plaines.
- Downstate - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:02 am:
Setting aside the compensation levels to union employees at MTA, NYC investment banks are being heavily scrutinized for allowing associates to work 100 hours per week. Based on these numbers, managers at CTA are being as “horrific” as those investment bankers when it comes to managing employees. (half snark)
- train111 - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:29 am:
I am a Metra craft employee.
If you want to reduce the overtime then you actually have to hire the proper amount of people to fill the open jobs.
In my location (major downtown station) - which is staffed 24/7 - when I started 7 years ago had 9 employees in my craft. Today there are 6. Those 3 positions - now filled with overtime. We had a vacation relief position to cover employee vacations and absences. That position - eliminated - coverage for vacations and absences is also now all overtime.
The solution - hire enough people to fill the open positions. However that is easier said than done. Despite good pay,good insurance and good retirement actually getting people to work off hours and weekends (where you will start at the bottom of seniority) - and even getting people who can pass the drug tests (FRA regulated, so follows federal pot laws) is very difficult.
So here we are paying out tons of overtime to fill vacant positions - that if filled with new hires would be paid at regular rates and would reduce costs.
I’m not defending these agencies record on this, just explaining from my perspective why it is happening. Also, I believe there is definitely grounds for reform in all 3 transit agencies.
train111
- James the Intolerant - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:30 am:
Metra has similar OT, don’t leave them out.
And I never saw a response to Kam Buckner’s request to see the $1.5M investigation about Metra Police issues.
- Here here - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:49 am:
This CTA story that reaks of outrageous salaries that waste tax dollars is another example of why Cook County government needs a performance review asap. With all the townships, mosquito abatement districts, cities, county — and all the audits — yet no one cried “foul” about the $300,000 salaries until now? Fire the entire leadership of CTA and start over.
- Jerry - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:49 am:
Thank you for explaining Train111. As a regular CTA rider I’m glad there are employees like yourself who can help keep the system in operation and do that labor intensive work. How about opening an iron working school within the prison system.
Having said that, there are turnstile jumpers who go right pass the security with their dogs. Regularly. And a Customer Service employee in the booth too.
And don’t get me started on the Blue Line between Kedzie and Forest Park.
- Annonin' - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:55 am:
Hope Isabell got a generous bonus from Capt. fax and the Sun Times for this effort. It will be interesting to what CBA provisions permit this. BTW we are not sure anyone ever thought CTA L trains designed for speed. Most like the less hassle, less costly than car ownership, park fees and yes — traffic jams.
- Original Rambler - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 10:56 am:
Just got back from NYC. Rode rapid transit there until 10 at night and always felt safe. Didn’t need a special card to got on, just swiped my credit card. CTA needs to get to this point just as a start.
Train111 points are well taken. Same goes for the CPD.
- ChicagoBars - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 11:13 am:
CTA had another abysmal weekend of meeting their scheduled service on the L. It is mind boggling they are paying this much in overtime, and having workers complain to reporters about being required to work overtime, and still somehow routinely missed their own scheduled service goals.
They’ve been fully funded for three years now thanks to Federal Covid grants for transit, and this is the service Chicago gets once they reached their operating revenue dream? Not an additional dime until wholesale changes are made.
- supplied_demand - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 11:54 am:
==Union workers making $200-300K/year is just not right, regardless of OT rules.==
Not saying you are wrong, but can you explain why (pensions, job security, etc.)? 15% of American workers make $200k+.
- Jerry - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 11:57 am:
The only relationship between scheduled service goals and iron workers would be if that section of the route was out of service (and down to single tracking). And depending on where an outage like that occurred it could affect multiple train lines.
So from now on I want the trains to magically fly over sections under repair. Not an additional dime until this happens.
- Blue Dog - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 12:44 pm:
Looks to me as if Rep Moylan could be part of the DOGE team.
- Rich Miller - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 12:48 pm:
===Looks to me as if Rep Moylan could be part of the DOGE team===
lol
Marty wants real management reforms, not willy-nilly slash and burn.
- sim1 - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 12:56 pm:
=== Didn’t need a special card to got on, just swiped my credit card. CTA needs to get to this point just as a start. ===
CTA has been at that “point” for many years. You can use any form of contactless payment. Riding CTA doesn’t require a special card. https://www.transitchicago.com/fares/
- Old IL Dude - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 1:51 pm:
We just accept it. Excessive OT? Oh, it’s just how it goes at CTA. Slow trains? Ghost buses? Hey, they don’t call it the Chicago Turtle Association for nothing.
It’s puzzling why no one has been held accountable for the cta being a slow and mismanaged organization for decades. How about $500K per foot of the Red Line extension that terms at a public housing project? Who is watching CTA?
- Just a Citizen - Monday, Mar 17, 25 @ 3:10 pm:
Great article Isabel. Good for you for highlighting this problem. It will be interesting to see whether the CTA makes any changes or continues with business as usual. If I were a betting person, I would put my money on the latter.