Some Cabbies Want Strike For Fare Increase

CHICAGO (WBBM)  -- Some Chicago cab drivers say they will go on a 24-hour strike beginning Sunday afternoon at 2 - unless the city moves toward a fare hike that would take effect January 1. 
 

 WBBM's Steve Miller Reports.   

Several dozen cab drivers who want a 16 percent increase on January 1 demonstrated outside the Thompson Center in the Loop yesterday - but they were drowned out by counter-demonstrating cab drivers, like Melissa Callahan, who says the city will give them a fare increase in the spring.

"You guys are a bunch of rebels.  That's it.  You want what you want right now.  You can't wait a couple of months."

"The city has already agreed to give us a fare increase.  They're proposing that in the springtime.  This is completely senseless.  There's no reason to strike right now.  All this is is just a power play by a group of radicals."

But Chicago Consumer Services Commissioner Norma Reyes says a fare increase in the spring is not a sure thing.

"It is under discussion.  It is certainly something that may happen."

Cab drivers usually get a fare increase every four years.  2009 would mark four years since cab drivers were last allowed to raise fares.