BILLINGS - The work week began Monday with much of the city's work force on strike - and in visible force - over pay and seniority issues, and leaders on both sides expected no immediate resolution.

Buses were idle, the library was closed and plans were being made for drop-off sites for residents' garbage as the strike by more than 350 city workers, members of the Teamsters Local 190, entered its third day.

''We're doing the best we can to provide services to our citizens,'' Mayor Chuck Tooley said, ''certainly not nearly at the level we offer and provide them when we have our excellent employees on the job.''

The union said Friday that workers would go on strike, effective at midnight, after agreement could not be reached on a new labor contract. Union members Wednesday narrowly rejected a three-year offer the city had termed its ''last, best and final.''

Workers include airport police, dispatchers, library and sanitation workers and bus drivers. They account for roughly 40 percent of the city's total work force, said Rick Harden, human resources manager for the city.

On Monday, a judge signed an order, agreed to by the two sides, that dispatchers would continue handling emergency calls. The city on Friday was granted an order to keep the dispatchers from walking off their jobs, and the union said it would not fight the order so long as dispatchers did not have to handle routine or rerouted calls.

Those calls, attorneys said, would be handled by a private service.

The effects of the strike were already being felt in Montana's largest city, population about 92,000. Regular bus service, which serves about 13,000 a week, and nearly all ''paratransit'' services for the handicapped or elderly have been suspended, transit manager Ron Wenger said.

At least three city parking garages were unmanned but open. And parking wasn't being enforced, though officials planned to clear meters periodically, assistant city administrator Tina Volek said.

The meters, she said, are ''still being fed by conscientious citizens.''

While plans were being made for trash drop-off sites, the city was also looking at hiring temporary workers to help with residential garbage, public works director Dave Mumford said.

Harden said the city will hire replacement workers - temporary or permanent - if it appears the strike will be extended. He did not elaborate.

Near the landfill Monday, striking sanitation worker Tony Lehner joined others on the picket line. Employees, he said, are resolved in their action.

''I kind of regret having to put the citizens in the middle of this, but we felt it was our only option,'' he said.

Last month, union members voted down an offer by the city and authorized a strike. A mediator worked with both sides in late July, and the city issued the offer the union rejected Wednesday.

While the offer addressed issues including longevity pay, union leaders say concerns remain with how long a worker must be employed for that to kick in. Another big issue for the union is seniority for promotions or vacancies.

Representatives for the two sides met briefly Thursday to see if there was common ground to work from. But a union leader said it yielded no real progress.

Harden said Monday no contract talks with the union were immediately planned and that it's up to the union to make a move.

''If they want to get back to the table, they know the constraints we're working under,'' he said.

Dee Brown, who's been a part of the bargaining team and was on the picket line Monday outside the library, said both sides need to put aside their ''personality issues'' and get back to the bargaining table.

''We've got to be willing to sit down and talk. Otherwise, it's going to get ugly,'' she said. ''And nobody needs it to get ugly.'' Library worker Melanie Tibbetts, who was also picketing, wore a yellow button that read: ''Solidarity Forever.''