Grocery Store Workers Go On Hunger Strike Over Stagnant Wages

[kpete]

Source: Huffington Post

Grocery Store Workers Go On Hunger Strike Over Stagnant Wages

All night long, Jose Garcia performs his job while surrounded by food -- a painful bit of irony, he says.

The 52-year-old Mexican immigrant works the overnight shift cleaning floors inside a Cub Foods store in Minneapolis, Minn., a job he's mostly appreciated for the nine years he's held it down. But lately, waxing aisle after aisle filled with groceries has simply reminded him of how little he has.

Despite his long tenure with the same cleaning company, Garcia says he earns a wage of $9 an hour -- more or less the same rate he was making when he started cleaning floors back in 2002. Taking inflation into account, his salary has effectively gone down since he started working on the cleaning crew.

.............
Feeling desperate, Garcia and a former coworker are now in the midst of a hunger strike, posting up at an encampment in Minneapolis to bring attention to their plight. The goal of organizers and local clergy is to bring Cub Foods management to the bargaining table to negotiate pay.


Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/28/grocery-store-workers-hunger-minneapolis-minnesota-cub-foods_n_868195.html

[Dokkie]

1. something tells me

that the workers in the story are undocumented. Here in omaha, you can easily get $12+ with benefits for the same job. Dont ask me how I can make such a claim, its just a feeling

[blaze]

2. And if they are?

Aren't there a couple of laws on the books that could be thrown at Cub Foods?

[hughee99]

11. I don't think so. They don't work for Cub Foods.

"Like a lot of the workers who clean retail and food stores these days, Garcia doesn’t work directly for the store he cleans. He's employed by a company called Carlson Building Maintenance, which has a contract to wax and buff the floors inside Cub Foods stores, a chain concentrated in Minnesota."

[wickerwoman]

3. Yes, because undocumented workers are constantly trying to get into the media

by staging protests that call attention to their plight. I can hardly walk down the street without illegal aliens jumping in front of me and trying to get their picture taken by news organizations.

[Dokkie]

6. $9 per hr in this economy

I dont think he has much to lose. I know undocumented workers that make $21 + working construction, now I would be surprised if those guys participated in some media campaign.

[defendandprotect]

5. We need instant Social Security check and putting employers who hire illegals in jail -- !!

Elites would be forced to pay higher wages if they weren't being permitted to

exploit illegals --

$20 an hour should be the minimum wage -- and not even sure that's a living wage!!

[defendandprotect]

4. We're starving workers while producing fat cat CEO's ... putting seniors on CAT FOOD ...

while voting for millionaire and multi-millionaire members of Congress ---

We have urgent issues -- 50 million on food stamps -- 3 million Homeless !!

Crumbling infrastructure -- Global Warming is advancing rapidly -- two wars going

on ten years now bankrupting our Treasury -- Pentagon eating taxpayer money --

Corporate fascism --

Obama/Duncan warring on public education and teachers and unions --

And rightwing after what's left of the New Deal -- !!

[Sadie5]

7. Cub Foods

Advertise such low prices but never pay great wages. These days Cub foods wants to wring every last cent out of shoppers so there "LOW' prices are about the same as Kroger and the others. Lately they are expanding into smaller towns where other chains won't go. They probably will never pay good wages. They also advertise that that their low prices is due to no union involvement.

[Brickbat]

8. Most Cubs are union -- where have you seen these ads?

[Brickbat]

9. I'm confused -- why are they trying to get Cub Foods to the "bargaining table" and not the company

they work for?

[hughee99]

10. It sounds like the company they work for isn't doing so well,

so they're protesting their company's customers. Not sure how effective this strategy will be. In the end, even if they "win" I could see Cub Foods temporarily upping what they pay for services, and then going to another service once the contract is up. And is there any guarantee that if Cub foods pays more, that the workers will see any of that money?

[Brickbat]

17. But what does that mean, "isn't doing so well" -- is it failing? I still don't see why going after

a union grocery store is the way to solve this. I know the UFCW and other unions are supporting this, but I really can't figure out why it's going the way it is.

[hughee99]

18. It means they're getting less and less work, as

corporations cut back on cleaning expenses. The company may not be going under, but isn't profitable enough to start giving raises either. They may just be trying to stay afloat until the market turns around.

The workers seem to be targeting the grocery store in hopes of getting them to pay more for the same cleaning services they're getting now. Theoretically, I guess this is where their raises are supposed to come from, but from a practical standpoint, I don't think things are going to turn out well for them, even if they get this.

[ChrisBorg]

19. Grocery stores operate on a 3% margin.

At least that was the case when I worked in one.

[hughee99]

20. Yes, but these workers don't work for a grocery store

they work for a cleaning company contracted by a grocery store.

[ChrisBorg]

21. It still is calculated into the overhead.

[hughee99]

22. I'm not sure where you're going with this...

If the store's margin is 3%, calculating in the cleaning expenses, the company they work for (not the supermarket) may still be breaking even or even slowly losing money.

[annm4peace]

12. Here is some info from the group.

http://ctul.net/hunger-strike/

They have tried to bring light to the abuse in the retail cleaning through press conferences, marches, rallies, petitions.

that helped some and some stores responsed.

Here is some more info:

Abraham Leon, retail cleaning worker: “Many years ago at the stores I clean, some workers made up to $11 or $12 an hour. Now the workforce has been reduced, our workload has nearly doubled and many cleaning workers are barely making minimum wage. But it’s not just us, this problem is happening across the industry, to the point where we’ve seen a slavery ring in retail cleaning uncovered in Philadelphia. If we don’t do something to ensure fair wages and working conditions now, then we are heading a hundred miles an hour down a very slippery slope.”

Here are just a few of the serious violations of human rights in retail cleaning:

1. In July 2010 a slavery ring was uncovered in retail cleaning in the Northeast, involving workers who cleaned at Target, Kmart, Wal-Mart, Safeway and other locations.


Paquette Maintenance. Cleaned Lunds Food Holdings, Goodwill, Menards, Marshall’s, and other retail chains. In 2007 the United States Department of Labor (USDOL) carried out an investigation against Paquette Maintenance for failure to pay proper overtime to workers based in Minnesota. The USDOL found 106 violations totaling over $25,000 in unpaid wages. According to the USDOL investigator, it appeared that the company deliberately delayed responding to the investigation to be able to declare bankruptcy and not pay workers

[annm4peace]

13. Pay check bounce

Instead of improving as a result of the Wage/Hour investigations, pay practices became considerably worse: all paychecks for some 116 employees bounced in January ’08, and then again in February of 2009.”

Menards is a hardware store in Minnesota and some other nearby states:


Unfortunately, 2010 also marks another year of exploitation in retail cleaning; another year that large retail chains profit off the backs of the workers who clean their stores. One retail chain provides a particularly insightful window into this reality: Menards. What cleaning company would not want to gain a contract with a prestigious company such as Menards? As dozens of companies compete to underbid each other to gain contracts with large retail chains such as Menards, workers suffer the consequences: poverty wages, exploitation, wage theft, and threats of retaliation if you complain.

The following is just a glimpse of retail cleaning during one year at one retail chain, based on reports from workers who have been brave enough to come forward and fight for their rights:

November 2009. OBG Janitorial, cleaning Menards in Richfield. A long-term member of CTUL realized that workers were not being paid for all hours worked. When he complained, he was threatened with physical harm. After several weeks of pressure, OBG Janitorial finally compensated the worker the $500 he was owed.
May 2010. Maintenance One, cleaning Menards in Cambridge. Two workers approached CTUL because they had not been fully compensated their wages, totaling around $1,500 in unpaid wages. These two workers won their back wages, but we do not know how many other workers were impacted by this issue.
November 2010. Clearwater Cleaners, cleaning Menards in Stillwater. Two workers approached CTUL complaining about reports of unpaid wages, totaling over $4,200 in unpaid wages and damages. Workers have filed a complaint with the United States Department of Labor.
December 2010. Maintenance One, cleaning Menards in Cambridge. Just over six months after resolving the issue of unpaid wages for cleaning workers at the Menards in Cambridge, two more employees of Maintenance One approached CTUL regarding reports of unpaid wages, totaling around $7,000 in unpaid wages. CTUL is partnering with workers to recover their wages.

One year and over $13,000 in unpaid wages for six cleaning workers at only one retail chain; this based solely on the reports of workers who have been brave enough to fight back.

These issues are a problem throughout retail cleaning. It is time for locally based retail chains to accept their role in maintaining such exploitative working conditions in the cleaning of their stores. We are calling on Cub Foods to be a leader in changing this reality.

Retail cleaning workers are committed to ensuring that 2011 marks a new era in the retail cleaning industry – an era of dignity, respect, and living wages. We are confident that it is only a matter of time before locally based retail chains such as Cub Foods catch up with the workers.

[annm4peace]

14. there has been change with some companies

“We commend Target, SuperValu and Lunds & Byerly’s for establishing a positive image of social responsibility within our communities, and we feel confident that the stores will live up to this standard by meeting with workers,” Mario Colloly Torres, retail cleaning worker.

http://ctul.net/newsrecent-events/wall-of-hope/

[annm4peace]

15. Organizations that support the HUNGER strike

Faith-Based Organizations:

Jewish Community Action
Bethany Lutheran Church
Holy Trinity Lutheran Church
Spirit of Truth
NEW: Cherokee Park United Church (St. Paul)
Lyndale United Church of Christ (Minneapolis)
St. Paul’s Monastery Justice and Peace Committee
Justice Commission of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet and Consociates
Justice and Peace Network of the Sisters of St. Francis

Labor Organizations:

United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1189
Service Employees International Union Local 26
NEW: Minneapolis Federation of Teachers
St. Paul Federation of Teachers
Office and Professional Employees International Union Local 12
AFSCME Local 3800
Twin Cities branch of the Industrial Workers of the World

Community Organizations:

Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Coalition (MIRAc)
Minnesota Fair Trade Coalition
Neighborhoods Organizing for Change
Centro Campesino
La Conexion de las Americas
Minneapolis Autonomous Radical Space
Opposition to War and Occupation
Iraq Peace Action Coalition
Sisters of Camelot
Social Welfare Action Alliance

Student Organizations:

Minnesota Public Interest Research Group
Adelante, Macalester
Students for a Democratic Society, Macalester

[annm4peace]

16. Minneapolis City Council passed a resolution supporting ALL workers

Shortly after the press conference, we heard that the Minneapolis City Council unanimously passed a resolution supporting all workers including retail cleaning workers seeking better wages, working conditions and economic justice in the workplace.

Boycott Cub Foods at Minnehaha and Lake over Memorial Day Weekend!

http://ctul.net/hunger-strike/hunger-strike-daily-reports/may-27-hunger-strike-day-7/