Small business owners voice support for sick-time ordinance in St. Paul

August 8, 2016 by
Ward 6 co-owner Eric Foster speaks at a press conference arranged by a coalition of businesses supporting St. Paul's proposed sick-time ordinance.

Ward 6 co-owner Eric Foster speaks at a press conference arranged by a coalition of businesses supporting St. Paul’s proposed sick-time ordinance.

 

At a press conference today, small business owners in St. Paul said passing a citywide sick-time ordinance is the right thing to do – not only for the health of their workers, but also the health of their bottom lines.

Providing employees with earned sick and safe time makes them less likely to jump ship for more stable benefits, according to members of the Main Street Alliance. The small-business coalition has signed up more than 40 St. Paul businesses that support the proposed ordinance, and several used the press conference at Workhorse Coffee to counter Chamber of Commerce claims that it would drive employers out of town.

Matt Zanetti, co-owner of Lake Monster Brewing Company, said he could understand why some businesses owners would “look at the bottom line and say, how are we going to make this work?” But after taking a closer look, most discover that “paid sick time is an easy way to make sure you’re retaining people.”

Lake Monster Brewing co-owner Matt Zanetti explains his support of a citywide sick-time ordinance while holding his son, Leo.

Lake Monster Brewing co-owner Matt Zanetti explains his support of a citywide sick-time ordinance while holding his son, Leo.

“When we have to hire new people, we have to spend money and time to train them,” Bob Parker of Ward 6 restaurant added.

Parker’s co-owner, Eric Foster, served on a task force appointed by the City Council to study the issue of earned sick and safe time. He took direct aim at the Chamber’s narrative.

“Sometimes some groups have a tendency to say the sky is going to fall if we do this, and it never does,” Foster said. Raising  minimum standards when it comes to workers’ health and safety, he added, would end the “race to the bottom” among employers competing to cut costs.

The City Council is on track to take action on the issue Aug. 24.

Both the task force and the city’s human rights commission have voted to recommend an ordinance requiring all employers to provide workers with one hour of sick time for every 30 hours they work, with sick-time earnings capped at 48 hours per year. If adopted, the proposed ordinance would extend benefits to an estimated 70,000 workers – and put St. Paul among about 25 cities nationwide with a sick-time rule on the books.

Council President Russ Stark, who attended the press conference in his ward, said council members’ “ears are still open,” but reiterated his commitment to passing “a strong ordinance.”

Stark also reflected on his experience as a working parent of young children, being notified while at work that one had fallen ill.

“Anyone who’s had kids in day care has gotten that call. It’s not a choice. You just have to go,” Stark said. “But some people face consequences for leaving work at that time.”

In addition to expressing support for the sick-time ordinance, Main Street Alliance also rolled out a “Shop Your Values” campaign for consumers looking to support St. Paul businesses that back earned sick and safe time. Find details, a map of participating locations and information about joining the alliance at www.tinyurl.com/SYV-STP.

“We know many small businesses both here in St. Paul and statewide care about their employees and their communities,” alliance director Corinne Horowitz said. “We encourage Minnesotans to shop their values, and patronize businesses that support their employees, the community, and working families.”

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Retail janitors win agreement with Best Buy on eve of shareholder summit

June 14, 2016 by
Workers celebrated outside Best Buy's corporate headquarters in Richfield this morning, hours after the company agreed to use responsible cleaning contractors inside its stores.

Workers celebrated outside Best Buy’s corporate headquarters in Richfield this morning, hours after the company agreed to use responsible cleaning contractors inside its stores.

 

A protest planned by retail janitors today outside Best Buy’s corporate headquarters turned into a celebration after executives agreed to partner with workers on efforts to ensure people who clean the company’s stores have safe and fair working conditions.

The agreement, reached late last night on the eve of Best Buy’s annual shareholder meeting, puts the Richfield-based corporation on track to join Target in implementing a Responsible Contractor Policy, organizers with the Twin Cities low-wage worker center CTUL said.

Target approved the policy two years ago, and it includes provisions ensuring a safe and fair process for workers organizing for a voice on the job. The agreement with Best Buy, according to CTUL, will ensure “a responsible janitorial contractor” cleans Best Buy stores.

Outside the shareholder meeting today, janitors and their supporters from the community praised Best Buy for doing right by workers who clean its stores.

“I’m happy that Best Buy has heard our voices and has taken a leadership role to improve the janitorial industry here in Minnesota,” said Jose Gonzalez, an employee of KBS who cleans an area Best Buy store. “I am confident that janitors who clean Best Buy will be able to begin a dialogue with our employer and improve our working conditions.”

One year ago, workers like Gonzalez banged on drums, carried signs and chanted slogans outside the annual shareholder meeting. Today, they quietly reflected on how far their campaign to raise wages and improve conditions for retail janitors – now entering its seventh year – has come.

“This news makes me very happy,” said longtime CTUL activist Maricela Flores, who cleans an area Target store as an employee of Carlson. “Today, because of our struggle to bring these injustices to light, Best Buy has listened to our petitions and is showing leadership by agreeing to contract a responsible janitorial contractor to clean their stores.”

Cleaning workers and supporters demonstrated outside Kohl's, urging the retailer to follow Best Buy's lead.

Cleaning workers and supporters demonstrated outside Kohl’s, urging the retailer to follow Best Buy’s lead.

The victory gives Flores and other workers a shot of momentum as they push other retailers to join Target and Best Buy – momentum they wasted no time putting to use.

After leaving the Best Buy campus, workers crossed the bridge over I-494 to demonstrate inside and outside a Kohl’s store. Two CTUL activists, employees of the cleaning contractor Kimco, described the conditions they face cleaning Kohl’s stores, including long hours and low wages with no voice on the job.

Workers have been pushing Kohl’s to address concerns about the cleaning contractor for more than two years.

It might not be Kohl’s, but other major retailers in the Twin Cities may be on the cusp of giving janitors less cause for protest and more cause for celebration. CTUL organizers today credited Herberger’s for taking “positive steps” toward implementing a policy similar to the one Best Buy approved.

“We hope that other stores will follow large corporations like Best Buy and Target in working to recognize the need for change in the retail janitorial field in Minnesota,” Flores said.

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Hospital workers take a stand for paid sick time

May 3, 2016 by
Madeline Gardner, a member of the MN Nurses Association, spoke in favor of a citywide ordinance making paid sick time mandatory.

Madeline Gardner, a member of the MN Nurses Association, spoke in favor of a citywide ordinance making paid sick time mandatory.

Nurses and hospital workers today added their voices to the call for guaranteed access to earned sick and safe time for all workers, urging members of the Minneapolis City Council to take up a robust citywide ordinance when they meet Thursday.

It’s estimated 42 percent of Twin Cities workers don’t receive earned sick and safe time benefits. They are forced to make choices no one should have to make, health care workers said at a press conference outside Abbott Northwestern Hospital.

Jeff Sarro, who schedules patient appointments at Abbott Northwestern, said he’s “witnessed several patients have to choose between their appointments and feeding their families.”

Madeline Gardner, a labor and delivery nurse, said working parents shouldn’t be forced to choose “between staying home with a child who’s too sick to go to school or being able to pay the rent that month. Life just doesn’t need to be that stressful.”

And Christina Cortez, who has worked at the McDonald’s restaurant inside Abbott Northwestern for 10 years, said she still doesn’t get earned sick time – even though she works in a health care facility.

The press conference was organized by the Minnesota Nurses Association, SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and the Twin Cities-based worker center CTUL to highlight support for the policy recommendations of the Workplace Partnership Group, a task force set up by Minneapolis’ mayor and city council.

Jeff Sarro, who schedules patients' appointments at Abbott Northwestern, said it's not uncommon to hear people say they can't take time off work to get well.

Jeff Sarro, who schedules patients’ appointments at Abbott Northwestern, said it’s not uncommon to hear people say they can’t take time off work to get well.

At a news conference yesterday, workers and business owners of color gave their support to the WPG’s recommendations.

The WPG included representatives of large and small businesses, as well as workers, and it hosted listening sessions across the city over the last four months before voting 13-1 in favor of its recommendations.

If turned into a citywide ordinance, Gardner said, the WPG recommendations would make for “breath-of-fresh-air public policy.”

A group similar to the WPG is considering earned sick and safe time recommendations to the St. Paul City Council. The advisory committee is expected to finish its work by this summer.

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Nursing home workers see Fight for $15 as vital to quality care

April 15, 2016 by
Golden Living Center workers Rhoda Brown (L) and Tsge Abraham rally for a fair contract outside the company's Lakeridge site in Roseville.

Golden Living Center workers Rhoda Brown (L) and Tsge Abraham rally for a fair contract outside the company’s Roseville facility.

On the same day over 100 Twin Cities fast-food workers went on strike, area nursing home workers took up the “Fight for $15” as well, rallying outside a Roseville care center for a contract that includes fair wages.

Employees of Golden Living Center welcomed nursing-home residents, striking fast-food workers and other supporters to an informational picket line outside GSL’s Lakeridge site in Roseville yesterday.

About 350 members of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota are in contract negotiations with the company, which operates nursing homes across the state. Tim Sorenson, a 25-year employee and member of the union’s negotiating team, said workers want GSL to put a recent influx of state funding for nursing homes where lawmakers intended the money to go – into workers’ paychecks.

“It’s getting harder to find people who want to do this work for the pay we get,” Sorenson said. “Yet our work is very important. We take care of the most vulnerable people among us, our seniors.”

In Minnesota, certified nursing assistants’ median hourly wage is $12.22, and one-third rely on public assistance. It’s a major reason turnover rates for nursing assistants exceeded 50 percent in 2012 and are expected to climb – an alarming trend in an industry expected to see an uptick in demand as baby boomers retire.

“Too many people I work with want to go to other jobs where there’s better pay instead of staying in this job to take care of our seniors,” Sorenson said.

Tim Sorenson speaks at the rally outside GLC's Lakeridge home.

Tim Sorenson speaks at the rally outside GLC’s Lakeridge home.

Sorenson and other GSL workers were among SEIU members in more than 40 cities nationwide who stood up for fair wages and quality care at nursing homes. The timing of the nationwide day of action – on the same day fast-food workers in a record 320 cities went on strike – is more proof that the “Fight for $15” is catching on among low-wage workers in all sectors of the economy.

“No matter if you’re in health care or maintenance or whatever, we all need to be there for each other,” Sorenson said. “That helps you get what you’re after in the long run.”

GSL workers’ current union contract is set to expire May 1.

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Retail janitors pledge strikes will continue until conditions improve

February 18, 2016 by

web.CTUL-strikeA day after union janitors walked off the job in an unfair-labor-practices strike, non-union janitors organizing with the Twin Cities-based worker center CTUL did the same, picketing early this morning outside Macy’s on the Nicollet Mall.

It marked the seventh time in the last three years CTUL janitors, who clean big-box stores, car dealerships and other retail properties, have gone on strike to protest low pay, backbreaking conditions and rampant wage theft in the industry.

Luciano Balbuena, who cleans an area Home Depot, said the strikes would continue until cleaning contractors engage in a meaningful dialogue with workers about their concerns.

“We have been demanding from our companies for some time to respect what we’re asking for, and they refuse,” Balbuena, an employee of the cleaning contractor Kimco, told supporters on the picket line. “I hope this strike is the last we’ll have to have, and we will win fair wages and working conditions.”

Organizing through CTUL, a Spanish acronym for “Center of Workers United in Struggle,” has led to significant victories for retail janitors in the past, including a Responsible Contractor Agreement with Target that sets scheduling, safety and other standards the retailer’s Twin Cities cleaning contractors must meet.

And earlier this week, CTUL janitors who cleaned Macy’s and Herberger’s stores won $425,000 in unpaid wages and damages after settling a class-action lawsuit against Capital Building Services Group.

The back-pay is welcome, CTUL member Jesus Sanchez said, but it shouldn’t take a lawsuit for janitors to get paid for the hours they work.

“Wage theft is an all too common problem for retail janitors,” Sanchez said. “We don’t need a band-aid. We need a cure. And that cure is a voice on the job, union rights and $15 an hour.”

Demonstrators take over an intersection in downtown Minneapolis during morning rush hour.
Striking janitors and their supporters prepare to march.
Striking CTUL member Luciano Balbuena: “I hope this strike is the last strike we will have to have.”
CTUL strikers on the picket line outside Macy’s in downtown Minneapolis.

After walking the picket line for nearly two hours before dawn, striking janitors from CTUL and SEIU Local 26 marched alongside allies in the labor, faith and progressive community, blocking traffic at several downtown intersections during rush hour.

Protesters called on corporations to do their part in addressing Minnesota’s racial and economic disparities – among the most glaring in the nation.

“While Minnesota houses some of the wealthiest corporations in the country it also houses some of the worst racial and economic disparities in the nation,” said Donna Cassutt, Director of Minnesotans for a Fair Economy, which organized the march. “Minnesota’s largest corporations harm communities of color when they pay poverty wages, don’t invest in our schools by paying their fair share and practice toxic banking practices that pollute our environment and extract wealth from our communities.

“These corporations have the ability to powerfully impact our communities if they stand up and do the right thing by paying a living wage.”

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Striking janitors: ‘We do the dirty work, we deserve a better wage’

February 17, 2016 by

web.Local26-strike.msp1

Union janitors are setting up picket lines across the Twin Cities today, raising the stakes in their fight to win a $15 minimum wage and address alarming workload issues.

The one-day strike over unfair labor practices will impact nearly 200 office buildings in the area before the day is done, according to Local 26 of the Service Employees International Union, which represents about 4,000 janitors in contract negotiations.

Although employed by several different cleaning contractors, members of Local 26 work inside the offices of the state’s corporate elite, including Medtronic, U.S. Bank, 3M and United Health Group.

The day’s first picket line popped up at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. Janitors marched and chanted slogans in several languages outside the drop-off area at Terminal 1.

Terry Groce, third from left, walks the picket line with other MSP Airport janitors.

Terry Groce, third from left, walks the picket line with other MSP Airport janitors.

Terry Groce, whose duties include waxing floors and separating compostable waste from garbage, said his wages haven’t kept pace with his ever-increasing workload during the two years he’s worked at MSP.

“We do more than people see to make the airport look good,” said Groce, who earns $14.80 per hour. “We do the dirty work. We work with chemicals. We work hard, and we deserve a better wage.”

Groce isn’t the only janitor being asked to do more without getting paid more. Reductions in the Twin Cities’ janitorial workforce over the last decade have created dangerous, backbreaking conditions in the industry, with many janitors cleaning the equivalent of 20 homes in one night on the job, according to a report released last month.

It’s dangerous work, too. Building-cleaning and maintenance occupations had the highest rate of lost time due to work-related injury or illness in Minnesota during 2014.

Janitors are seeking several gains in contract negotiations to remedy the workload crisis, including a greater voice over staffing levels and safety procedures, in addition to wages and health benefits that reflect the work’s dangerous and stressful nature.

Union janitors walk a picket line outside the Securian building in downtown St. Paul.

Union janitors walk a picket line outside the Securian building in downtown St. Paul.

Brahim Kone, who cleans the Minnesota Department of Human Services’ offices in St. Paul, said Local 26’s previous contract included language stipulating that employers would not put “unreasonable” workload demands on janitors.

“But what’s unreasonable?” asked Kone, a Maplewood resident who has worked as a janitor for the last 15 years.

“We need the language to be something solid, something specific. Otherwise the (contractors) will just keep increasing and increasing and increasing. I’ve seen it over and over again.”

Janitors’ previous contract expired at the end of 2015, and talks between to the two sides began in October 2015. According to the union, cleaning contractors have refused to address the workload crisis, instead offering a contract that would leave nearly half of the union’s members earning below $15.

Negotiations are scheduled to resume Monday.

“We’re out here showing the bosses that we’re serious, that we want them to do the right thing,” Kone said.

Non-union janitors in the Twin Cities, members of the worker center CTUL, plan a strike of their own tomorrow.

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White House summit lifts up Minnesota workers’ success stories

February 9, 2016 by
Renee Brand, who works at the New Flier bus plant in St. Cloud, introduces Labor Secretary Tom Perez at the Worker Voice Summit in Minneapolis. "I'm living proof manufacturing is alive in the U.S.," the CWA member said.

Renee Brand, who works at the New Flier bus plant in St. Cloud, introduces Labor Secretary Tom Perez in Minneapolis. “I’m living proof manufacturing is alive in the U.S.,” the CWA member said.

 

When President Obama called a Worker Voice Summit at the White House last October, he pledged his administration would hold regional summits across the country in 2016 to continue the conversation about common issues working people face on the job.

The first of those summits took place in Minneapolis today – and with good reason, U.S. Secretary of Labor Tom Perez told area workers, business owners, union leaders and elected officials gathered at a community center in south Minneapolis.

Minnesota is “ground zero,” Perez said, for successful and innovative strategies that serve as a model for workers looking to gain a meaningful voice on the job.

Labor Secretary Tom Perez stops for a photo with an AFSCME member at the Worker Voice Summit.

Labor Secretary Tom Perez stops for a photo with an AFSCME member at the Worker Voice Summit.

Perez pointed to faculty at the University of Minnesota who will vote soon on forming a union, retail janitors who won a historic agreement with Target to improve standards in their industry and SuperAmerica workers organizing outside the margins of a traditional union drive.

“Workers need a seat at the table,” Perez said. “We need to build bigger tables rather than taller fences in this country.”

Since Obama took office at the height the Great Recession, his administration has shepherded a recovery that’s succeeded on many fronts. The unemployment rate recently dipped below 5 percent, and the auto industry has come “roaring back,” Perez noted.

But wage growth has been sluggish, and while the economic recovery succeeded in creating new jobs, many lack traditional, full-time schedules and benefits like paid sick time and family leave.

The Worker Voice Summit, Perez said, is an effort to tackle the “unfinished business of ensuring this wind that is at our back results in prosperity for everyone, not just for a few people at the top.”

Local workers participated in a panel discussion led by Department of Labor Office of Policy head Sharon Block (L). They include SuperAmerica co-manager Tara Lee Johnson (R) and Maricel Flores (second from left), who cleans a Target in Shakopee.

Local workers participate in a panel discussion led by the Department of Labor’s Sharon Block (L). They include SuperAmerica co-manager Tara Lee Johnson (R) and Maricela Flores (second from left), who cleans a Target in Shakopee.

To do that, summit organizers are lifting up best practices for organizing workers in the new economy, and a panel discussion held after Perez’s keynote speech today highlighted several local success stories.

Tara Lee Johnson, a SuperAmerica co-manager from St. Cloud, talked about her leadership in putting pressure on the convenience-store chain to improve its hiring practices and working conditions. High turnover rates make it difficult to organize a traditional union, she said, but with support from two union-backed community outreach initiatives, Working America and the Greater Minnesota Worker Center, workers won a meeting with the company’s president to discuss their concerns.

“They’ve given us a voice,” Johnson said of Working America and the worker center. “They’ve educated us about our rights.”

Target janitor Maricela Flores, a member of the Twin Cities-based worker center CTUL, appeared on the panel with a corporate vice president. They recounted the series of meetings that led to agreement on a Responsible Contractor Policy that stipulates scheduling and safety requirements Target’s cleaning contractors must meet – and provides workers with a pathway to collective bargaining.

Flores said she hopes other retailers follow Target’s example and take a collaborative – rather than adversarial – approach to dealing with workers’ concerns. She noted that CTUL members who clean Macy’s stores in the metro plan to strike Feb. 18 unless the company agrees to a meaningful dialogue about working conditions.

“Each and every one of us are human beings, and we deserve respect,” she said. “We deserve to have a voice on the job.”

U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, whose district includes Minneapolis, drew a connection between elevating workers’ collective voice and addressing the region’s alarming economic disparities between white workers and people of color.

“We’re proud of our state and proud of our town,” Ellison said. “But we’ve got to do something, and conversations like this are part of the solution.”

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Fight for $15 putting upward pressure where it’s needed – on wages

January 27, 2016 by
Fast food strikers and supporters rallied during a one-day strike in Minneapolis last April.

Fast food strikers and supporters rallied during a one-day strike in Minneapolis last April.

Currents across the country created a wave of support for $15 as a just minimum wage last year, with fast-food workers in New York and airport workers in Seattle scoring high-profile victories in the so-called “Fight for $15.”

But the rising tide is lifting wages for local workers as well, including some who carry union cards.

Several contracts recently negotiated by Minnesota unions demonstrate how $15 per hour is becoming a new threshold for wages – not only among unorganized fast food workers, but also among people working in banks, nursing homes, local government and beyond.

The idea of $15 as a minimum wage has “crept into the consciousness” of working people, SEIU Healthcare Minnesota President Jamie Gulley said.

Employers are taking note too.

St. Paul Federal Credit Union unilaterally established $15 as its base wage last fall, resulting in raises of $1 to $3 per hour for several employees. Tom Glatt, CEO of St. Paul Federal, acknowledged that “talk on the national level” about $15 per hour was a catalyst for the financial institution’s decision.

The buzz around $15 began when fast-food workers in New York staged strikes for $15 and union rights more than two years ago. The spark quickly spread quickly to all corners of the U.S., including the Twin Cities.

“It was laughed at when it first started,” Gulley said. But since then, cities like Los Angeles and Seattle have established $15 minimum-wage laws, and New York state lawmakers passed a measure last September requiring fast-food restaurants in the city to pay $15 by 2018.

No one’s laughing anymore.

“Now workers are bringing the same demands to their union meetings and saying, ‘If fast-food workers can get $15, why can’t I get $15?’” Gulley said. “That’s what is so great about the demand.”

In December 2014, more than 200 people joined a march in support of establishing $15 as a minimum wage at MSP Airport.

In December 2014, more than 200 people joined a march in support of establishing $15 as a minimum wage at MSP Airport.

Winning $15 in contracts

Members of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota were among the first locally to seize on the momentum of the Fight for $15 and incorporate it as a demand at the bargaining table.

Last February, members who work in hospitals across the Twin Cities and at the Mayo Clinic won contracts guaranteeing full- and part-time workers make at least $15 per hour within their first six months on the job.

Other bargaining units have claimed similar victories since then:

• In separate negotiations last fall, Hennepin County and the University of Minnesota reached new contracts with six locals of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees that establish $15 minimum wages.

AFSCME Local 34 President Jean Diedrich, a leader in negotiations with the county, called the $15 minimum wage “one of the big wins,” particularly for clerical workers. “Anyone who begins employment with Hennepin County (in 2016) will do so knowing that they will earn at least $15 per hour,” she said.

• Hospitality workers at Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport, newly organized members of UNITE HERE Local 17, saw their wages increase by up to $4 per hour and into the $15 range as a result of their first union contract, which also provides comprehensive health benefits, according to the union.

• St. Paul Federal Credit Union didn’t wait for contract negotiations to establish a $15 starting wage for members of Office and Professional Employees Local 12, which represents 16 to 19 tellers, member-services representatives, loan officers and accounting employees.

“Our contract states they can pay higher (wages) if they want to,” Local 12 representative Lance Lindeman said. “I was surprised, to say the least. I know ($15 per hour) is significantly more than a lot of other banks or credit unions in the Twin Cities pay their employees.”

Glatt, the credit union’s CEO, said investing in “the folks who are the face of the credit union” is money well spent.

“We may be ‘small’ in terms of asset size for a financial institution, but I would put our workers up against any institution of any size as far as delivery of quality service goes, so we didn’t want to lose any of our people to any other employer because of money,” Glatt said.

• Direct-care workers in nursing homes across the state are seeing wage gains as big as $5 per hour as they negotiate new union contracts in the wake of a legislative victory last year that reduced funding disparities between urban and rural care centers.

Sonja Lemire, an SEIU member who has worked at Parkview Care Center in Buffalo for the last 38 years, said her unit recently negotiated a contract that raised wages for all nurses and nursing assistants by $2 in 2016.

“That’s astronomical for us, tremendous,” Lemire said. The bump in pay makes the starting wage $14.86, or “almost to that $15 an hour mark,” she added.

Lemire said union members worked together to push the reimbursement increase through the Legislature, and now they’re working locally to make sure the funds trickle down into workers’ paychecks.

“Employees across the state are seeing the Fight for $15 is real, and a lot are doing their part,” she said.

352A ‘wageless’ recovery

Whether small or large in scale, wage increases for any group of workers are reason for celebration, as slow wage growth has been dragging down the U.S. economy since the start of the 2008-09 Great Recession.

Economist Lawrence Mishel, president of the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute, wrote in a recent blog post that from the beginning of the economic recovery in 2009 to 2014 (the most recent year for which data was available), the income of median working-age households dropped by almost $3,000, from $63,532 to $60,462, when adjusted for inflation.

“This followed the earlier period from 2000-07 where income fell 3.4 percent,” Mishel wrote. “So, we’ve had 14-15 years of pitiful income growth. No wonder people are not feeling the recovery.”

Most economists agree annual wage growth between 3.5 and 4 percent is ideal, but few workers – union or non-union – this side of Wall Street are realizing those kinds of gains.

Generating an upward push from the low-wage sectors of the economy probably would help, and that’s one reason organized labor has thrown its support behind Fight for $15 campaigns, low-wage worker centers and efforts to pass local minimum-wage ordinances, including in St. Paul and Minneapolis.

“Unions are experiencing a difficult time making (wage) gains in collective bargaining,” Gulley said. “The thinking in SEIU was we needed to have a fight over wages that was broader than just the labor movement and across the whole economy.

“Every victory shows that it’s possible – cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle and others are making these huge gains. It just shows it is possible if you’re organized.”

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SuperAmerica workers’ concerns fall on deaf ears

November 18, 2015 by

web.MySAJustice-bullhornSuperAmerica continues to stonewall workers looking to meet with corporate leadership to discuss concerns about low pay, favoritism and poor working conditions.

Workers from the St. Cloud area, organizing with Working America and the Greater Minnesota Worker Center, brought their campaign to the Twin Cities yesterday. Joined by allies in the labor movement and students from St. Cloud State University, they demonstrated outside a SuperAmerica store in St. Paul and staged a brief sit-in at the company’s headquarters in Woodbury.

But they didn’t get the meeting SuperAmerica President Jack Helmick they’ve been demanding for months.

SA workers and supporters march outside the store on Lexington and I-94 in St. Paul.
Workers are calling for higher wages, fair scheduling, broader access to management jobs and improved safety standards.
The demonstration in St. Paul continued for about 30 minutes in a steady rain.
James Quaye, a student at St. Cloud State who works at an SA, delivers a petition and letter to the store manager in St. Paul.

“The community has spoken,” said David Wakely, statewide program director for Working America. “After today’s action, SuperAmerica can’t continue to ignore the requests of working families in the Twin Cities.”

Workers delivered a petition to the Minnesota-based convenience store chain outlining their demands, including two week’ notice of their schedules, improved workplace safety standards and a commitment to putting more women and people of color on the track to management positions.

Speaking at a day of action among low-wage workers in Minneapolis last week, Makaida Garrett, a mother of five who has worked at a Super America in St. Cloud for about a year, said she said she earns just $9.50 per hour and was recently passed over for a management-track job.

“There are many women and people of color who work at this company but are not properly represented in management,” she said.

Garrett and other SuperAmerica workers marched alongside striking food service workers and janitors on the picket line last week, and several janitors and fast-food workers returned the favor yesterday, protesting in the rain outside the gas station at Lexington Avenue and I-94.

Working America is the community affiliate of the nation’s largest labor federation, the AFL-CIO. More than 259,000 Minnesotans are active Working America members. The Greater Minnesota Worker Center (GMWC) is focused on creating systemic change and social justice for low-wage workers in the St. Cloud area.

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Striking workers revive campaign for Working Families Agenda

November 10, 2015 by
Striking workers and their supporters rally outside a McDonald's and Super America in Northeast Minneapolis.

Striking workers and their supporters rally outside a McDonald’s and Super America in Northeast Minneapolis.

 

Fast-food workers and retail janitors from 70 Twin Cities stores joined a nationwide strike today, rallying early this morning with other low-wage workers in support of a $15 minimum wage, paid sick days and other policies in the stalled Working Families Agenda.

Workers in 270 cities planned to join the strike, which mostly targeted fast-food employers. Organizers said it was the largest strike of the Fight for $15 campaign to date – a sign of growing support for workers’ demands of $15 and union rights.

Locally, striking workers also included retail janitors, who, like fast-food workers, are organizing with the Twin Cities-based worker center CTUL, a Spanish acronym for Center for Workers United in the Struggle. Home care workers, bank workers, childcare providers, temp workers and Black Lives Matter activists bolstered their ranks on early-morning picket lines outside McDonald’s and Macy’s in Minneapolis.

Steven Suffrage, who works at a fast-food restaurant in Minneapolis, fires up the crowd.

Steven Suffrige, who works at a fast-food restaurant in Minneapolis, fires up the crowd.

Guillermo Lindsey, who works at a McDonald’s in Roseville, said he and other strikers are among “thousands of low-wage workers in  Minneapolis and in the nation who have taken bold action for change in their communities.”

The strikers seized on the nationwide events as an opportunity to renew pressure on the Minneapolis City Council to pass the Working Families Agenda – a $15 minimum wage, paid sick time, fair scheduling and increased enforcement of wage theft.

Mayor Betsy Hodges and a majority of council members recently backed away from their support of sick time and scheduling ordinances. Workers planned to march from a picket line outside Macy’s on Nicollet Mall to City Hall to serve notice that the fight was far from over.

“Seattle is getting $15. New York is getting $15,” 16-year fast-food veteran Steven Suffrige said. “Why can’t we get $15?”

Recent polling indicates the public is on Suffrige and other low-wage workers’ side. Among likely voters in Minneapolis, according to a poll conducted by Minnesotans for a Fair Economy, 82 percent support raising the minimum wage to $15 now or over time, and 91 percent support fair scheduling and paid time off for illnesses or family emergencies.

By delaying action on the Working Families Agenda, strikers said, city officials are further denying justice to low-wage workers, many of whom are women and minorities.

“I work seven days a week,” said striking worker Michaela Hudson, who cleans the Macy’s in Ridgedale Mall. “I don’t get a day off; I don’t get any benefits.”

DSC_0217 (2)Lena Gardner, a leader of the Black Lives Matter movement in Minneapolis, said the average worker of color in Minneapolis earns $28,000 annually, compared to $74,000 for the average white worker. “They want our bodies to control for their profits, but they don’t want our lives to matter,” Gardner said.

In addition to targeting fast-food restaurants and retail cleaning contractors, the strike took aim at Super America. The Minnesota-based chain of gas stations has come under fire from workers in St. Cloud, organizing with Working America and the Greater Minnesota Worker Center, for its hiring practices.

Workers have been asking the company for a meeting about the issue for months, said Makaida Garrett, a mother of five who has worked at a Super America in St. Cloud for about a year. Meanwhile, she continues to earn just $9.50 per hour and was recently passed over for a management-track position.

“There are many women and people of color who work at this company but are not properly represented in management,” Garrett said. “We are no longer asking for that meeting; we are demanding that they meet with us.”

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