News

Business Rep Steven Lua reports that in December, Watsonville Community Hospital filed for bankruptcy. If this, the only hospital in Watsonville, were to close, it would be devastating not only for the 55 Teamsters who work in the business department, but for the entire community.

Lua and the Teamsters sprang into action. Working with Joint Council 7 Political Director Doug Bloch and with the Matt Broad, advocate for the California Teamsters Public Affairs Council, they worked with community leaders to help establish the Pajaro Valley Health Care District and raise $25 million from the State to use toward the $60 million purchase price of the bankrupt hospital. As of September 1, the new health district will own the hospital, and every Teamster member will be able to keep their job and their benefits.

Lua wanted to also thank the Beeson and Rosenfeld law firms for playing a huge part with ensuring fairness out of the bankruptcy. “Specifically, Catherine Holzhauser with Beeson did a great job on filing claims for all of our members.”

The hospital is home to 600 employees and four different unions. “This was a win for all unions involved and it was great working alongside the other unions to make it happen,” Lua adds. “It really shows how coming together in Union can have such an incredible impact on an entire community.”

Congratulations to everyone who made this decisive victory happen!

Sadly, the big Anheuser Busch (AB) distribution facility in Oakland got sold and suddenly closed in July with minimal notice. Local 853 represented 113 drivers, warehouse workers, draft technicians, merchandisers, and salesmen at that facility. “We only had about two weeks\’ notice, which, besides being terrible for our members, didn’t even meet legal requirements,” says Business Agent Efren Alarcon.

As soon as the union was notified, Alarcon and Secretary-Treasurer Dennis Hart swung into action. They were able to get 27 members new jobs at Matagrano, in South San Francisco, which is a union facility. Another 20 went to Markstein in Antioch, which is currently non-union, but Hart says, “we now have 20 ins to work on organizing over there.” Other business agents and Local Unions also helped identify job openings at similar facilities; a few members were able to get union positions at the Fairfield Budweiser plant and at Coca-Cola in San Leandro.

Most important, Alarcon negotiated a great severance package that includes more than one week of wages for every year of service for most members, six months of medical coverage that will carry them through the end of March 2023, and cashing out not only their vacation time, which is legally required, but also their sick time, which for many was about 30 days. In a very smart move, in order to reduce the tax hit on these large payouts, the union negotiated that the different sources of funds would be paid over a six-week period, instead of in one lump sum. Finally, the company agreed to a $7500 retention/training bonus to help members attain training so they could get Class A License training or other re-training.

“A closure is a closure and it’s never nice,” said Alarcon, recognizing that only about half of the members seamlessly went into new jobs. “But I thank all of our Business Reps and sister Locals for working to help these members, and that effort will continue until we get as many of them jobs as we possibly can.”

Teamsters Local 665 has been working to organize the workers of Amy’s Kitchen in Santa Rosa for many months. Unite HERE was working on an organizing drive with the San Jose group. Suddenly, on July 18, with no warning, the company closed the manufacturing operations at its San Jose facility effective immediately.

Upon hearing the news, Business Rep Ray Torres contacted two union employers that he knew were looking for employees. Within two days, T Marzetti, the salad dressing maker in Milpitas, organized a hiring event. They invited Amy’s Kitchen employees to tour the facility and interview, and by the end of that day, they hired about 30-35 workers. A few weeks later, Kellogg’s did the same thing and brought in 25-30 new workers.

“People’s lives were turned upside down. Even though 300 lost their jobs, we were immediately able to help about 50 of them get good jobs. And though we weren’t actually conducting any of the union drives at Amy’s Kitchen, now those 50 people are Local 853 members,” Torres says with pride. “This is what we do!”

On June 8 and July 6, Local 853 brought its barbeque to Watsonville and Santa Cruz literally to serve the members! The Local held BBQs at Watsonville Hospital, where about 24 members came out; the HA Rider bottling plant, where they fed 50 members, and at Driscoll’s (Fruit & Vegetable Growers, Packers & Shippers), which had the largest turnout, with about 100 members.
The three groups of workers had been in Local 912, which merged with Local 853 in 2021.

“We wanted to acclimate our members to Local 853,” said Business Rep Steven Lua. “When we merged last year, with the pandemic still raging, we really didn’t get a chance to do membership appreciation for the companies in Santa Cruz and Watsonville.” Lua says his goal was to introduce the members to Local 853 and to let them know what the local is about. “This Local puts members first. We wanted to show the members our appreciation for their first year in Local 853.”

Lua also wanted to thank the Business Reps who attended the events and fired up the barbecue. This includes Steve Beck, Ray Torres, Ralph Campos, Santos Lerma, Mike Henneberry, Cesar Martinez, and Trustee Reggie Knighten.

About 35 drivers who work for Premier Recycling in San Jose voted Union Yes in May. These drivers drop off and pick-up recycling bins at construction sites.

“This was a dog fight,” says Business Rep Pablo Barrera. “The company brought three union busters to the worksite—and they’re still there. But we still won the election handily.” Barrera says that management kept telling the drivers, ‘If you don’t like it here, get another job,’ but they really just wanted to work at this job, and make it better.”

Roman Tamez, who works for UPS, just down the block from Premier, helped organize the Premier group; he brought several UPSers to share their stories about being in the union with the Premier group. “This was a great campaign,” Roman says. “These guys were getting treated unfairly; they were harassed if they needed to take a sick day. As election day got closer, the employer kept throwing out deals, but nobody bit. They didn’t feel they could trust any promises the employer made at that point. They moved as one group and overwhelmingly voted for the union.”

Negotiations for a first contract will start the last week of August.

For too many years, the shuttle drivers and cashiers at area parking lots settled for too little, and new Business Rep Mike Fritz not only aims to change that — he already has.

“We need to ensure that these members start getting paid what they’re worth—especially given the health hazards that so many of them have endured,” he says. “We have one shuttle driver who has contracted COVID four times so far.”

Fritz had three parking contracts to negotiate in the first half of 2022. His first, completed and ratified overwhelmingly in March, was for the 60 members at LAZ Kaiser in Oakland and Richmond. “At the start of the pandemic, this company couldn’t hire anybody, so they raised the wages to $18/hour. After a while, they lowered the wage back to minimum wage, and, as you’d expect, that didn’t go well with the members,” he says wryly.

“Fortunately, this year’s contract negotiations brought big change, including the highest raises our members here have ever seen,” Fritz says.  Fritz adds that the members will also get a new floating holiday, and will be able to observe holidays that fall on Saturdays on the Friday before. Also, for the first time, the company will contribute to their 401K Plan. Fritz wanted to recognize the negotiating committee for their excellent work.

The next parking contract up was with Premiere Parking at Highland Hospital and to get that deal, Fritz upped his tactics. “These members were so underpaid that I had at least one who was living out of his car.” In a great team effort, Business Rep Mike Henneberry helped Fritz get in front of the Alameda County Board of Supervisors to get support for the workers at this County facility. And Business Rep Jonathan Pinney joined Fritz and Henneberry in negotiations.

“The members voted unanimously on May 14 to ratify the best contract they’ve ever seen,” Fritz says. The 3-year contract includes an immediate raise to bring them up to area standards, and more in each of the next two years. “Most important, this company is on notice that the supervisors will take their contract away if they don’t continue to do the right thing by the workers.”

Fritz\’ third contract will be for the members who work at LAZ Oakland Airport. “We’re in bargaining now and I am looking to get these members almost the same deal as we got at Kaiser. I will involve the Board of the Port of Oakland if I have to.”

After a week-long strike, about 4,800 nurses with the independent union CRONA (Committee for Recognition Of Nursing Achievement) at Stanford Health Care and Stanford Children’s Health in Palo Alto, CA won a significant raise over three years. Not only did Senator Alex Padilla turn up on April 29 for a major rally to support the picketing strikers, but he was joined by Local 853 Trustee Reggie Knighten.

Addressing the group, Padilla said: “I am proud to stand in solidarity with nurses today in calling for fair contracts and for the sustainable working conditions nurses need in order to continue providing world-class care for their patients.”

Reginald Knighten told the nurses and their children: “The Teamsters are here to let you know that we recognize your worth and stand with you fully. We have seen thousands of nurses standing strong on the picket line because you believe a better contract and working environment is not just possible, but necessary. We support you in your efforts to bring transformative changes for yourselves and your nursing colleagues down the line.”

It\’s not new news to hear that union multi-employer pension plans had been hit hard due to a combination of factors including changing industries and the 2008 stock market crash. While unions fought for years to get congress to support our plans as they had already supported single-employer plays, this effort had gone nowhere.

Until last year. The Biden administration ensured that the Butch Lewis Act would be inserted into the American Rescue Plan, providing foundational support for hundreds of troubled union plans.

The result: for our 1000 members in the San Francisco Lithographers Pension plan, instead of seeing their hard-earned pensions become insolvent next month, they will start to again receive their full monthly payouts in June. And in July, they will get a retroactive check representing full payment for the 10 months of checks that had been reduced starting in 2021.

“At the last minute, our consultants from the Segal Company and our trustees were able to negotiate a $130 million investment from the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC),” explained Business Rep Lennie Kuhls. “If this hadn’t happened, we’d have been insolvent starting next month. Now the pension is guaranteed through 2051, if not longer.”

This good news impacts members who worked in the printing industry and were members of GCC 583, which had merged into Local 853 in 2006.

The 50 Hayward Unified school bus drivers who work with special needs kids ratified a new contract with Storer in January and it’s the best these drivers have ever seen.

“This was essentially a new contract,” explains Business Rep Tracy Kelley. Previously, Durham School Services held the contract with the Hayward schools. “But when Storer won the bid in 2018, they just added wage increases to the previous contract with the goal of creating their own contract once that one expired.”

Kelley says that when the pandemic hit, schools closed immediately and these drivers were hit hard. “They stopped working in March 2020 and didn’t come back until August of 2021.” When the contract expired in the midst of the pandemic, the union opted to extend it indefinitely, “because we had no idea when or if these drivers would get back to work. We reopened the contract in October of 2021 and resumed negotiations as work started to return to normal.”

Ultimately, the five-year contract provides significant economic gains for the drivers. After a large initial wage bump, the drivers will get sizeable wage increases through the end of the contract. “This makes them the second-highest-paid school bus drivers in the Bay Area, next to San Francisco,” says Kelley. The non-commercial non-school bus drivers will also see a significant raise. In addition, the contract includes an increase in the health care allowance and additional days of paid time off (PTO).

“School bus drivers were probably the hardest hit among all transportation drivers,” Kelley says. “We fought hard to bring up their wages so they could deal with the high cost of living in this area. Hopefully, by achieving area standards, some of the burden of inflation will be tempered.”

Kelley particularly wanted to recognize and thank Yareny Gonzalez and Joline Knott for representing the members on the negotiating committee and communicating the progress of the talks back to the members. “They stepped up to be on the bargaining team after two long-time stewards had recently left, one retiring and one on a leave of absence. They did an outstanding job.”

Closing out, Kelley adds that “it’s good to see the company recognize the services that our members provide to their clients every day. This contract puts them in a great position to improve their wages even further next time.”