When Baldor, a specialty foods company up in the Hunts Point Market in the Bronx, put up a sign on its terminal that read, "Baldor -- Proud to be Union Free," the Teamsters Union responded with a huge organizing sign on top of the Celeste Diner where Baldor workers often eat.
This is a story of a fierce anti-union company mistreating its workers and doing everything in its power to intimidate the workers away from standing up for themselves and organizing a union.
The terminal of 180 drivers goes to vote early next week.
Imagine standing up for yourself by unionizing at a company where a huge sign on the building you work at reads, "Proud to be Union Free."
At Baldor, a specialty food distributor, more than 180 drivers tried to join Teamsters Local 202 on and off for the last decade. The most recent campaign heated up again in January of this year. A vote is scheduled for May 21.
Recently management put up a huge sign on the terminal building that reads, "Baldor, Proud to be Union Free."
"The company is using fear tactics. In the last campaign they fired a lot of workers, most of which are now working at other companies in Hunts Point. Four of those workers fired have become volunteer organizers on the current Baldor campaign," said Kate O'Connor of the Teamster Warehouse Division and Local 202 Organizer.
The workers need better pay, affordable health care and a great deal more respect on the job. Almost every company up in the Hunts Point Market is unionized. Baldor employees know that they are making about $5 an hour less than workers doing the same exact work across the street.
Max Paniauga, an employee and volunteer organizer, said that any discussion of potential positive change at work is halted. "It is their way or the highway; there is simply no room for discussion."
"The company gave T-shirts to the warehouse workers that say "Baldor: Union Free!" The managers would stand behind the warehouse workers as the shirts were being handed out to see what kind of reaction there would be," Max said. "If you don't wear one, management retaliates," he added. "My route is generally 7 - 10 stops; all of a sudden my route is now 14 - 18 stops."
A group of workers started wearing Teamster hats, pins and T-shirts to work to show their right to organize a union.
O'Connor said this current campaign is different from the others in that there "is a movement in there. These workers know that if they lose the vote, most of will be let go ... but they are determined to go down fighting a good fight, the right fight."
Another worker, Julio Chavez, says that a lot of the drivers want the union, but were afraid to pipe up. "They are all coming out of their shells now, even those that did not want to be known to be for the union."
While the workers are flexing considerable muscle to their employers, the union is doing its own flexing to support the campaign. "We told the company that for every worker you fire, we will hire them and put them in front of your building," said Luis Gonzalez, Local 202 business agent.
Gonzalez said that the local is immediately responding to every anti-union move the company makes. "They put up their union-free sign, and we put up our signs on top of the Celeste Diner where all the workers would go for breakfast and lunch."
The company began to tell the workers that their counterparts at Nebraska Land, also at the Hunts Point Market, were all miserable being members of Local 202, Gonzalez called up 25 Nebraska Land trailers to surround the Baldor building. He approached the company's manager in front of the workers, and said, "Go ahead ... ask any one of them if they are unhappy."
The company has bent over backwards to keep the pro-union workers away from each other. "At all times they are preventing us from having any interaction with other employees," Julio said. "The routes are overloaded so we get back late and have no communication with other workers," he added. "To make matters worse, when they have meetings, we can't get back in time to make them. This is because they don't want us to interrupt what they are saying and to ask the difficult questions."
"Baldor is now making promises that they will make the future better. They admit mistakes and say to us, please give us a break and an opportunity to make it better, and my office will always be open to you. It is too late for that now, and people want change.
"One year they bought us all boots to vote against the union," one worker said. "This time, they can't buy their way out of doing the right thing."
Some 200-plus workers and union activists plan to meet on May 19 at the Celeste Diner to show support and stand in solidarity with the Baldor drivers.