Letter City Councilors William Greenlee And Blondell Reynolds-Brown Tells Guards That City Law Protects Against Employer Claims

Leaders from the Philadelphia Security Officers Union (PSOU) expected their employer to warn that a vote for the union was a vote to loose their jobs. Union organizers hope that a letter from City Councilors William Greenlee and Blondell Reynolds-Brown that points out that even if the company decided to leave the contract behind, their jobs would be protected by the Philadelphia "Protection For Displaced Sub-Contractors" Law.

The security officers at the Philadelphia Museum of Art have been holding out hope for improved working conditions for a long time. Thus far, they have they tried to communicate via the standard methods of written letters and phone calls, yet their requests remain unanswered. Finding themselves without much more recourse, they decided to translate their message into a language sympathetic to the ears of the museum leaders: art.

The security guards have come together to create a thirteen minute video addressed to Timothy Rub, the incoming Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMA), in the hopes that their voices, in this way, will finally break the silence.

On August 26, the film entitled "Welcoming Change: A Message To Timothy Rub," directed by David Stuart Randle from local media organization Media Mobilizing Project, will be released on the internet and will premier on screen at 4205 Chestnut St at 6:30 pm. The film will also be mailed to 100 local churches.

The debate over the Employee Free Choice Act is going to heat up in the next couple of weeks. In Philadelphia, there is an effort that stands out as an example of why we need to pass this critical labor law reform.

I frequently shop at Whole Foods. It is the closest grocery store to my house. They have excellent cookies, good produce, etc. They employ or have employed a bunch of my friends, and seem to pay them fairly well, even if they do not always treat them as kind as their image would suggest. And, after reading any Michael Pollan book, it is pretty hard to totally buy into Whole Food's take on organics. But still, despite all that, and that it creates a (w)hole in my wallet (badda boom!), I end up going there a lot.

But that said, it is worth remembering a few things for when you have a choice of where to shop. First, in an industry that is largely unionized, Whole Foods stands out as being anti-labor. This is a comment from their CEO:

The union is like having herpes. It doesn't kill you, but it's unpleasant and inconvenient, and it stops a lot of people from becoming your lover.

Well that is just so sweet of him. As the quote would suggest, Whole Foods has been working to kill Employee Free Choice, a hugely important reform for working families.

And now, the same whack-job is lobbying against true universal healthcare:

John Mackey, chief executive of Whole Foods, said that while his company offers coverage, he worries that an employer mandate would lead to more stringent federal rules on what employer plans must include.

He said that would drive up the cost of employer benefits, motivating companies to end their benefits and instead let employees sign up for the public insurance option, figuring that paying a penalty would be less costly. This would result in eventual domination by the public insurance plan -- something Mackey suspects is reformers' secret hope.

"It's a Trojan horse," he said.

As Jake McIntyre notes, if you take an employee mandate and a public option out of health care reform, you are basically left with nothing except a huge payout to insurance companies, with millions upon millions of people still uninsured.

Does the fact that the CEO of Whole Foods is anti-labor or anti-universal health care mean I will never shop there again? No. But, there are a considerable amount of grocery stores that are much more friendly to labor, and presumably, to health care for all. From the United Food and Commercial Workers 1776 page, we see for example, that the following grocery stores are unionized:

Acme Markets
Giant Eagle
Shop Rite Supermarkets
Super Fresh Food Markets

It doesn't list Fresh Grocer. I have no clue about them. But either way, that is a big portion of our city's groceries stores.

And when you combine that list with the 30 or so farmers markets around Philly, most of which sell organic, locally made, fresher than Whole Foods goods, you kind of realize, yes, you do have a choice.

Will I forever boycott Whole Foods? No. Will I try to be more conscious of where I am shopping in the future? You better believe it.

An article in yesterday's Scranton Times Tribune gives us the perspectives of Mr. Frank Scarvo, a manager for Keystone Automotive.

In Mr. Scarvo's opinion, the binding arbitration provision of the Employee Free Choice Act would harm employees. He also says that the current workplace regulatory agencies are sufficient. It is easy enough to discover with some research or, as many workers have found out through first hand experience, that this is untrue.

Mr. Scavo should know that there are many dirty tricks that employers use when they don't want to deal with the union that their employees worked hard to form and win. Most commonly, they draw out the collective bargaining process with excessive appeals. This unfair practice of forestalling process is hardly uncommon.

From Twitter user @Kalahn, we see the poster that seems to be everywhere in Philadelphia these days:

As Chris Bowers noted, while some of labor may have fallen in line with Specter, there is a real understanding by many that Specter has sold them out, and if he wants their support, he needs to start singing another song on the Employee Free Choice Act.

50 percent of the museum’s workers have signed cards authorizing the Philadelphia Security Officer Union (PSOU) to represent them, they still cannot negotiate for better working conditions. That’s because under current federal law, workers lack the right to organize solely through the “card check” process. (PSOU has not requested a federally conducted workplace election because it has no staff and few resources with which to counter potential AlliedBarton anti-union efforts before the vote.)