Five hundred workers at Rite Aid’s distribution center in Lancaster scored a remarkable victory on May 1st when they reached a tentative agreement on their first contract. On May 12th, a strong majority of employees ratified the three-year agreement that provides guaranteed raises, fair health insurance rates, protection against subcontracting, and powerful new tools to control the pace of work and promote safer conditions inside the million-square-foot warehouse.
“Everyone on the team deserves credit for helping win this fight,” said ILWU International President Bob McEllrath, “beginning with the rank and- file warehouse workers, our coalition allies around the country, and especially the ILWU members up and down the coast who pitched in to help us win.”
Nasty anti-union campaign
The five-year effort required a level of dedication and commitment that most union members haven’t experienced for a generation or more. The fight began soon after Rite Aid workers Lorena Ortiz and Angel Warner contacted the ILWU in March of 2006. The ILWU Organizing Department began working with Local 26 President Luisa Gratz to help Rite Aid employees build a strong committee inside their warehouse.
Rite Aid management responded with an aggressive anti-union campaign, hiring a team of union-busting consultants and unleashing a barrage of illegal threats, retaliation and firings– all aimed at chilling union support inside the giant distribution center. The company also organized their own committee of anti-union workers who openly campaigned against the union.
“The whole process was really hard,” said Rite Aid worker Sylvia Estrada, “but those first two years were especially difficult because so many of us were being disciplined and fired for standing up for our right to have a union.”
Legal help
Firing and harassing union supporters is supposed to be illegal under federal law, but it can be hard to prove and difficult to enforce. ILWU lawyers helped workers by pushing federal officials to investigate Rite Aid’s blatant law-breaking and enforce the law.
Testimony from workers was gathered and legal documents were filed, but the wheels of justice turned slowly at the regional office of the National Labor Relations Board. Almost a year later, Rite Aid officials were finally facing a federal complaint detailing 49 labor law violations. The company chose to settle those charges by promising to re-hire two of the fired workers with back pay, and compensate workers who had been suspended. “It took too long and the firings never should have happened in the first place, but it was clear to everyone that the ILWU was fighting back and supporting our fight,” said Debbie Fontaine, one of the Lancaster workers who was fired and later re-hired.
Beating the odds, winning the vote
After enduring two years of antiunion attacks, it would have been understandable if employees had ditched their union dream, having seen their friends and co-workers fired. Companies and union-busting consultants know most workers fold under that kind of pressure. But the Rite Aid workers forged ahead and boldly called for a union election in March of 2008 – which they won, against all odds.
“Winning that election seemed like an incredible victory at the time – and it was,” said Rite Aid worker Ignacio Ignacio Meza. “But it was really just half the battle – because we still had to negotiate a first contract and Rite Aid didn’t seem the least bit interested in cooperating with us.”
First contracts can be fatal
By the spring of 2008, Rite Aid workers had survived long enough to be among a handful of private-sector workers in the U.S. who had weathered a blistering anti-union attack and still managed to win a union election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board. Now they faced a final but formidable hurdle of winning their first contract.
“First contract fights have been the graveyard of many union struggles,” said ILWU International Vice President Ray Familathe who oversees the ILWU Organizing Department. “Without tremendous pressure from workers on the inside and support on the outside, employers have every reason to stall and ‘run out the clock’ until people give up.”
The “inside/outside” strategy
The first year of contract negotiations was unproductive – confirming that Rite Aid wouldn’t be negotiating seriously without more pressure. In the fall of 2008, the company announced a series of layoffs and cutbacks that left 46 workers holding layoff slips and 300 employees with lower paychecks. The company said their actions were sparked by economic necessity, but it was no accident that these cutbacks raised fears in the warehouse. The ILWU argued that the layoffs and cutbacks were illegal because workers had voted for the union, obligating Rite Aid to negotiate with employees before making changes. Eventually, federal officials agreed and required Rite Aid to re-hire employees and provide back-pay to everyone who lost wages.
Workers and the ILWU Organizing Department developed an “inside/ outside” strategy that could generate enough pressure to dramatically increase the odds of winning a first contract. The approach relied on workers to take action to defend their rights on the shop floor, while a support network was built on the outside to back them up. By working together in a coordinated strategy, the plan aimed to increase pressure on Rite Aid to do the right thing and sign a fair agreement.
In-plant protests
Workers inside the Lancaster Distribution Center stepped up and organized around shop-floor issues that needed attention – with or without a contract. After Rite Aid announced the layoffs and cutbacks in late 2008, workers didn’t wait for the federal Labor Board to respond – they took action by organizing a picket line at their warehouse, marching in front of management’s offices to demand that their co-workers be re-hired.
Employees also protested against dangerous working conditions inside their warehouse, including the dangerous practice of stacking heavy items on the high shelves that could cause serious or fatal injuries if they fell down on someone. That’s what happened to Pedro Lopez who was hit by a box of liquor that crashed down on his head in late 2009.
Lopez suffered a head wound from the incident, and the incident sparked warehouse workers to take immediate action. Three hundred signed a petition and a group of workers surrounded the plant manager to demand that heavy liquor bottles be lowered to the ground floor, which management finally agreed to do.
Solidarity outside
While workers were asserting their rights in Lancaster, ILWU’s Organizing Department was contracting other unions that represented Rite Aid workers across the country, including the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), Teamsters, SEIU-1199, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU).
The goal was to build a network to promote solidarity, share information, and coordinate action. The first joint action took place in April 2007, when Rite Aid unions co-sponsored a reception for union benefit administrators in Anaheim, CA. Other joint actions followed, many taking place in front of Rite Aid retail stores during high-traffic times that included Valentine’s Day, Halloween, Easter, and the Christmas holiday season. The ILWU Communication Department created a special website that featured the growing number of actions and participants who were joining the effort: www.RiteAidWorkers.net.
Building a coalition
International Vice President Familathe was overseeing work by the Organizing Department to build the
Rite Aid campaign coalition, expanding it beyond the Rite Aid unions. Early support came from ILWU Pensioner and Auxiliary groups, plus chapters of the Alliance for Retired Americans and the Congress of California Seniors. Another big boost came from Jobs with Justice, the national activist network with dozen of chapters nationwide. Working together with local religious and community groups, this network now had the capability to organize national days of action that could coordinate events at dozens of Rite Aid stores across the country.
A final boost of energy came from United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS), a campus-based network with 150 chapters and a serious track record of winning against powerful corporations like Nike and Russell Athletic Wear. USAS joined the campaign in August, 2010, adding new energy and creativity. ILWU International Vice President Familathe attended the USAS conference in Columbus, Ohio where he was invited to speak on February 4, 2011. Familathe came away impressed:
“The energy of all these young people was incredible and inspiring,” he remembers. “Their conference started early in the morning and went late into the night with constant discussions about action and social justice – including our Rite Aid campaign.”
One week later, students turned out in force at Valentine’s Day actions in front of dozens of Rite Aid retail stores in eight states.
Surprising shareholder support
Rite Aid, like most companies, conducts an annual shareholder meeting that is typically boring and attracts little attention. That changed when Rite Aid workers started appearing and speaking, beginning at a special meeting held in New York City on December 2, 2008. Rite Aid workers and Negotiating Committee member Carlos “Chico” Rubio attended the event and criticized management for failing to respect workers. Six months later, Rite Aid worker Angel Warner travelled from Lancaster, CA to New York City where she spoke at the company’s annual shareholder meeting. She got a sympathetic ear from many shareholders in the audience who expressed concern for workers in Lancaster and urged company executives to “solve the problem.” In addition to appearing at the shareholder meeting, Warner spoke at a rally in Times Square organized by the AFL-CIO plus several unions and community groups. Ms. Warner also appeared on two nationally- televised news programs.
Pin-point boycott
Actions being organized in front of Rite Aid stores were building pressure for a fair settlement, but the launching of a boycott against two drugstores in San Pedro may have been a decisive factor. San Pedro is a working-class town with strong union roots like other West Coast communities where many ILWU families live.
It has two Rite Aid stores that collect $2 million a year from ILWU families – a fact seized on by ILWU leaders from harbor-area locals who gathered in early 2011. They decided to help the workers in Lancaster by planning a boycott of the two San Pedro stores. The boycott was launched on April 1 with a rally attended by hundreds of ILWU members. ILWU Local 13 President Joe Cortez spoke at the rally along with other ILWU leaders. Coast Committeeman Ray Ortiz, Jr. led a delegation of longshore workers who marched into the Rite Aid pharmacy where they “pulled their prescriptions” until the company agreed to treat workers fairly in Lancaster.
Within weeks, hundreds more customers were volunteering to “strip their scripts” by sending prescription business to other union pharmacies. ILWU volunteers appeared each day in front of both stores, talking with customers and winning more support for the boycott. Another team of volunteers led by Local 63’s Cathy Familathe, with Steve and Isela Linares of Local 13, reached out to small business owners who agreed to distribute information about the boycott in their stores and offices. Customers received information about the boycott in both Spanish and English, and could join by mailing a postage-paid card or by calling the toll-free hotline at 1-855-WE-BOYCOTT.
Final push & May Day victory
By late April, Vice President Familathe says he could see pressure building on the company to make a fair agreement possible. He placed a phone call to Rite Aid’s Vice President, urging her to fly out and participate in the final round of negotiations that lasted several days and sometimes went late into the night, concluding on the evening of May 1st. “It was a fitting day for a first contract that was fair,” says Familathe. Hundreds of workers participated in discussions and the ratification vote that took place onMay 12, garnering support for the new agreement.
The road ahead
The San Pedro boycott ended on May 1st and customers who honored the boycott are now returning to both Rite Aid stores. Inside the Lancaster warehouse, workers say they’ve been changed forever by the five-year experience.
“All of us want Rite Aid to succeed now more than ever, but in a way that respects everyone, not just a few at the top,” says Lorena Ortiz, one of several warehouse workers who travelled from Lancaster to San Pedro to support the boycott. During an April 1st visit to San Pedro when she attended the boycott kickoff, Ms. Ortiz met with three Rite Aid workers who came from Ohio to support the event. The Ohio workers were striking against six Rite Aid stores in the Cleveland area because the company was using illegal threats against them; trying to force workers into accepting an unfair health insurance deal.
“We’re all still in this struggle together and have to keep helping each other,” she said. “Things will be better now in Lancaster with our contract and a union, but I’ve learned that we have to stick together and help each other because that’s what the union is really all about.”