As a volunteer in the School Bus Worker Project I wanted to meet some of the drivers who are trying to form a union. Teamsters HQ quickly arranged it. My goals were to try to understand their plight first hand, get their story out and do a sanity check on some of the ideas that some of us had over the last few weeks. I had no idea what to expect when I drove down to San Diego, so along the way I picked up another Kossack to help me navigate these uncharted waters.
What I discovered in San Diego is that there is a war going on between First Student (the company that operates the school buses) and the workers who are trying to form a union and join the Teamsters. This war goes on unnoticed, but it is a vicious fight that pits average Americans against a powerful and ruthless adversary with vast resources. The people I met have risked becoming the targets of all sorts of union busting tactics that First Student has at its disposal, tactics that can make their lives miserable and discourage less courageous or committed people to give up the fight.
This diary is both a trip report and call to action.
San Diego was one of the cities where the Teamstershad succeeded in unionizing school bus drivers as shown on their School Bus Workers United website.
The meeting with the drivers took place at a McDonald’s not far from the First Student school bus yard where they report to work.
We were running a little late and when we got to the McDonald's we found five workers sitting on tables waiting for us, the "bloggers."
Needless to say, the looks we got were a bit incredulous. I imagine they were thinking, who are these "bloggers" and why does Teamsters HQ want us to meet with them?
I introduced us as individuals who blogged at DailyKos and emphasized that we were not journalists although we would take notes and pictures. I told them our goal was to try to help them by getting their story out and that we intended to do whatever we could to help them succeed.
So we told them we wanted to hear their stories.
This unionization effort was the third one, the first two were sabotaged by the company. (Funny how it is companies who"sabotage" workers efforts nowadays and not the other way around). Back on May 24 the workers at the First Student School Bus Yard in San Diego had voted 69 to 44 to form a union and be represented by the Teamsters. 134 workers voted, another 20 or so abstained.
You are allowed to say; 134 workers, what IS the big deal? Well, this IS one way to win a war, one precedent setting battle at a time.
The management of First Student, a subsidiary of First Group, seems to operate under the principle that they need to nip in the bud any effort to unionize. This flies in the face of their own policy of neutrality regarding unionization efforts. Read the full report here.
In the period between November 2006, when the unionization effort started, and May 2007, when the successful vote took place, First Student repeatedly flew in high powered executives from their Cincinnati HQ to San Diego to help orchestrate a union busting campaign, lead by the Rick Vilines, VP of Human Resources. Let's give Rick some credit, he took it upon himself to give the anti-union message unassisted to captive audience convened to talk about bus safety.
John Sievers, who convened all the other Teamsters for the meeting, was a member of the union organizing committee. They focused on him and managed to get grounds to fire him by making a late attendance offense penalty retroactive.
The company quickly organized a group of employees called the "Employees for Free Choice" to fight the union organizers in the yard itself. They threw a BBQ in the yard where employees who did not say they would vote against the union were not given hamburgers (what a cheap shot). They intimidated workers who crossed the street to pick up fliers from union organizers. They fired a four year driver in the organizing committee because a parent called to say her child had hit his head in the organizer's bus, just like that , no recourse, not even a formal accusation of anything. The members of the organizing committee got their pay reduced. In general they tried to make the life of workers who became proponents of forming a union as miserable as possible.
And there are all kinds of tricks management plays. Promises of higher pay if the vote went against the union. Company printed anti-union fliers. Pre-hiring training periods extended (at lower pay) for workers who may vote for the union. Hiring new inexperienced workers when a 10 year pro-union veteran returns after a 2 months hiatus. Better routes assigned to anti-union drivers. And on and on.
Organizers and sympathizers were openly photographed during meetings like the one we had as if to say; "we are watching you".
Understand the demographics of the new school bus driver Teamsters in San Diego; 65-70% women, 40-45% Hispanic. Some claimed that Hispanics can be intimidated because although they are legal residents or citizens, some of their relatives in the US are not and in todays immigration climate things are tough in extended Hispanic families, this is San Diego after all.
Although the election in May was a success, the war for workers rights goes on unabated.
First Student can do several things at this stage;
- Challenge the election and call for a second one. During the period in between they can get people fired on retroactive rules and technicalities and they can hire people they expect to vote against the union. They are hiring as you can see in the photo at the top.)
- Make the union fail in the collective bargaining stage which is supposed to have started. This will teach other workers elsewhere that even if they form a union they do not get better wages or benefits.
- Qualify workers as "supervisors" and prevent them from voting. (All kinds of tricks are cooked up by "union free" consultants)
First Student is probably attempting to do all three things and then some. They got lawyers, PR firms and "union free" consultants. All trying to defeat the teamsters and trip the workers efforts any way they can.
Again let's put things in perspective; the school bus drivers we met with only want to exercise their right to form a union and engage in collective bargaining. That is all, this IS the 21st Century and this is America isn't it?
More perspective; First Student operates this yard in San Diego. It only has 160 buses. Buses that would not be tolerated in any other school bus yard in San Diego. Most of the other school buses in San Diego belong directly to government agencies and are driven by union members belonging to a public employee union.
Two of the Teamsters we met; Philip Liburd and James Newton are Navy veterans. San Diego is a big Navy town. Two smart and tough guys. I can see why they became organizers. The other two Teamsters we met were Erica Ramirez and Jerry Pradd Jr. All had stories, all made contributions to the fight. These people are fighting against the odds. The company has time, money, lawyers, consultants, political clout, media clout.
I asked them if they had any contacts with the local press. Nope. I asked them if the San Diego Unified School District was aware of their plight. They told me that once they were visited by a school district board member who seemed to sympathize with them, once.
When I heard their stories I heard the voices of average Americans who made a decision to risk their jobs to fight for their right to organize. This makes them heroes in my book and not average at all. They are winning, but the fight against First Student and its full-court press union busting tactics is their daily reality and I could hear that in their voices, these are people under severe pressure.
I have material for more diaries from that brief meeting we had in San Diego but now I need you to think about what you can do to help.
- Volunteer with the School Bus Worker Project by sending an email to schoolbusworker(at)yahoo(dot)com
Specially if you live in or near cities where the Teamsters are actively organizing school bus drivers.
- Contribute to the effort by contacting school districts, local media, PTAs, local politicians after touching bases with Teamster organizers in your area.
- Contribute to help improve the content of the new United We Blog website that will be a focal point for information and to organize future activities.
So finally, here is a group picture of Teamsters and Kossacks after the meeting at McDonalds. Philip Liburd, James Kennedy, Shockwave and John Sievers in the back. In the front, none other than OrangeClouds115 and Erica Ramirez.
I plan to return to San Diego once the school year starts and do a follow up story.
Thank you already for your support.