Workers for Justice has divided student volunteers into several key committees: media, which includes both photos and videos and interfacing with members of the press; student organizing, responsible for gathering signatures from Pomona
3/11
3/12
ASPC passes pro-unionization Senate Resolution; takes no clear stand on either cardcheck or secret ballot
Oxtoby gets serious and e-mails Pomona community. College website now devotes entire section to the issue.
The food service workers, however, have proven much more vocal and substantive in their accusations of the administration’s
Indeed, the unionization debate has pitted Workers for Justice against Oxtoby, relegating the workers themselves to a secondary role, necessary only as mouthpieces and personifications of a battle being fought in emails, editorials, and blog posts – far from the confines of the dining halls in which they toil for hours a day. While Workers for Justice has made immense strides toward their goals, in the long-term they should consider de-villifying Oxtoby and looking to compromise. Meanwhile, some workers, like Juan Gonzalez, have other options. “I’ve worked in the fields before,” he says, “but I want to work at Pomona.”
international
Still, Workers for Justice argues for the validity of the signatures they collected. “The student role is not a guidance role,” Gordon says. “It is more of a facilitation role, and to overstep that role is a really inappropriate thing.” As a faciliator, Workers for Justice has proven an invaluable resource for food service employees. Absent the time, technical skills, or political training to launch and maintain an effective media campaign, the workers have come to depend on Pomona students activists’ fervor and support for the cause.
Yet in an issue as divisive as unionization, where both sides cite the other’s intimidation as a key impediment to employees’ judgment, student activists must tread carefully. While Workers for Justice seeks to pressure Oxtoby from all sides, its central role has given the administration considerable ammunition. Oxtoby’s opposition to the card-check process lies in its susceptibility to worker and student intimidation. “In a small operation like Pomona College,” he argues, “where the staff know each other and know the students very well, it is hard to say ‘no’ to a request to sign a petition or a card.” So, even though Gordon says “workers are organizing workers, and students are organizing students,” administrative skepticism persists.
intimidation attempts. A March 15 letter to Oxtoby accused Bob Robinson and Margie McKenna from the administration of holding “meetings with no prior notice… with the intention of dissuading us from forming a union.” Robinson responded to the allegations, telling the Port Side, “We felt it necessary to affirm our workers’ rights to non-intimidation.” Interestingly, Workers for Justice knew about these “impromptu” meetings and even discussed them at a March 7 meeting, the day before they occurred; a worker had notified them. Even stranger, though, is the decision to sign the workers’ March 15 letter “sincerely, Workers for Justice,” as if the student organization had drafted and sent it. Given these scenarios, what once seemed a calculated administrative scheme to undercut the unionization effort on the basis of student intimidation and overexertion now makes some sense.
Unionization Methods: The Who and the What...
David Oxtoby, President of Pomona College
Workers for Justice
“Pomona College is not blocking any unionization effort... The question remains whether a union is necessary.”
volumeVII issue3
SECRET BALLOT
CARD-CHECK
aProtected by NLRB law aFair and free a“Let[s] staff express their views independent of any public pressure to vote in a certain way”
r“Restricts free speech” r“The person who collects the cards from the workers knows who has and has not signed a card”
r“Good way to make sure a vote never really happens” rTakes two to five years r“Favors employers” rOften happens in workplace rAnti-union propaganda
a“Allows process to happen in a timely way” a“Protects workers from employer intimidation” aWorkers decide outside the workplace
3/15
3/24
Several workers hand-deliver letter to Oxtoby, complaining of intimidation by Robinson and McKenna in impromptu meetings.
Workers for Justice holds a “vigil for labor peace” outside Pomona’s Frary dining hall
|
claremontportside.com
|
m a r c h 10
... |
page 5
national
Gordon and his fellow activists have made impressive accomplishments in a short time. Most critically, they accompanied workers and some faculty into Oxtoby’s office and presented a petition, signed by 90% of the food service employees, demanding “cardcheck neutrality.” Oxtoby was skeptical. “The staff were never presented with a choice between a secret ballot vote and a card check process,” he told the Port Side, “so I question the statement that 90% of the workers prefer the latter.” The overwhelming presence of Workers for Justice makes the true intentions of the workers nebulous. Oxtoby asserts that a large group of students and a small number of faculty “may well have initiated the unionization effort.”
students and inputting information into databases; fundraising, which targets campus organizations and alumni to subsidize printing and material costs; visibility, charged with “painting the 5Cs orange” with posters, banners, armbands, and buttons; and web maintenance. On all counts, Workers for Justice has seen success. By spring break, they had collected the signatures of 40% of Pomona students and had landed favorable articles in the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, Los Angeles Independent Media Center, and Huffington Post. Gordon affirms, “We’ve done a lot with a little so far.”
campus
entirely from the typical iteration – whereas union representatives tend to initiate and organize the push, student activists have assumed an integral role. Workers for Justice, created just days before the issue went public, has made unionizing food service workers via “card-check neutrality” its mission. Pomona junior Sam Gordon, who heads up the organization’s media apparatus, explained his commitment to the cause. “These are the people who cook three meals a day for me,” he says. “It’s such a luxury we are taking for granted… They are asking for something from us now.”