Vol.64/No.28 July 17, 2000
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Los Angeles airline workers win union |
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Militant/Carole Lesnick
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| After waging a two-year-long organzing drive, workers at Argenbright, a contractor at the Los Angeles airport, won a representation vote for the Service Employees International Union. |
BY MARK FRIEDMAN
LOS ANGELES--After a more than two-year organizing drive, which included marches, walkouts, vigils, and testifying before the city council, Argenbright workers at Los Angeles Airport (LAX) will now be represented by the Service Employees International Union. The 600 workers are baggage screeners, wheelchair attendants, and baggage handlers contracted by the major airlines. The final tally was 285 for and 50 opposed. Argenbright immediately agreed to honor a similar balloting process at the San Francisco airport.
At one terminal controlled by Northwest, Hawaiian, and Air Canada, the employers fired 200 soon-to-be-union members on June 24. They accomplished this by terminating the contract with Argenbright and contracting with Aviation Safeguards, another nonunion outfit. Under pressure from the workers fighting to retain their jobs, the Los Angeles City Council voted to delay the renewal of Northwest's operating agreement.
"People have worked here for up to 13 years and now they are out of a job," stated Dionicia Robinson, a fired worker and union activist. "We are demanding that workers with more than one year seniority be immediately hired by Aviation Safeguards. This is union busting, we have fought for more than two and a half years to form a union and 95 percent voted union in a straw poll organized last year by Respect at LAX, a coalition of labor, religious and community groups and individuals. You can't survive on $5.75 with no benefits."
Less than five Argenbright workers were hired by Aviation Safeguards, which is paying $8.76 an hour without benefits, due to the implementation of the city's Living Wage law on June 20. Some 100 Argenbright workers were never given an interview by the new contractor, who clearly does not want the pro-union work force.
"We decided to join the union because we have no rights, no medical and dental coverage. I was going to vote union tomorrow, but we were put out the door," said Tommy Woo, who has worked at Argenbright for two years.
A march at LAX June 29 attracted about 40 fired workers, several members of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) union, and a delegation of United Steelworkers of America Road Warriors, who have been locked out by Kaiser Aluminum in Spokane, Washington, for nearly two years. They received support from passengers and Teamsters-organized Northwest flight attendants. Ramp workers at the airline were also furious about the bosses' decision to fire the workers who had spoken at IAM union meetings and in the ramp break room appealing for support over the course of the organizing drive.
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