The packinghouse workers voted July 21 by a resounding vote, 112 to 71, to join United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 789, in an election run by the NLRB.

The company has claimed that the majority of workers at Dakota Premium voted for the union because they were intimidated. They charged that union "agents" offered to pay workers $10,000 each, that the union threatened to tell the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) the names of workers who did not support the union, and that the union had organized a "ruckus" outside the voting area to pressure the meat packers into voting for the union.

On the first day of the hearing, company lawyers called Miguel Olvera as a witness. They hoped his testimony would help their allegation that Local 789 officers had organized the campaign for union recognition from the outside and told workers what to do from the outset.

Instead, the testimony of Olvera, a worker in the boning department and one of the main leaders of the union-organizing drive, dealt a blow to the company's charges that he and other workers acted as "agents" of the union officers.  
 
Workers undermine company charges
Referring to the seven-hour sit-down strike that workers carried out June 1, during which they launched the fight for union recognition, Olvera explained, "We organized a sit-down strike because the line speed was too high." That day, when the company agreed to meet with protesting workers in face of that action, 14 workers were elected to meet with the plant manager before they would all go back to their jobs. The meeting resulted in an agreement by the company to limit the line speed and other important concessions.

"I don't know how it happened," Olvera testified, "but when we came out of the meeting, I found union representatives had been there and people were signing cards. That is how the union came in. But we started this fight," he said, emphasizing the word "we."

Olvera was questioned about the Workers' Voice, a newsletter published in English and Spanish by meat packers involved in the organizing drive to answer the company's antiunion propaganda. Olvera explained that he, along with others, helped edit and distribute the newsletter in an effort to make sure that all the workers in the plant received accurate information.

William Pearson, president of UFCW Local 789, testified three days later, confirming and adding another side to Olvera's description of the events. "On June 1," he stated at the hearing, "I was sitting in the union hall a little before noon, when a worker walked in and said, 'We have a problem over at Dakota Premium.'"

Pearson reported that union representatives later found out that workers had conducted a strike inside the plant and had elected a committee to meet with management about the speedup of the line. He said that when the workers began leaving work that day, dozens had signed union cards. He added that some went to the union hall to get help in organizing themselves and to hear from a lawyer about their rights during a union-organizing drive.

Since that day, Pearson testified, groups of workers have gone to the union hall every evening to discuss their fight. He explained that the composition and size of the meetings varies from day to day. "Decisions are made by democratic debate. It's different than what I am used to," he remarked. "I am used to looking at things and acting."  
 
Refute intimidation charge
Throughout the first several days of the hearing, company lawyers tried to prove that the elections took place in an atmosphere of chaos and intimidation, with no one in control and workers were threatened with deportation or promised large sums of money by union representatives. The NLRB requires that union elections be conducted under "laboratory conditions."

At the company's insistence the election was held late in the workday on a Friday--payday--in the plant lunchroom. Jennifer Swanson, the Local 789 organizer who negotiated the specifics of the election, testified, "I had requested that the election take place at a neutral location, on a non-payday," so the process would be smooth and avoid any hint of intimidation of the workers.

Company supervisors asserted at the hearing that one worker ran around the boning department, as groups of workers were gathered to go vote, whispering "Dile que sí--sí se puede" ("Tell them yes--yes we can"). They also testified that, before the vote, some workers on the line were banging their tools and chanting "Sí se puede."

Shouts of "Sí se puede" and chanting have taken place on the production line in the plant since the June 1 sit-down.

A worker who served as an observer for the company during the election testified she had seen "a Black man just outside the voting area during the election" and added that during this time she had heard a voice saying "Sí se puede." She testified that Samuel Farley, one of only six workers at Dakota Premium who are Black, is one of the leaders of the union-organizing drive.

This attempt by company lawyers to paint Farley--and by extension other pro-union workers--as a thug and intimidator backfired, however. Under cross-examination, the same worker testified that Farley is always respectful and friendly with other workers.

Also during cross-examination it was revealed that three of the company witnesses are subject to special pressure by the company. One is on probation from a jail sentence and must be able to keep his job. Another rents a house from the company personnel director. A third is granted regular overtime on Saturdays while most workers are not getting 40 hours of work. Other witnesses for the company included a supervisor and a quality control employee.

The latest issue of the Workers' Voice, published the opening day of the NLRB hearing, explained the process of the hearing and urged workers in the plant to keep up their fight, which aims to secure a contract.

"The company is only going to negotiate when they decide they can't afford not to. They will come to the negotiations table if we keep building the union by actively defending ourselves and taking on their daily abuses," the newsletter said.

The company called all its witnesses over the four days of the first week of the hearing. The union was just beginning to call its witnesses at the end of the week. The testimony by union witnesses resumed after the Labor Day holiday.