By LAUREN SHEPHERD
AP BUSINESS WRITER

August 29, 2008

NEW YORK -- A barista who said he was fired from Starbucks Corp. for helping to organize fellow workers into a union has been given his job back.

In a preliminary reinstatement agreement dated Aug. 14 obtained by The Associated Press, Starbucks said its firing of employee Erik Forman was "ill-considered and should be reversed."

Forman said he will start back at work on Sunday at the same Mall of America location in Minnesota that he was fired from in July.

When he worked there, Forman said he had been talking to employees at his own store and at other stores in the area about joining the Industrial Workers of the World union.

In an interview, Forman said although several other employees at the store were members of the union, "I was the most vocal and the most active."

Starbucks spokeswoman Tara Darrow confirmed that Forman was being given his job back but said his firing and reinstatement had nothing to do with his support for the union.

"We don't track our partners' involvement in those organizations," Darrow said.

Forman said he was fired July 10 after he received a "final written warning" for showing up half an hour late to work. The warning followed two prior instances of tardiness a year earlier. Once a final written warning is issued, an employee may be fired.

Forman said he had expected a warning after showing up late for work, but not a final warning. Some employees are given half a dozen or more warnings before receiving a final one, he said, adding that managers frequently choose not to give warnings to well-liked employees.

In the agreement, Starbucks called Forman's firing "an unfortunate series of events." Darrow characterized it as "a mistake."

Besides giving him back his job, Starbucks is also paying Forman about $2,000 in back pay, he said.

Forman said he believes Starbucks reinstated him partly due to pressure from the IWW and other Starbucks workers. His co-workers at the Mall of America store walked out of work the day after he was fired in protest and Forman said about 50 Starbucks employees in the area signed a petition asking the company to give him his job back.

Forman also said he filed an unfair labor practice complaint against Starbucks with the National Labor Relations Board the day after he was fired.

Darrow said the filing of complaint did not influence Starbucks' decision to re-hire Forman and that the company reviewed the situation at Forman's request.

Although Starbucks has asked him to voluntarily withdraw the NLRB complaint now that he has his job back, Forman said he still intends to pursue it.

"The law was violated," Forman said. "They haven't given me any guarantee that this will not happen again."

Robert Chester, regional director for the NLRB in Minneapolis, confirmed that Forman filed the complaint in July and said the office is investigating.

If the NLRB deems that a law was broken, it will attempt to negotiate a settlement between Forman and Starbucks. If they don't agree to a settlement, the case would then go to court.

In 2006, Starbucks entered into a settlement with the NLRB to resolve a complaint filed by New York City workers attempting to organize a union at a Starbucks store. In that settlement, Starbucks rehired two employees that had been fired and posted a notice in three stores for 60 days affirming the rights of workers to unionize under the National Labor Relations Act.

Starbucks also settled with the NLRB in a 2007 Grand Rapids, Mich. case that involved bulletin board postings and an alleged comment made by a manager that an employee said was threatening.

Darrow said Starbucks did not admit to any wrongdoing in either settlement agreement and that the company decided to settle the cases to save both time and expense for all parties.

What does political-economy mean? 

It means that the wealth we create as workers is owned and controlled by our masters.  The control is political.  We create the economy.  We create capital.  The owners decide what to do with what we've created, once they've paid us wages for what we have agreed to sell our skills for and what they've agreed to buy them for.  

What is useful for the capitalists is to make money.  Money is the measure of all things for them.  Count it.  It is a quantitative measure of what they have had us produce.  Remember, they control what is produced by us.  

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Die Organisierung illegaler LagerarbeiterInnen in Brooklyn / New York. Eine Veranstaltungs-Tour mit Stephanie Basile (IWW New York) vom 2.-15 September 2008

Die IWW im deutschsprachigen Raum organisiert, in Kooperation mit lokalen gewerkschaftlichen Gruppen und Initiativen, eine Reihe von Veranstaltungen in 9 Städten, um über den Kampf von New Yorker LagerarbeiterInnen zu informieren, Solidarität zu ermöglichen und einen Beitrag zur Debatte über selbstorganisierte gewerkschaftliche Strategien im Kampf gegen Ausbeutungsverhältnisse und rassistische Diskriminierung zu leisten. (Termine siehe unten)

Seit 2005 organisieren sich ArbeiterInnen in den New Yorker Hafenstadtteilen Brooklyn und Queens, um gegen ihre extremen Arbeitsbedingungen zu kämpfen. Sie arbeiten über 60 Stunden die Woche, weit unter Mindestlohn, ohne Kranken- und Sozialversicherung. Viele von ihnen sind illegal in den USA, die meisten aus Lateinamerika. Ihnen droht, wenn sie ihre elementaren Rechte einfordern, nicht nur die Kündigung, sondern auch die Abschiebung.

Dennoch haben sich im Laufe der Zeit die Beschäftigten von 10 Lagerhäusern der IWW angeschlossen, einer kleinen militanten internationalen Basisgewerkschaft, die seit 1905 abseits etablierter Gewerkschaftsstrukturen aktiv ist. Die New Yorker IWW arbeitet regelmäßig zusammen mit „Make the Road by Walking“ (Hace el camino caminado), einer Initiative, die Community-Zentren in migrantischen Vierteln betreibt (derzeit in Bushwick, Brooklyn, Woodside and Jackson Heights, Queens and Port Richmond, Staten Island).

Stephanie Basile (24) ist Mitglied der IWW New York City. Sie ist in der Kampagne aktiv und wird erläutern, wie die IWW versucht, in einem Dreikampf aus Protest, Boykott und Gerichts-Prozessen, die Ausbeuter in die Knie zu zwingen.

Das Programm:

• 30 Min. Vortrag auf Englisch + deutsche Übersetzung
• Zwei Aktions-Videos aus Brooklyn mit englischen Untertiteln
• Fragen und Antworten

Stuttgart: Dienstag 2.9. um 18 Uhr, DGB-Haus (Kellerschenke), Willi-Bleicher-Str. 20, veranstaltet von: Zukunftsforum Stuttgarter Gewerkschaften

Frankfurt/M: Donnerstag 4.9. um 20 Uhr, Türkisches Volkshaus, Werrastr. 29, veranstaltet von: IWW Frankfurt

Marburg: Freitag, 5.9. um 20.30 Uhr, Cafe am Grün, veranstaltet von: Arbeitsgemeinschaft für gewerkschaftliche Fragen

Köln: Samstag 6.9. um 20 Uhr, Allerweltshaus, Körnerstr. 77-79, veranstaltet von: IWW Köln

Bochum: Montag 8.9. um 19.30, Bahnhof Langendreer, Wallbaumweg 108 Veranstaltet von: LabourNet Germany und Kulturzentrum Bahnhof Langendreer

Wuppertal: Dienstag 9.9. um 19 Uhr, Alte Feuerwache, Gathe 6 (Elberfeld) Veranstaltet von: Basisinitiative Solidarität (BaSo)

Bremen: Mittwoch 10.9. um 20 Uhr in der Buchtstr.14/15, veranstaltet von: FAU Bremen

Hamburg: Donnerstag 11.9. um 18.30 Uhr im Curiohaus, Rothenbaumchaussee 15, veranstaltet von: Jour Fixe Gewerkschaftslinke

Göttingen: Freitag 12.9. um 19 Uhr im DGB-Haus, Obere Masch 10, veranstaltet von: Göttinger Betriebsexpress

Berlin: Montag 15.9. um 20 Uhr im FAU-Lokal, Straßburger Str. 38, veranstaltet von: FAU Berlin

Es erwarten uns spannende Diskussionen: - über die Arbeits- und Kampfbedingungen der illegalen LagerarbeiterInnen - über die Situation der Gewerkschaften und sozialen Bewegungen in den USA - über das Konzept des „solidarity unionism“ als Organisierungsansatz - über die Möglichkeiten internationaler Solidarität und Gegenmacht der ArbeiterInnen.

Infos / Links:

“Wobblies organize Brooklyn Warehouses” - The Brooklyn Rail Nr. 4/2007 (engl.)
Update über den Stand der Auseinandersetzungen - Industrial Worker, Juni 2008 (engl.)
IWW Lagerarbeiter gefeuert - Nachricht auf wobblies.de vom 16. Januar 2007

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(Forwarded from Labourstart)

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Demand that the ABCC be abolished and charges be dropped against Noel Washington

Where: - Kervin Rudd's Electoral Office, 630 Wynnum Road, Morningside

MORE:

http://bushtelegraph.wordpress.com/2008/07/31/construction-workers- campaign-for-equal-rights/

The ABCC has charged an VIC CFMEU official Noel Washington for refusing
to give evidence on discussions with union members, join us in calling
for the abolition of the ABCC and the dropping of charges against Noel
Washington.

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Correction to back page: Next Melbourne GMB meeting is on Saturday 30th August at Loophole, 834a High Street, Thornbury. Contact delegate for further details.

From a recent editorial in the very influential bourgeois newspaper, "The Washington Post":

"Yet Mr. Obama's account of his strategic vision remains eccentric. He insists that Afghanistan is 'the central front' for the United States, along with the border areas of Pakistan. But there are no known al-Qaeda bases in Afghanistan, and any additional U.S. forces sent there would not be able to operate in the Pakistani territories where Osama bin Laden is headquartered. While the United States has an interest in preventing the resurgence of the Afghan Taliban, the country's strategic importance pales beside that of Iraq, which lies at the geopolitical center of the Middle East and contains some of the world's largest oil reserves. If Mr. Obama's antiwar stance has blinded him to those realities, that could prove far more debilitating to him as president than any particular timetable."

Translation: "The 'global war on terror is just a front.  It's all about oil."

Chadron F. T. D.

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Furthermore brewery of Spring Green, WI has just released their delicious new coffee beer Oscura, and we couldn't be more excited. This incredible lager is cold brewed with La FEM's medium roast coffee producing a sweet aromatic goodness and a wide awake drunk.

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A small demonstration called by London IWW took place last week in support of another radical union, 'Workers' Initiative' (Inicjatiwa Pracownicza) in Poland. It was called to support WI members being discriminated against in the Polish postal service, and particularly the sacking of a member - Bartosz Kantorczyk - for his lead role in a wave of strikes last year. The IWW is demanding his reinstatement and back-pay from the date of his termination.

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The Gardeners of Eden East Timor Seed Project is calling for support for its 2009 program. You can help by sending seeds or making donations. With global food stockpiling and rising prices, Timorese families need to renovate their traditional farming systems organically and address the annual hunger and nutrition gaps, as well as invest carefully in other crops (forestry and small-commercial farming systems) sufficient to support trading. To do this, they need seeds, tools, supplies, and training.

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By Anthony Nadler , TC Daily Planet
July 23, 2008

This week the Mall of America (MOA) became an unusual site for the return of a group once thought to be a relic of Minnesota’s radical union past – the Industrial Workers of the World. Yesterday a group of workers at a MOA Starbucks delivered a letter to their management announcing their affiliation with the I.W.W. union and making a number of demands about working conditions and compensation.

The Starbucks Workers Union, part of the Industrial Workers of the World, has been organizing Starbucks workers for more than four years in cities across the U.S. including New York, Chicago, Grand Rapids, MI, and Minneapolis. The union claims to have over 200 current and former Starbucks employees as members nationally. This is their first public union action in Minnesota. The demands of the MOA Starbucks workers include calls for a living wage, automatic cost-of-living pay increases, and an expanded tuition reimbursement program. One of the benefits often advertised in Starbucks’s employment promotions is tuition benefits. A detailed explanation of the benefits packages on Starbucks website says this benefit will be considered only for “accredited courses relating to Starbucks business.” Union members say the tuition benefit is given only for study in areas relevant to future Starbucks employment.

The union action comes at a sensitive time for Starbucks, just after the company announced they would be closing over 600 stores nationwide and 27 in Minnesota. While neither of the two Starbucks locations at the Mall of America is slated for closure, the workers letter of demands also asks for fair severance packages for workers at closing stores.

Yesterday’s letter of demands comes on the heels of another controversial incident at the Mall of America I Starbucks. On July 11, Erik Forman, a former employee, filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (N.L.R.B) claiming he had been fired the previous day as retaliation for union activity. After Forman’s firing, five workers attempted to get management to reverse the decision through a petition and a short work stoppage. Supporters collected just over 50 signatures from Starbucks workers around the Twin Cities in a petition of support for Forman. Speaking for concerned employees, Jake Bell, a current MOA Starbucks worker, said, “We’re afraid that if Starbucks is willing to break the law to fire Erik, they might fire any of us.” [Editor’s note: Full disclosure—Jake Bell also works with the TC Daily Planet.]

In New York City, where the Starbucks Workers Union has also been active, the N.L.R.B. has accused Starbucks of at least 30 violations. In one settlement, Starbucks agreed to rehire two fired workers. Starbucks Workers Union sources also say their organizing has been instrumental to significant pay increases for New York City workers.

Five Starbucks workers participating at a press conference today at the Mall of America said that they were first attracted to employment with the company because of its reputation for generous benefits and social responsibility. However, they felt that reputation had proved illusionary. Workers participating in today’s press conference said Starbucks baristas are all making much less than a living wage (with salaries starting at $7.60/hour), facing hurdles to get enough hours needed to maintain eligibility for their health benefits and many are not in the position to be able to pay for the premiums and co-pays of company health packages if available. Starbucks requires employees work 160 hours every two months to qualify for healthcare packages in which the company covers a portion of insurance costs. Workers at the press conference today said it is not always possible for employees to secure enough hours on regular basis to qualify for these benefits.

The I.W.W. is a unique union in many respects. Since the early 1900s, the I.W.W. has tried to organize all workers regardless of race, gender and level of skill. They have tended to favor direct action by workers rather than working through governmental mediation or electoral politics. According to Macalester College labor historian Peter Rachleff, the I.W.W. was very active in the 1920s and went into a slump in following decades due to government repression and the success of more powerful unions. Rachleff says the public re-emergence of the I.W.W. now is partially “in response to globalization, economic neoliberalism, and the inability of official unions to develop strategies to resist corporate onslaught.” The Starbucks Workers Union is open to all Starbucks employees and does not require members pay dues.

Local union members would not say if they had plans for any further public actions. Starbucks has not returned phone and email requests for comments and specific information about this story.

Starbucks baristas union drive comes at key time

The effort to organize local latte-slingers could hurt the ailing chain

By Matt Snyders

published: July 23, 2008, City Pages

It was a typical, busy Thursday afternoon at the Mall of America's first-floor Starbucks, and Erik Forman was four hours into his shift. The slight, 23-year-old barista was soon approached by a vaguely familiar face: Caroline Kaker, the chain's Bloomington-based district manager.

She pulled him aside and led him to the adjacent Barnes & Noble. There, she broke the grim news: You're fired.

Forman was stunned. Sure, two weeks earlier, he had shown up a half-hour late and was issued a written warning. But that wasn't why Forman was getting the ax today. Management decided to deep-six him after learning that Forman had discussed the warning with co-workers.

"Erik violated terms of his June 2008 final written corrective action by discussing it with a peer," reads the notice of separation.

But there was another topic Forman had discussed with peers, one not explicitly mentioned in the write-up: unionizing.

A member of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), Forman had been in the process of organizing his co-workers under the IWW banner for nearly two years.

"It started with workers during their situations during cigarette breaks, during car rides to and from work," Forman recalls. "We first approached the IWW in September of '06. They helped us figure out how to build a strategy."

In 2004, the IWW took on a Starbucks in Midtown Manhattan, with modest success. In the following years, the list of IWW Starbucks Union affiliates grew to include five other shops in New York City; two in Chicago; one in Grand Rapids, Michigan; and one in Rockville, Maryland.

Shortly after the first union sprouted in New York, Starbucks higher-ups exchanged concerned emails, leaked to The Wall Street Journal, about how to handle the epidemic of unionizing. One, dated October 29, 2004, begins with a blunt introduction: "Below is a summary of the recent developments in New York City regarding our attempts to thwart a potential union situation," it reads.

In March 2006, the IWW accused the coffee giant of union-busting and filed a charge with the National Labor Relations Board. Starbucks settled, agreeing to display workers' rights posters in three of its stores and to allow two fired workers back on staff.

"The reasons they gave for firing me were identical to what they did in New York," says Forman, who's also filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. "This is a pretty blatant example of union-busting. We've been planning on making our movement public for a while—so even though it comes as a blow, it's kind of a galvanizing blow."

On July 11, one day after Forman got clipped, five workers walked off the floor and approached the floor manager, Jason Lyons, with a petition demanding Forman's reinstatement. Lyons told them it was out of his hands.

Now Forman and the IWW stand poised to organize baristas throughout the metro. On Monday, July 21, they went public. Their demands include a living wage, "respectful" scheduling, and an end to the company's alleged union-busting.

Asked about Forman's allegations, a Starbucks spokesperson had little to say.

"We just received the charge [from Forman] and we're reviewing it," says Stacey Krum, on the phone from Seattle. "There's nothing we can offer right now."

The charges clash with Starbucks' image as a corporate paragon of social responsibility. The Seattle-based chain has staked its reputation on progressive values that play well with its well-to-do clientele. Starbucks was listed as No. 7 in Fortune's "100 Best Companies to Work For" this year.

The most frequently extolled of Starbucks' labor practices is its healthcare program. It's one of the few major retailers to provide health insurance to part-time employees. But that comes with a couple of caveats.

First, in order to qualify, workers must log 240 hours per quarter. However, there are no guaranteed hours and many baristas complain of sporadic, unpredictable scheduling. As a result, only 65 percent of Starbucks workers, including management, meet the 240-hour minimum. Many of the remaining workers (particularly part-timers) decide not to buy into the plan; rent payments take priority over premiums.

Consequently, the company's health insurance plan covers less than half (40.9 percent) of employees. As organizers like to point out, that's less than the oft-demonized Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., which covers 47 percent of its workers.

"It's just incredible hypocrisy on this core identity issue," says IWW organizer Daniel Gross. "It's absolutely misleading. It's taken a sub-par program and turned it into a marketing advantage through spin and PR."

Last week, Starbucks released the full list of 600-odd stores expected to close in the coming months, including 27 in Minnesota. Sixteen of the doomed shops sit in the Twin Cities metro.The closings will affect some 12,000 workers nationwide. On Monday, Forman's former co-workers at the Mall of America's Starbucks walked off the floor and issued a letter to management demanding "just treatment of all employees affected by Starbucks' closure of stores nationwide." With an economy seemingly in free-fall and job security plummeting, unionization—for good or ill—enjoys more appeal than it did 10 years ago.

"This will be the biggest fire they've had to put out in a while," says Forman. "The economy is getting worse, people can't get by and are having to work 14-hour days. Management's biggest tool has always been the threat of firing. People are starting to think maybe that's a risk worth taking."

Fellow Workers

As you might have heard a group of politicos (the Revolutionary Socialist Party) (recently split, we are informed, from the Democratic Socialist Party) have taken it upon themselves to expropriate without consultation or compensation, the title of our paper "Direct Action." This was the paper started by the IWW in world war one and brutally suppressed by the government then, restarted by the IWW in the late 1920's and published by the IWW in several editions from 1990.

In this publication of theirs, that they are calling Direct Action, the RSP make reference to the IWW in the past tense only. They make no reference whatsoever to the editions of Direct Action after 1990. This is particularly dishonest because I wrote to them before publication commenced reminding them of our existence and the fact that we maintain ownership of the title "Direct Action".

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One of the most commonly overlooked ethics of fair trade is transparency. We at JC are committed to it and in order to show this we have posted our Profit and Loss statements since 2002-- our first year of business.

To summarize the P&Ls, we have grown quickly and shown a slight loss or slight profit every year. Our accountant would call us a textbook "break even" company. We have shown small losses for the past two years, this year we are committed to turning that around. Thus far we are running at a slight profit for the year, so we'll see. The important thing for us-- as a worker cooperative-- is to provide a decent income stream to all people who work at our co-op as well as to the growers that we work with. In this we have been fairly successful.

The purpose of this exercise is to show you exactly what we are doing with our company. This is why we post our contracts with the growers we buy from as well as all of the transaction documentation for getting the coffee from the farmers to us. We will also soon have balance sheets on line as well as salary information for people working at JC.

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Mall Starbucks workers join union

July 21, 2008

by Matt McKinney, Star Tribune

A group of Starbucks employees at the Mall of America has joined a national union and called on the coffee company for better treatment of its workers following a company announcement this month that it would shutter some 600 stores nationwide, including 27 in Minnesota.

The laid off employees deserve a severance package and the option of a transfer to another location, said Erik Forman, a former Starbucks employee at the Mall of America. He said some employees of the mall location stopped working briefly on Monday to protest the closings; the group plans a press conference today.

Forman, who said he was laid off last week for union activities, said about half of the store's 13 employees have agreed to join the Industrial Workers of the World, which has helped Starbucks employees in New York and Chicago organize unions.

An e-mail sent to a Starbucks spokesperson on Monday evening was not immediately answered.

Mall of America Starbucks Baristas Walk Off Job, Protest Closures

Starbucks union plans protest of nationwide closures at MOA

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- Starbucks baristas at the Mall of America location walked off the job Monday and delivered a letter to management demanding “just treatment” of all employees affected by Starbucks' store closures nationwide.

The barista walkout comes days after Starbucks announce the closure of 600 stores nationwide, including 27 in Minnesota.

BARISTA DEMANDS

The baristas demanded a severance package of closure-affected workers, plus the option to transfer to other stores.

The Starbucks Workers Union says the company plans to give workers one month notice before laying them off with “a paltry two weeks' pay.” The union also says Starbucks will "insist some baristas transfer and will revoke severance pay if transfer offers are refused."

Starbucks pays baristas a wage of $7.60 per hour -- a rate above minimum wage, but below an amount baristas find satisfactory.

"With the skyrocketing cost of living, workers have no other choice than to stand up for improvements on the job,” former barista Erik Foreman said. “Even at Starbucks in the Mall of America, we can organize and fight!"

MINNESOTA MINIMUM WAGE

There are three minimum wages in effect in Minnesota: $5.25 an hour at businesses with gross yearly sales of less than $500,000; the federal minimum of $5.85 at businesses with sales between $500,000 and $625,000; and $6.15 for larger companies. Starting July 24, all employers with sales topping $500,000 must pay the new federal minimum of $6.55 an hour.

Union Link: www.StarbucksUnion.org