Buyback recyclers' support key to Curbside recyclers victory in labor dispute. IWW shops' solidarity wins demands
Submitted on Sat, 09/15/2007 - 5:12am
By Fellow Worker Bruce Valde.
By now the story of what happened when truck drivers and loaders at Berkeley’s Ecology Center “curbside” recycling program refused to work until their demands were met is the stuff of legend.
This report adds more information concerning the IWW recycling sorters at a company in the same block who stopped worked and marched in solidarity to a meeting of the Curbside drivers and loaders in the midst of the work stoppage, which lasted from 6 am until 1 pm on Monday, September 10th.
Workers from Community Conservation Centers marched into the Ecology Center trailer in support of their co-unionists. The 25 workers at the Buyback are members of the IWW. When informed that trucks would not roll and that the drivers/loaders were holding a meeting, the workers at the Buyback stopped work and held a solidarity / safety meeting of their own.
After learning more details about what was happening at the other end of the yard some one said, “lets go support those guys”. Twenty workers reached the door of the trailer just as Martin Bourque, executive director of the Ecology Center, who had recently arrived, was talking with the Curbside workers.
The arrival of the Buy Back crew put an end to Bourque’s speech, and had the unintended effect of bringing operations manager Daniel Maher back to the meeting. Maher had departed when Martin Bourque arrived to take “fire” from the crew.
This was fortuitous in that Maher had been rejecting Union demands all morning and the workers wanted to address their concerns when both Maher and Borque were there.
For the next half an hour, workers demands were discussed with management and by the time the Buy Back workers left, management agreed to return to routes that the Curbside crew wanted.
Three days later workers at the Buy Back agreed that solidarity is the key. “Let’s make solidarity and direct action a regular thing at Curbside and BuyBack.