19 minute read
Union Matters
Staten Island Amazon workers pause organizing effort
By STEPHON JOHNSON
Amsterdam News Staff
It had a spark when it started, but now it’s over.
Last week, Amazon workers on Staten Island withdrew their petition to unionize less than a few weeks before a hearing would show the amount of interest workers had in organizing. Organizers must submit signatures from at least 30% of the workers on staff to hold a hearing with the National Labor Relations Board. In this case, organizers had to acquire 30% of 5,500 workers at the Staten Island location.
The AmNews contacted the original organizers of the Staten Island campaign multiple times to no avail.
Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union head Stuart Appelbaum told the AmNews that this shouldn’t deter the first-time organizers from making another attempt. However, does the consistent turnover of Amazon employees render any organizing flawed and on shaky ground?
Appelbaum told the AmNews to look back several months ago at a successful campaign against the online retail giant.
“People all over the world, people like in Bessemer, Alabama, people in Staten Island, and people in Europe and elsewhere in the world are all complaining about the same sorts of things,” he said. “And that’s why there is high turnover at every Amazon warehouse.”
In June, workers at an Amazon fulfillment center in Bessemer, Alabama tried to organize to form a union and to collectively bargain so that they could ask for better wages, benefits, and work conditions. They accused Amazon of tampering with the voting process, which led to an eventual loss in the election. RWDSU officials then filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) challenging the results and accusing Amazon of violating parts of the National Labor Relations Act. In August, the NLRB confirmed that Amazon interfered with the election process, while the company denied any wrongdoing.
Another clash between those two will happen soon when workers vote for a second time. Amazon officials have already, according to Reuters,
made workers sit in on meetings, littered bathroom walls with antiunion propaganda and they have flown in staff from in the west coast to talk to workers.
Attempts by the AmNews to contact Amazon were unsuccessful.
Lynne Vincent, an assistant professor with industrial and labor relations at Syracuse University’s Whitman School of Management, said in an emailed statement that Amazon’s actions in Bessemer and on Staten Island are yet again pushing its workers to want their employer to make their situation more comfortable.
“Amazon is using their anti-union tactics that we have seen before— public comments about wanting to hear from employees (directly, rather than through a union), voicing skepticism that a union would have support from the employees, and circulating anti-union communications,” said Vincent. “It is a different warehouse, a different state, and a different set of employees. It is too early to know what will happen, but we are seeing the same trends.
“Employees are frustrated and want better working conditions and benefits,” Vincent continued. “Amazon is sticking with what has worked for them in the past. At this point, I am waiting and watching.”
According to a report by The New York Times, the employee turnover rate at Amazon is 150%.
Appelbaum told the AmNews that
the workers on Staten Island deserve praise and that the fight isn’t over. They have other places to look to for examples around the globe.
“It worked in Alabama and elsewhere, that people are fed up, and they don’t feel that they should be treated this way,” said Appelbaum. “And I think that everyone should be encouraged by seeing people standing up to Amazon, regardless of what’s the initial result.”
In a letter to shareholders earlier this year, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos promised everyone that he would make Amazon the planet’s “safest place to work.” According to workers on Staten Island, that hasn’t been the case.
No room for harassment and violence in our retail stores
Stuart Appelbaum
President, Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, Twitter: @sappelbaum. www.rwdsu.org
Retail sales in the U.S. are already surging as holiday shoppers are checking their lists and buying their gifts for the 2021 holiday season. It’s important that consumers are returning to stores this holiday season, but we are also concerned about an alarming uptick in harassment and abuse directed at retail workers, especially this year.
Retail workers in New York—including thousands of RWDSU members at stores including Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, H&M, Zara, Guitar Center, and more—are eager to welcome customers back into stores this holiday season. However, workers are experiencing increased aggression and poor treatment from stressed out shoppers.
It’s been a tough time for retail workers in the U.S. and across the globe. Besides the risks to the health of workers and their families that’s hung over retail during the entire pandemic, violence, abuse, and harassment on the job skyrocketed. Tensions rose as stores and governments instituted mask, social distancing, and other COVID safety protocols, and retail workers bore the brunt of customers’ anger, often fueled by misinformation and extreme political rhetoric. Workers were yelled at, spat upon, coughed on, and worse. Some workers have even been shot at—and some murdered—by irrational customers over mask and COVID restrictions.
This type of behavior toward retail workers needs to end, and can’t simply be shrugged off as “part of the job.” We owe it to these retail workers—who have courageously served us throughout the darkest days of the pandemic—to make this a stressfree holiday season. Even in the best of times, the holiday season is very stressful for workers at retail stores and supermarkets. Big crowds, irritable customers, hectic days and the need for workers themselves to take care of their own holiday obligations can all weigh heavily on workers’ shoulders this time of year. In 2021, however, with the pandemic still a part of our lives, this stress could be exponentially worse. All of this is aggravated by a shortage of goods caused by supply chain problems this holiday season. Retail workers can become the target of shoppers’ frustration when customers hear that coveted holiday items are stuck on shipping containers at sea and have been backordered for months, especially if they’ve gone to multiple stores only to go home empty-handed.
This holiday season, we need to treat retail workers with dignity and respect, and we must understand that our own stress and the problems we are experiencing shouldn’t be placed on the shoulders of working people. Workers are not to blame. Stores should provide security, safety protocols and training to handle problems that may arise. It’s a time to come together this holiday season and do everything we can to reduce stress and anxiety for each other, and especially retail workers. A little extra kindness and understanding will go a very long way this holiday season.
(Photo courtesy of mj0007 and deberarr via iStock)
Staten Island workers at Amazon quash organizing effort…for now.
Partnering to help create opportunities
Last year, Bank of America committed $1.25 billion over five years to advance racial equality and economic opportunity. To date, we’ve directly funded or invested one-third of this amount on top of long-standing efforts to make an impact in our communities and address society’s greatest challenges.
Here are some of the ways we’re working to make a difference: • Investing $300 million in 100 minority-owned and minority-led equity funds, including Harlem Capital and Zeal Capital Partners.
This will help diverse entrepreneurs and small business owners create more jobs, financial stability and growth.
• Investing $36 million in 21 Minority Depository Institutions (MDIs) and Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) banks, such as Ponce Bank, that support minority-owned businesses. This is in addition to approximately $100 million in deposits to MDIs and our existing CDFI portfolio of more than $2 billion, which helps build pathways to economic vitality in local markets.
• Providing funding and support through innovative programs and partnerships with community colleges, universities and nonprofits, including Baruch College, that offer training and credentialing programs connecting more people to high-wage, in-demand careers.
We’re doing this work in collaboration with community partners, business leaders, experts and academics across the public and private sectors to ensure that our investments are directed where they’re needed most. Together, we can help drive sustainable progress in New York City.
What would you like the power to do?®
José Tavarez President, Bank of America New York City
Learn more at bankofamerica.com/metroNY
A bold agenda for quality education for Eric Adams
By ZAKIYAH ANSARI and VANESSA LEUNG
Earlier this month, voters elected Eric Adams mayor of New York City. This historic moment cannot be understated, as Mayor-elect Adams will be our city’s second Black mayor. At the same time, Black leaders of government have had the burden of “fixing everything” on their shoulders. Mayor-elect Adams’ shoulders will also bear this burden. We are hopeful he will be more than a mayor who talks and doesn’t deliver.
After eight years of promises from a self proclaimed “progressive” administration to end the “tale of two cities,” we have seen how a lack of urgency, plans, and commitment from outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio has stifled the critical work of addressing racial inequities. The devastation of COVID-19 has impacted all aspects of our great city, and our public schools, particularly those serving low-income, Black, Brown and immigrant children, have felt the impacts of this devastation firsthand.
The Adams administration’s education success will be judged by the real commitments it makes to support our most marginalized students, including those who are Black, Latinx, immigrant, refugee, low-income, living in transitional housing, English Language Learners, LGBTQIA, and learning with disabilities, and how it prioritizes cultivating nurturing environments where they can thrive by following through and delivering outcomes.
For decades, we have worked together, slowly chipping away at long-entrenched, harmful policies and structures to push our public education system to adequately serve all of our students. The Alliance for Quality Education this year won a historic commitment from NYS to fully fund $4B in foundation aid to public schools. I (Zakiyah) was a parent volunteer when that fight began 20 years ago and currently serve as the advocacy director. I (Vanessa) am the co-executive director of the Coalition for American Children and Families (CACF), which advocates for equity and opportunity for those most marginalized across the diverse Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community, focusing on dismantling the damaging model minority myth. I am also the chair of the Panel for Education Policy, and a public school parent. We have stayed committed through administrations and chancellors, shifts in structures and priorities, and seen endeavors succeed, go wrong, or be set up to fail. For example, as members of the New York City Council’s Middle School Taskforce, we worked in collaboration with the NYC DOE and private funders and launched the Middle School Quality Initiative (MSQI), an instructional intervention for improving literacy levels in NYC middle schools. As a successful partnership between elected officials, the NYC DOE, and community leaders, this model should be replicated. As such, we refuse to be siloed in the fight to improve our education system—we are at our best when we are in community. Recently, we partnered as members of New Yorkers for Racially Just Public Schools (RJPS), a grassroots coalition working to ensure that city and state education budget and policy decisions regarding schooling are centered on racial and educational justice. Our collective is united on a set of core beliefs, grounded in empathy and our full humanity: every New York City student deserves an education that is high-quality, transformative, culturally responsive, and diverse, providing tools and opportunities for all students to equitably participate in democracy, enter the workforce, and ultimately reach their fullest potential.
RJPS previously released a broad and comprehen-
sive agenda for racially just schools, and now, we invite Mayor-elect Eric Adams and the next chancellor to consider our Bold Vision for Quality Education. Our vision coupled with the billions in pandemic relief dollars we received from the federal government can transform our schools.
We have the opportunity to build a public school system that puts the needs of students it has historically marginalized first in all decisions, defining their well-being and success as the measure of its strength. Indeed, we know our own children and grandchildren’s success in our public schools is inherently linked to the system’s success—and, crucially, the system cannot be deemed successful if it continues to neglect our most marginalized students.
As we move towards an Adams administration, we are ready to collaborate where there is alignment around his education goals, yet we remain committed and ready to hold this administration accountable alongside our allies: the way we have for decades past.
A season of exonerations!
While we are grateful in this holiday season for the number of Black men being exonerated for crimes they did not commit, it would be even better if they had received justice before having their lives irreparably disrupted, their youths forever erased.
There was always the belief that something was amiss in the convictions of the three men charged in the murder of Malcolm X (el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz), particularly after one of EDITORIAL them confessed and testified that the others had nothing to do with the assassination on Feb. 21, 1965 at the Audubon Ballroom. It has taken more than five decades for Muhammad Aziz and the late Khalil Islam to have their convictions exonerated, and even longer for four Black men in Groveland, Florida to have their convictions overturned.
In 1949, four Black men were accused of raping a white woman and that false accusation precipitated Klan attacks on the Black community and the murder of Ernest Thomas, one of the accused.
Much more needs to be said about both these exonerations as they arrive on the heels of Kyle Rittenhouse being found not guilty in killing two white men in Kenosha, Wisconsin and wounding another.
The incidents, separated by years, reveal once more the disparity in criminal justice when it comes to trying white men and Black men. The conviction of Aziz and Islam was a gross injustice that stemmed mainly from a failure to consider the prevailing evidence of innocence. In Groveland, the injustice was a consequence of the unforgiving Jim Crow system so clearly evident in southern parts of America back then—and today.
We may see another instance of systemic racism, the unchecked assaults of white men with guns as the trial in Brunswick, Georgia comes to an end. If an underage white boy can cross state lines armed with an automatic rifle, and charge selfdefense in the murder of two men, we would love to be wrong in our feelings that a similar acquittal will not occur in Georgia.
Yes, Georgia is on our mind and so is the spate of exonerations now occurring underscoring the injustices in the past.
Zakiyah Ansari is the advocacy director of the New York State Alliance for Quality Education (AQE). Vanessa Leung is the co-executive director of the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families (CACF) and chair of the Panel for Education Policy.
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not represent those of the New York Amsterdam News. We continue to publish a variety of viewpoints so that we may know the opinions of others that may differ from our own.
ARMSTRONG WILLIAMS
As we approach Thanksgiving, it’s customary to look back on the preceding year. It’s a chance to consider the good and the bad and identify where we can make improvements. There are no obstacles we can’t conquer if we have faith, love, and an open mind.
By every objective metric, the year 2021 has been a rollercoaster of a year. The year began similarly to the previous one, with the majority of the country remaining under lockdown. Then, with the certification of the 2020 election and the January 6 demonstrations, the culmination of four years of intensive politics reached its apex just after the year began. Indeed, Joe Biden was sworn in as president and assumed command of a country in shambles. One sincerely hoped he could make a good difference. Patience is essential, of course.
To many, it seems, their aspirations have been continually dashed by our new president. Millions of Americans’ pockets are being emptied by inflation, as prices for practically all necessary commodities have risen. Everything from pet food to gasoline has virtually doubled in price, but earnings have remained unchanged or, in some cases, even decreased. Meanwhile, we are facing a severe labor shortage, with millions of people simply refusing to work. People have discovered that it pays better to not work and instead collect government paychecks as a result of the extravagant stimulus packages that continued under Biden. Businesses are shutting as a result of a lack of staffing.
Others, on the other hand, see the new president as a role model, a beacon of hope, and the leader who is ready, willing, and able to mend our country and lift us out of the abyss. Whatever your political views, this Thanksgiving, like all other Thanksgivings, should be free of provocative political speech and incendiary political stories. Thanksgiving is a day for family and friends to gather together, not to stay apart. That is why, despite the suffering we have endured over the past two years, we should all be grateful just to be here with one another.
COVID-19 was the black swan event of 2020, and we hoped it would be finished soon as we approached 2021. Yet, despite Biden inheriting a vaccine that prevented nearly all deaths from COVID-19, in the waves of the pandemic a new issue arose; that issue is the opioid crisis. The continuous surge in drug overdose mortality among our young is arguably more concerning than the deaths from COVID-19. More than 100,000 Americans have died as a result of drug usage so far in 2021. This far-reaching epidemic affects millions, regardless of their race, religion, sex, or income class. Our children have become hooked on opioids; they change their brain’s chemical composition, and they place them on a path to death. Like COVID-19, many families will be missing loved ones over Thanksgiving this year, only this time it is youth rather than the elderly who are the victims.
Even more epidemics have arisen that have become cause for great concern. While our population is rapidly dwindling, our new neighbors, illegal immigrants from South America, are quickly replenishing our numbers. President Biden, who ran on a platform of open borders, has kept his word. Every month, tens of thousands of people enter the nation illegally, and our border agents have no means of stopping them. Those that are apprehended are allowed to remain in the country and are never required to appear in immigration court. Foreigners, as it turns out, are practically invading our nation, and we have no control over it.
As we near the end of the year, I urge my fellow Americans to work together to overcome partisanship and find a common ground. We should heed the words of our Founding Fathers when they declared the first Thanksgiving. Surely, the day was not designated for getting drunk and eating turkey. In truth, Thanksgiving was founded as a day to express gratitude to the Lord for the benefits He has bestowed upon us. I hope that internalizing that message allows us to see that there is more to life than fighting and dragging others down. Our mission is to improve the world around us so that future generations will have a better place to live. For this Thanksgiving, that is my prayer.
Armstrong Williams (@ARightSide) is the owner and manager of Howard Stirk Holdings I & II Broadcast Television Stations and the 2016 Multicultural Media Broadcast Owner of the Year. He is the author of “Reawakening Virtues.”
CHRISTINA GREER PH.D.
Many people have mixed feelings about Thanksgiving. Knowing the history of colonization, subjugation, and mass genocide committed by white settlers toward Native peoples across this country is an unsettling reality when compared to the narrative most of us were taught in elementary school—that of a happy and peace-filled dinner between pilgrims and Native people. We know the idea of Thanksgiving is nothing more than one of the many myths created by settlers to mythologize the founding of this country and disguise the truth and the glaring atrocities committed for hundreds of years.
Those realities exist and it is my hope that many of us reflect on the land in which we now live and work. It is also my hope that for those of us fortunate enough to gather around the table with family and friends, we are thankful for the sacrifices others have endured for us to be able to have this moment of reflection.
I try to use Thanksgiving as a time to really sit with my countless blessings. The most obvious area of thanksgiving is the abundance of food on the table and the laughter coming from almost every corner of the house. I know so many families will have an empty seat at the table this year, having lost loved ones to the coronavirus, the racist incarceration system, or some other ailment. I know some families may have had to scale back this year because their financial security is not what it used to be. Others may be celebrating Thanksgiving in a new locale due to housing insecurity or eviction.
I will be thinking of so many different families this year as I sit down with my family and friends. So many soup kitchens and pantries are stocked for Thanksgiving due to the generosity of strangers. However, many of these important institutions need people to show their generosity throughout the year.
One of the organizations I support on a monthly basis is Fuel the People. They are guided by the belief that, “Food is the fuel for the revolution; Fuel The People works to provide nourishment to protestors on the front lines, support local Black and POC-owned restaurants and businesses, and donate to local organizations who work tirelessly to support Black liberation. The fight for liberation and justice goes beyond protests, and we must remember that Black joy and prosperity are also worth fighting for.”
There are so many organizations doing the work to provide meals and solidarity to people in need. I hope this holiday season as you take stock of your many blessings, large and small, you remember to support the many organizations doing the work year round.
Happy Thanksgiving to all of our readers and thank you for being a part of my extended Amsterdam News family. Wishing you and yours a safe holiday season.
Christina Greer, Ph.D., is an associate professor at Fordham University, the author of “Black Ethnics: Race, Immigration, and the Pursuit of the American Dream,” and the co-host of the podcast FAQ-NYC.
Wishing you a Happy Thanksgiving
