Sofía Martínez told La Opinión that never in her 30 years as a cleaning and maintenance employee had she suffered a retaliation like the one imposed on her by a San Diego company when she proposed that the employees request a collective contract.
“They forced me to work eight hours on my knees, with diluent chemicals live, undiluted, and without protection against those toxins,” he said, “and the next day they wanted me to do the same.”
Ms. Martinez had worked as a janitor at the San Diego County Administration Building for ten years and says that throughout that decade she had good working relationships.
But ever since, a few months ago, he proposed that the county government require companies that provide services to grant collective contracts, his employers have insisted on making his work unbearable.
His assignments became more and more difficult. At least three of his colleagues couldn’t take the pressure and were forced to resign. Mrs. Martínez had endured humiliation and provocative comments until she was forced to spend eight hours on her knees.
“The next day when I returned to work, they told me that I had to do the same thing throughout the shift,” the worker commented, “I told them to at least give me protection, because if two caps of chemicals have to be diluted in gallons of water because it’s so strong, imagine five gallons undiluted and breathing closely because you were on your knees.”
The chemical removers they use to clean public buildings are so strong that if they are used without gloves, the skin begins to come off the hands in a few hours, he said.
She added that because they did not provide her with a mask with filters or knee pads, she felt dizzy all the time, blood often came out of her nose, and although at the end of the day she asked the company to send her to a doctor for examination, they clearly ignored Your request.
When the next day “I told them that I was fine, that I was doing the job for them, but that at least they had to give me the right gloves and a good-quality mask to protect me, or I was going to get sick, that I already felt very dizzy,” said Doña Sofía.
–Ah, well, you must be seeing pink elephants like the ones in the union, right?
That was the response of the contractors, who, instead of providing equipment to Mrs. Sofía, issued a report of non-compliance with work, a sanction that Mrs. Martínez had not had in 30 years.
“And it’s not that I refused, it’s that it’s impossible to do the job that they made me do in retaliation, no one would put up with it,” said Doña Sofía, “I can’t imagine seeing them do that job for even ten minutes, much less eight hours consecutive days.
The Nova Comercial company did not immediately respond to requests from the press. The only explanation that he has given to the employees in his refusal to accept a collective contract is “that they have never worked with a union and never will.”
But that supposed custom that the company clings to provides it with enormous benefits.
For example, Nova has contracts for $27 million to clean the county administration building over five years, equivalent to about $15,000 a day, and most of his team of 22 workers at that facility have been making the bare minimum for 14, 15 years.
But the company has other similar businesses in public buildings in San Diego, such as the County Courthouse and Hall of Justice.
The company had already fired Mrs. Martinez and other workers, and had even resigned others when, on December 13, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the proposal that companies that offer services public buildings to grant collective contracts to their workers.
Outgoing Supervisors Chairman Nathan Fetcher said the approval was to “help protect more than 1,000 janitors, groundskeepers and security personnel who work at county facilities from wage theft, sexual harassment and other unfair practices.” ”.
However, those practices continued by the cleaning company Nova. The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) reported that “several workers have filed unfair labor practice (ULP) charges with the National Labor Relations Board, including retaliation, demotion, harassment, and termination.”
He also confirmed that some Nova workers “who spoke out against sweatshop working conditions were fired” after the San Diego Board of Supervisors approved the measure known as “radical pro-worker politics.”
David Huerta, the president of the SEIU union in the west of the country, declared for his part that the workers of the Nova company “have really been subjected to retaliatory measures, some workers have been fired and others have resigned as a result of the actions of the employer”.
The collective bargaining policy has been called the most progressive pro-worker policy in any California county to date.
This weekend groups of workers from that company began to protest in front of the San Diego County Administration Building to call a strike, and in less than 48 hours some unions already joined the demonstrations in solidarity.
The political leader of the SEIU union for the western part of the country, Christian Ramírez, told La Opinión that the workers are demanding the reinstatement of their dismissed colleagues and that collective contracts with the cleaning employees now be negotiated.
Ramírez lamented that the employees who resigned their positions also left their rights when leaving their jobs and little can be done to help them.
However, the conditions that led to their resignation are now part of the reasons that reinforce that workers need collective contracts.
Deferring employee groups outside the county government building demonstrate with banners and also chanted slogans.
“Let the rich clean up, we’re going on strike,” the workers chanted this Sunday.
According to county office records, there are about 1,080 service, maintenance, landscaping and other employees who work for its facilities and must benefit from the rule of protection through collective bargaining agreements with the companies that subcontract.